Another approach I would like to see:
- DisplayPort
- DisplayPort/Secure
The idea being that anyone could implement the basic version without the support for encryption. The differing names would also avoid confusion caused by version numbers. Heck I work in the software industry and version numbers don't always describe the difference, so I doubt the layman would understand it any more. By having two differing versions it would also allow the market to decide which one they really want, as opposed to big movie companies.
Is it still true that fiber costs more than copper? Considering that copper's price has long been at the point where thieves have been stealing copper plating off church roofs, that is a shocking statement of the relative cost of fiber-optics
The cabling is not the only thing that needs to be taken into account. Think of optic network cards, switches and routers, since none of the come cheaply.
GSM systems using SIM cards were highly advantageous in allowing users to keep a single (expensive) phone and to purchase multiple SIM cards in different countries if they were moving around Europe.
The SIM card provides a supplementary advantage, in that when you change phone you just swap out the SIM card. With CDMA you have to call the support desk if you wish to change phones. Other than cost, convenience is big factor that drives any market. Any time you call the support desk of any corporation you often made to face the dark side of the company, so by being able to swap out the SIM card without having to ask permission helps you forget that there is this dark side.
GSM G3 supports CDMA (as in the encoding method, not as in Qualcomm CDMA), so there coverage area in GSM vs CDMA becomes moot. As to why GSM was developed in the first place you need to understand the history of cell phone networks in Europe. The story I have always been told is that with the old analogue networks you were faced with incompatibilities between networks and the inability to roam. GSM was devised as way of avoiding this issue in the digital era. In doing so this made the life of everybody simpler, since it is always much cheaper to develop a lot of the same thing, than something of everything.
What does the 40Gb standard have that the 100Gb standard doesn't cover?
In one word: cost. The 100Gb connection is limited to fibre optics, whereas the slower connection support copper. Fibre optics are still more expensive than copper. It should also be noted that backbones deal with more traffic than non-backbone networks. Think of the difference between inter-city high ways and local back streets and you should get the picture.
they also need to ensure that third parties don't break the human interface guidelines
Why? They've never even bothered to keep them themselves, so why should they care what third-parties do?
Yup, this is certainly a fair point and one that many people are pissed about. Apparently Apple is meant to be rectifying this in 10.5, but we'll see when it comes out.
How could they be caught off guard? 90%+ of the operating systems in the smartphone/pda phone market have SDKs. They obviously did a little poking around in the market before deciding to make the thing...and if it really is based on OSX, it shouldn't have been terribly difficult to provide one.
As you say I doubt very much they were caught off guard. Other phone do have SDKs and such, but some of them also suffer from reduced stability because of them. I can't say whether Apple will ever release an SDK, but if they do they need to ensure that "foreign code" won't affect the system's stability and they also need to ensure that third parties don't break the human interface guidelines. Heck, I would just be happy for J2ME support.
Apple is pretty much driving this one now. I think this quote from TFA is telling, "its improvements had become difficult to move back into KHTML"
You are missing some of the context. WebKit is being heavily developed and is receiving contributions from many source, though what is most notable is the fact that WebKit has an abstraction layer, whereas KHTML does not. This abstraction layer allows WebKit to be adapted to many underlying architectures and this is why Webkit is getting the attention. Because of the original license nothing is stopping the KHTML developers from taking the WebKit source and making a fork (KHTML -> Webkit -> KHTML NG), but while everyone is benefiting there is little need to do this.
What is also interesting are some of the players that are contributing to WebKit, since there are big corporations in there too, including Adobe and Nokia. There are of course many unaffiliated developers that should not be forgotten, of course.
This is a useless comparison. Vista will grow in share as there are bazillions of consumers that are running older versions of Windows and have a compulsion to "upgrade". Mac OSX doesnt.
In other news more Mac users upgraded from MacOS 9 to MacOS X, while Windows users didn't bother.
