>Yeah, ok, I' know could just hop on over to google.
No problem, I'm not one of those obnoxious twits that post a link to lmgtfy.com in response to a question.
The fact is, I don't think us geeks will ever have it as good as with the N900. The stuff I listed above is just things that would be appealing for a N900 alternative in a Microsoftized Nokia world.
And I hate the fact that we lost a great Debian-based platform with Maemo (Meego is RPM-based).
"What we've actually been asked to do by Larry and Sergey is to investigate what technology alternatives exist to Java for Android and Chrome," the Google executive wrote, referring to founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. "We've been over a hundred of these and think they all suck. We conclude that we need to negotiate a license for Java.
Since Android was going to to be a unifying OS for all manufacturers, dropping J2ME, $100 million is an eminently reasonable figure for licensing Java to Google.
>I am inclined to think that if Oracle wins this, then there are going to be a lot of other places that are going to end being afraid of utilizing Java in the future
And which ones would those be? Mobile and embedded apps? The licensing scheme for Java was always that the desktop is free, embedded/mobile is not.
What that means is your average 2-man programming shop can come up with nifty Java CRUD apps for free. Your average multinational corp that wants to produce 100,000 phones has to pay a fee.
>Did anybody other than Google put in the effort to create Android and deserve the rewards for doing so?
You just blew my mind with this one.
Why does Google deserve the rewards for Android, but Sun doesn't deserve the rewards for Java? Totally leaving aside all legalistic arguments Google were scumbags for giving a bit fat $zero to Sun.
Why do I imagine post-doc geeks wearing black sitting around in a darkened room in a "situation room" with huge screens looking at live monitoring logs?
I'd go the other way. Even if Google didn't have a legal obligation to pay Sun, I'd say that morally it would have been the right thing to do.
I mean come on, we're not talking about a 2-man garage startup being crushed by Sun Microsystems.
The overage sketch is Sun creates Java, nurtures the Java ecosystem, including the millions of developers who are automatically Android developers now, and Google comes along and doesn't feel like sending any money Sun's way.
So they do some acrobatics and pretend there's no Java in Android.
Google's responsible for twisting the knife into Sun: Before Android, Java MIDP was considered somewhat necessary for a phone (to run mobile Java apps). Android cemented the death of mobile Java apps, which was unfortunate, because a lot of those things worked on a huge number of platforms. Anyway, that resulted in revenue loss for Sun.
Oracle is definitely justified in asking for money. But not billions. Best scenario: Google pays at least $100 mil, maybe double that for a worldwide license, including for Android licensees.
Every year since the IBM PC, computer prices have been falling (or performance increasing, same thing).
Has that caused a problem? Most people think it's great.
Now imagine that for every sector of the economy.
And falling computer prices doesn't mean computer companies going out of business. Apple, M$, HP, Dell seem to be fine, although MidWest and some others went away.
A contract for $100 isn't a problem for you the receiver. That $100 will buy more goods and services in a constantly more productive economy. It's not really that much of a problem for the giver, either. First of all, if you want to buy something, buy it now. The reason companies make long term contracts in an economy where prices are increasing is to "lock in" the current price. Why do that if it'll be cheaper off-the-shelf next month?
Second, negotiations for a computer contract:
Supplier: I'll sell you 10 computers a month for 10 months at $1000 per computer. Vendor: But the price of computers has been falling every year. So I'll give $1000 per computer the first month, $999 the second month, $998 the third month. Supplier: OK.
>we take a small amount of this money and put it into funding projects like the SENS project and the Mprize and open cures projects.
What's the point?
I can understand the emotional appeal of reducing infant mortality, and various cancers that kill people "before their time".
But extending the life of Granpa Joe out a century?
Not to mention the fact that your listed programs project themselves to be a benevolent enterprise, but exactly what would be benevolent about permanently increasing the world population, without the current automatic reduction?
Not only that, but with aging ruled out as a cause of death, that would make any other deaths seem much more tragic. You'd get even more "saving lives" rhetoric than now, and helmets required for even walking around.
And here I was looking forward to finding out what *exactly* the erstwhile Sun Microsystems was thinking when it ran a fine tech company into the ground.
India's TFR is declining as well. Granted population continued to increase due to previous high TFRs, but it also seems headed toward 2 or below.
"The government said that the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) across the country had declined to 2.6 in 2008 from 2.9 in 2005." From one of the first hits on Google.
That's a huge decrease in just a few years. 0.3 points in 3 years. The same link says half the Indian states are at replacement level (2.1).