Looking for a Wii is like looking for a girlfriend: you will find one when you aren't looking. My experience has been that I have been popping into stores every once in a while and always being told that thy have none in stock and to check back frequently. The other day I walked into Futureshop, here in Canada, to buy a phone and didn't find one I wanted and on the way out decided to check when the next batch of Wiis were to be in stock. The sales guy told me that he happened to have two in stock, so I bought one there and then - I wasn't going to miss that opportunity.
Nintendo fans are like Apple fans. They assume that their favorite company comes up with every concept they market. For instance, people who think that the browser on the iPhone is something wonderful and new have never seen Opera Mini.
Coming up with an original idea is not that all the counts. Knowing how to package that idea in a format that appeals to the market counts just as much. You could ask the queation how original are original concepts, since few concepts a truly original and are simply improvements on what has gone before.
My issue with the series is the price and format of the seasons on DVD. It is more expensive than Star Trek, which is saying something, and also grouped in a strange format (half seasons). I really want to support the series by buying the DVDs, but not at the prices I see in my local DVD store. For me SG1 is an example of a TV series using an easy to understand format and approachable pricing.
Too many companies nowadays are taking advantage of the vast amount of population that pay money for a service that they don't completely understand. How many people actually know what all of those surcharges on their cellular/telephone/isp bills are for? I hope this ruling occurs eventually in New York as well.
This is why I believe companies should be required to show 'total costs' in any marketing and documentation. Total costs would be described as what the customer pays at the end of the month if they don't knowingly opt-in to extras or stay within the bounds of the base package. Extras whether they are roaming, extra functionality and on should also be described in a manner where the customer does not need a degree to understand. For example:
- base fee, including 200 minutes: $20 (all taxes, and made up taxes are included in this figure)
- additional per minutes charge $0.10, I used 10 extra
- roaming charge per minute $0.20, for area X, I used 0
- total fee would be $21.00 Easy to calculate, easy to discuss. If the companies billing systems are so complicated that even your support can't understand, then there is an issue.
It's because many in the slashdot crowd believe in standing on the shoulder's of giants to make their own works. (which can't be done with the current copyright).
Ironically Disney did just that. Most of his works are actually based on classic stories. If copyright was like anything it is today, Disney would have unlikely made some of his greatest works, especially since some of them pushed him to near bankruptcy and would have therefore been unable to pay the necessary licensing fees.
Just curious what sort of implications this will have on companies, such as Apple, who use Samba in their commercial software? Is anything that Apple doing now with Samba rendered incompatible, license wise?
This is to me the downside of using open source code in one of your projects - at any time your ability to use future versions with their bug fixes, security fixes, etc. may go away.
What is the legality of forks based on code prior to the purchase date?
...while Nintendo is pretty much only in the gaming market.
They might be, but what they get right is their focus. Although Nintendo hasn't always got things right, they are the only console maker that has been there from the beginning and it still here. Sony and Microsoft are new comers and the other companies who were there at the beginning are either gone or only developing software. While the PS3 has a lot of potential, which it might still fulfill, it is trying to be too much a jack of all trades and not really focusing - I would rather have a great gaming system that his half-assed at everything else, than not really knowing what it is.
BTW There might be some of you who mention that Nintendo has also got non-gaming features in the Wii, but these are currently fairly basic and aren't what is getting the focus. Yes it has Opera, a weather channel and a news channel, but I feel that they aren't what are being used to sell the console, but instead are treated as after-thoughts, which get development focus after the game aspect is made a success.
The problem is that specific models are designed so that, even if you could unlock them, certain features will only work with a specific carrier. Even if you could buy an unlocked iPhone for example, most of its features are only going to work with AT&T.
That may be true to a certain extent, but not totally true. For example the inability to install J2ME apps straight from your computer and the inability to use Bluetooth are examples of elements that are limitations that are imposed limitations and not technology limitations. There are some features that are actually provided by the network and can be added to any phone. For example when I traveled to New Zealand I had got my cellphone unlocked in Singapore and was using a Vodaphone pay as you go SIM. I suddenly found that you get a special Vodaphone sub menu with a whole bunch of extras.