I think the HOA mentality is nicely summed up in the selection of points you chose to bring up:
1) pink paint 2) crack
The idea that these two are somehow on the same plane of annoyance is weird. I don't know if you were taking pink paint to be a axiomatic cultural abhorrence and using to to lend credence to #2, or taking crack to be a universal abhorrence and using to support the HOA war on non-beige paint.
Secondly, drugs are illegal anyway. HOAs bind home-owners, not people standing around and possibly selling drugs. Oh, you say loitering is illegal in your city? Well, it's illegal anyway, nothing to do with HOAs.
No, I realize the packets weren't being recorded (yet).
But still, for a 1Mbs connection, just recording src, dest, size and time is a huge amount of space compared to just incrementing "bytes downloaded/uploaded" counters.
Slashdot Mirror
>Yeah, ok, I' know could just hop on over to google.
No problem, I'm not one of those obnoxious twits that post a link to lmgtfy.com in response to a question.
The fact is, I don't think us geeks will ever have it as good as with the N900. The stuff I listed above is just things that would be appealing for a N900 alternative in a Microsoftized Nokia world.
And I hate the fact that we lost a great Debian-based platform with Maemo (Meego is RPM-based).
Btw, somebody got Xorg and OpenOffice to run on Pre.
1. Konami code activates developer mode (i.e., root or jailbroken). No muss, no fuss.
2. The "card" metaphor to represent running apps. Slide to switch, throw away to kill.
3. It's Linux, and mostly open source. (Shares that with Android.)
3b. Not M$, not Apple, for people that care (shares that with Android).
4. Apps are in HTML/Javascript. Easy. Or C++ (harder but faster to run)
5. Touch to move stuff between Pre and TouchPad.
6. Looks nice. Fonts, layout, icons, etc.
7. The homebrew community
Wake me up when /. posts a non-NYT ad prompting me to log in.
And when, if talking about a web-based political party, actually gives the hyperlink for it.
>Java is a great technology, but Sun was unable to build a viable business around it, and Oracle acquired Sun largely for litigation potential.
Well, it was getting $100 million per year for mobile Java, which also subsidized desktop and server Java development.
Until Google came around and had all the mobile manufacturers transition to Android, and didn't pay Sun a cent.
That's what this trial is about.
From Andy Rubin, father of Android:
No, Sun made upwards of $100 million per year licensing Java to the mobile phone industry.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20013549-264.html
Java was free on the desktop, but not on mobile.
Since Android was going to to be a unifying OS for all manufacturers, dropping J2ME, $100 million is an eminently reasonable figure for licensing Java to Google.
>I am inclined to think that if Oracle wins this, then there are going to be a lot of other places that are going to end being afraid of utilizing Java in the future
And which ones would those be? Mobile and embedded apps? The licensing scheme for Java was always that the desktop is free, embedded/mobile is not.
What that means is your average 2-man programming shop can come up with nifty Java CRUD apps for free. Your average multinational corp that wants to produce 100,000 phones has to pay a fee.
Read the license, also see here.
>Did anybody other than Google put in the effort to create Android and deserve the rewards for doing so?
You just blew my mind with this one.
Why does Google deserve the rewards for Android, but Sun doesn't deserve the rewards for Java? Totally leaving aside all legalistic arguments Google were scumbags for giving a bit fat $zero to Sun.
>Most large buildings don't use central heating for a reason, they've pretty much all got heat exchangers, hydronic pumps
Isn't hydronic central? It's certainly not a space heater.
You know it's coming: it'll be an attachment for the iPhone. (not an iPhan)
Don't we already have one?
The nerdily-named Computer Emergency Response Team
http://www.cert.org/
Why do I imagine post-doc geeks wearing black sitting around in a darkened room in a "situation room" with huge screens looking at live monitoring logs?
And also asking each other, "Doctor, do you concur?"
>He asks for a Sun executive not on Oracle's payroll
But does that standard also apply to Google?
By rights, Google should have to produce ex-Googlers who will testify that they are correct, right?
Uh, well, morally?
I'd go the other way. Even if Google didn't have a legal obligation to pay Sun, I'd say that morally it would have been the right thing to do.
I mean come on, we're not talking about a 2-man garage startup being crushed by Sun Microsystems.
The overage sketch is Sun creates Java, nurtures the Java ecosystem, including the millions of developers who are automatically Android developers now, and Google comes along and doesn't feel like sending any money Sun's way.