In many ways I support the move by the FCC, since it would help change the business method of cell phone carriers. It would also highlight the limitations of any given carrier, instead of making it seem to be the limitations of the cell phone. Sure it would mean that cell phone carriers would have to compete on both wireless packages and wireless phone prices, but if that helps drive the market then even better. In fact having the cell phone manufacturers play a more active role in the support of their phones would also be a welcome change, since delegating this to the carriers is usually just asking for trouble.
3. It seems to me like a flawed rating anyway, _especially_ coming from a usability expert. Google's search is a tool. Being able to just do what you needed done, quickly and with a minimum of useless fluff, is what a lot of us would call a good tool.
My observations are that people spend more time on a single page because:
- the site is useful, so you are actually doing stuff there (good)
- the site is damn difficult to navigate that you are spending time hunting down stuff (bad)
- the whole site is in Flash (argh X(, bad)
This rating metric almost feels like a pitch to encourage portal type design and bad site design (please don't mention some big database company - you know there if you have been there). Sure good site design does encourage people to stay, but the nature of the site is just as important when interpreting this metric.
I find that 80 columns is a good reference point, since you know that even on the worst equipment the data is visible. If you want to be smart and support larger column counts then just use VT100 codes to find out the number of columns available and adjust accordingly. If you don't want to work it out yourself and are on a Unix type system, then use libcurses.
Slashdot Mirror
Another approach I would like to see:
- DisplayPort
- DisplayPort/Secure
The idea being that anyone could implement the basic version without the support for encryption. The differing names would also avoid confusion caused by version numbers. Heck I work in the software industry and version numbers don't always describe the difference, so I doubt the layman would understand it any more. By having two differing versions it would also allow the market to decide which one they really want, as opposed to big movie companies.
I am neither a number or a named individual. Fear my anonymity. f0x 4r3 10s3rs ;)
Damn, too fast to post. Damn this is what you call an unmasked AC - oh well.
I am neither a number or a named individual. Fear my anonymity. f0x 4r3 10s3rs ;)
Is it still true that fiber costs more than copper? Considering that copper's price has long been at the point where thieves have been stealing copper plating off church roofs, that is a shocking statement of the relative cost of fiber-optics
The cabling is not the only thing that needs to be taken into account. Think of optic network cards, switches and routers, since none of the come cheaply.
GSM systems using SIM cards were highly advantageous in allowing users to keep a single (expensive) phone and to purchase multiple SIM cards in different countries if they were moving around Europe.
g sm/history.html
The SIM card provides a supplementary advantage, in that when you change phone you just swap out the SIM card. With CDMA you have to call the support desk if you wish to change phones. Other than cost, convenience is big factor that drives any market. Any time you call the support desk of any corporation you often made to face the dark side of the company, so by being able to swap out the SIM card without having to ask permission helps you forget that there is this dark side.
GSM G3 supports CDMA (as in the encoding method, not as in Qualcomm CDMA), so there coverage area in GSM vs CDMA becomes moot. As to why GSM was developed in the first place you need to understand the history of cell phone networks in Europe. The story I have always been told is that with the old analogue networks you were faced with incompatibilities between networks and the inability to roam. GSM was devised as way of avoiding this issue in the digital era. In doing so this made the life of everybody simpler, since it is always much cheaper to develop a lot of the same thing, than something of everything.
While there are a lot of takes on the history of GSM, this one seems to explain things well: http://www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/t.pagtzis/wireless/
What does the 40Gb standard have that the 100Gb standard doesn't cover?
In one word: cost. The 100Gb connection is limited to fibre optics, whereas the slower connection support copper. Fibre optics are still more expensive than copper. It should also be noted that backbones deal with more traffic than non-backbone networks. Think of the difference between inter-city high ways and local back streets and you should get the picture.
they also need to ensure that third parties don't break the human interface guidelines
Why? They've never even bothered to keep them themselves, so why should they care what third-parties do?
Yup, this is certainly a fair point and one that many people are pissed about. Apparently Apple is meant to be rectifying this in 10.5, but we'll see when it comes out.
How could they be caught off guard? 90%+ of the operating systems in the smartphone/pda phone market have SDKs. They obviously did a little poking around in the market before deciding to make the thing...and if it really is based on OSX, it shouldn't have been terribly difficult to provide one.
As you say I doubt very much they were caught off guard. Other phone do have SDKs and such, but some of them also suffer from reduced stability because of them. I can't say whether Apple will ever release an SDK, but if they do they need to ensure that "foreign code" won't affect the system's stability and they also need to ensure that third parties don't break the human interface guidelines. Heck, I would just be happy for J2ME support.
I believe you mean KHTML and WebKit will be *spooning* soon!
;)
I suppose you did have to reference the karma Sutra
Apple is pretty much driving this one now. I think this quote from TFA is telling, "its improvements had become difficult to move back into KHTML"
You are missing some of the context. WebKit is being heavily developed and is receiving contributions from many source, though what is most notable is the fact that WebKit has an abstraction layer, whereas KHTML does not. This abstraction layer allows WebKit to be adapted to many underlying architectures and this is why Webkit is getting the attention. Because of the original license nothing is stopping the KHTML developers from taking the WebKit source and making a fork (KHTML -> Webkit -> KHTML NG), but while everyone is benefiting there is little need to do this.
What is also interesting are some of the players that are contributing to WebKit, since there are big corporations in there too, including Adobe and Nokia. There are of course many unaffiliated developers that should not be forgotten, of course.
This is a useless comparison. Vista will grow in share as there are bazillions of consumers that are running older versions of Windows and have a compulsion to "upgrade". Mac OSX doesnt.
In other news more Mac users upgraded from MacOS 9 to MacOS X, while Windows users didn't bother.
Mine's just a little tougher: 12345. -- oops did I just say that.
Well maybe its named after this film: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114369/
Looking for a Wii is like looking for a girlfriend: you will find one when you aren't looking. My experience has been that I have been popping into stores every once in a while and always being told that thy have none in stock and to check back frequently. The other day I walked into Futureshop, here in Canada, to buy a phone and didn't find one I wanted and on the way out decided to check when the next batch of Wiis were to be in stock. The sales guy told me that he happened to have two in stock, so I bought one there and then - I wasn't going to miss that opportunity.
Nintendo fans are like Apple fans. They assume that their favorite company comes up with every concept they market. For instance, people who think that the browser on the iPhone is something wonderful and new have never seen Opera Mini.
Coming up with an original idea is not that all the counts. Knowing how to package that idea in a format that appeals to the market counts just as much. You could ask the queation how original are original concepts, since few concepts a truly original and are simply improvements on what has gone before.
My issue with the series is the price and format of the seasons on DVD. It is more expensive than Star Trek, which is saying something, and also grouped in a strange format (half seasons). I really want to support the series by buying the DVDs, but not at the prices I see in my local DVD store. For me SG1 is an example of a TV series using an easy to understand format and approachable pricing.
3 290317?initialSearch=1&url=search-alias%3Daps&fiel d-keywords=farscape&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go
See here for Amazon.ca pricing:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/104-2424159-
Call me paranoid, but why do you allow the iPhone into the companys WLAN?
If the users include those in charge of the interests of the company, then you allow it.
Too many companies nowadays are taking advantage of the vast amount of population that pay money for a service that they don't completely understand. How many people actually know what all of those surcharges on their cellular/telephone/isp bills are for? I hope this ruling occurs eventually in New York as well.
This is why I believe companies should be required to show 'total costs' in any marketing and documentation. Total costs would be described as what the customer pays at the end of the month if they don't knowingly opt-in to extras or stay within the bounds of the base package. Extras whether they are roaming, extra functionality and on should also be described in a manner where the customer does not need a degree to understand. For example:
- base fee, including 200 minutes: $20 (all taxes, and made up taxes are included in this figure)
- additional per minutes charge $0.10, I used 10 extra
- roaming charge per minute $0.20, for area X, I used 0
- total fee would be $21.00
Easy to calculate, easy to discuss. If the companies billing systems are so complicated that even your support can't understand, then there is an issue.
It's because many in the slashdot crowd believe in standing on the shoulder's of giants to make their own works. (which can't be done with the current copyright).
Ironically Disney did just that. Most of his works are actually based on classic stories. If copyright was like anything it is today, Disney would have unlikely made some of his greatest works, especially since some of them pushed him to near bankruptcy and would have therefore been unable to pay the necessary licensing fees.
Just curious what sort of implications this will have on companies, such as Apple, who use Samba in their commercial software? Is anything that Apple doing now with Samba rendered incompatible, license wise?
This is to me the downside of using open source code in one of your projects - at any time your ability to use future versions with their bug fixes, security fixes, etc. may go away.
What is the legality of forks based on code prior to the purchase date?
...while Nintendo is pretty much only in the gaming market.
They might be, but what they get right is their focus. Although Nintendo hasn't always got things right, they are the only console maker that has been there from the beginning and it still here. Sony and Microsoft are new comers and the other companies who were there at the beginning are either gone or only developing software. While the PS3 has a lot of potential, which it might still fulfill, it is trying to be too much a jack of all trades and not really focusing - I would rather have a great gaming system that his half-assed at everything else, than not really knowing what it is.
BTW There might be some of you who mention that Nintendo has also got non-gaming features in the Wii, but these are currently fairly basic and aren't what is getting the focus. Yes it has Opera, a weather channel and a news channel, but I feel that they aren't what are being used to sell the console, but instead are treated as after-thoughts, which get development focus after the game aspect is made a success.
The problem is that specific models are designed so that, even if you could unlock them, certain features will only work with a specific carrier. Even if you could buy an unlocked iPhone for example, most of its features are only going to work with AT&T.
That may be true to a certain extent, but not totally true. For example the inability to install J2ME apps straight from your computer and the inability to use Bluetooth are examples of elements that are limitations that are imposed limitations and not technology limitations. There are some features that are actually provided by the network and can be added to any phone. For example when I traveled to New Zealand I had got my cellphone unlocked in Singapore and was using a Vodaphone pay as you go SIM. I suddenly found that you get a special Vodaphone sub menu with a whole bunch of extras.
In many ways I support the move by the FCC, since it would help change the business method of cell phone carriers. It would also highlight the limitations of any given carrier, instead of making it seem to be the limitations of the cell phone. Sure it would mean that cell phone carriers would have to compete on both wireless packages and wireless phone prices, but if that helps drive the market then even better. In fact having the cell phone manufacturers play a more active role in the support of their phones would also be a welcome change, since delegating this to the carriers is usually just asking for trouble.
3. It seems to me like a flawed rating anyway, _especially_ coming from a usability expert. Google's search is a tool. Being able to just do what you needed done, quickly and with a minimum of useless fluff, is what a lot of us would call a good tool.
My observations are that people spend more time on a single page because:
- the site is useful, so you are actually doing stuff there (good)
- the site is damn difficult to navigate that you are spending time hunting down stuff (bad)
- the whole site is in Flash (argh X(, bad)
This rating metric almost feels like a pitch to encourage portal type design and bad site design (please don't mention some big database company - you know there if you have been there). Sure good site design does encourage people to stay, but the nature of the site is just as important when interpreting this metric.
I find that 80 columns is a good reference point, since you know that even on the worst equipment the data is visible. If you want to be smart and support larger column counts then just use VT100 codes to find out the number of columns available and adjust accordingly. If you don't want to work it out yourself and are on a Unix type system, then use libcurses.