So they do some acrobatics and pretend there's no Java in Android.
Google's responsible for twisting the knife into Sun: Before Android, Java MIDP was considered somewhat necessary for a phone (to run mobile Java apps). Android cemented the death of mobile Java apps, which was unfortunate, because a lot of those things worked on a huge number of platforms. Anyway, that resulted in revenue loss for Sun.
Oracle is definitely justified in asking for money. But not billions. Best scenario: Google pays at least $100 mil, maybe double that for a worldwide license, including for Android licensees.
What are the alternatives?
Seems like Cisco is in the position IBM used to be in; Nobody ever got fired for buying IBM.
So, if you're a small/medium business with a good amount of money coming in, you can buy Cisco knowing that it can scale up to the highest levels.
So what would be a good 2nd choice?
Every year since the IBM PC, computer prices have been falling (or performance increasing, same thing).
Has that caused a problem? Most people think it's great.
Now imagine that for every sector of the economy.
And falling computer prices doesn't mean computer companies going out of business. Apple, M$, HP, Dell seem to be fine, although MidWest and some others went away.
A contract for $100 isn't a problem for you the receiver. That $100 will buy more goods and services in a constantly more productive economy. It's not really that much of a problem for the giver, either. First of all, if you want to buy something, buy it now. The reason companies make long term contracts in an economy where prices are increasing is to "lock in" the current price. Why do that if it'll be cheaper off-the-shelf next month?
Second, negotiations for a computer contract:
Linux?
You didn't catch the Slashdot story on the Army issuing iPhones to soldiers, did you? Everybody's enamored of the things.
Give me a screen that can be mounted, placed, or moved up high so I don't have to bend my neck looking downwards at the screen.
Oh, and the keyboard should be detachable, so it can be placed at the proper height for a keyboard (a few inches below normal desk height).
And a real mouse, also at keyboard level, not desk level.
And the screen should either be portrait, or it should be huge.
I think after I'm done, I'd end up with a desktop.
>we take a small amount of this money and put it into funding projects like the SENS project and the Mprize and open cures projects.
What's the point?
I can understand the emotional appeal of reducing infant mortality, and various cancers that kill people "before their time".
But extending the life of Granpa Joe out a century?
Not to mention the fact that your listed programs project themselves to be a benevolent enterprise, but exactly what would be benevolent about permanently increasing the world population, without the current automatic reduction?
Not only that, but with aging ruled out as a cause of death, that would make any other deaths seem much more tragic. You'd get even more "saving lives" rhetoric than now, and helmets required for even walking around.
And here I was looking forward to finding out what *exactly* the erstwhile Sun Microsystems was thinking when it ran a fine tech company into the ground.
India's TFR is declining as well. Granted population continued to increase due to previous high TFRs, but it also seems headed toward 2 or below.
"The government said that the Total Fertility Rate (TFR) across the country had declined to 2.6 in 2008 from 2.9 in 2005." From one of the first hits on Google.
That's a huge decrease in just a few years. 0.3 points in 3 years. The same link says half the Indian states are at replacement level (2.1).
Also from the 1st Google SERP, 7 Indian states are below replacement level.
How does this work with the other environmental exhortation to put solar panels on your roof?
Note: I'm a fan of solar.
But the two (white roofs and solar panels) seem to be mutually contradictory.
I think the HOA mentality is nicely summed up in the selection of points you chose to bring up:
1) pink paint
2) crack
The idea that these two are somehow on the same plane of annoyance is weird. I don't know if you were taking pink paint to be a axiomatic cultural abhorrence and using to to lend credence to #2, or taking crack to be a universal abhorrence and using to support the HOA war on non-beige paint.
Secondly, drugs are illegal anyway. HOAs bind home-owners, not people standing around and possibly selling drugs. Oh, you say loitering is illegal in your city? Well, it's illegal anyway, nothing to do with HOAs.
Yeah, the "neighbor from hell" is mostly of people's own making. I.e., in their own minds.
Granted, if someone's making a ruckus, you can call the police.
Other that that? Mind your own business.
Don't like the color of their paint? The problem is in your head.
Given decreases in TFR, it's possible the world will experience a population decline this century.
The total fertility rate is below replacement level for many countries of the world. The main exception is sub-Saharan Africa.
Most of the Anglo- and Eurosphere is in decline. The US is in decline natively, and only growing due to immigration.
No, I realize the packets weren't being recorded (yet).
But still, for a 1Mbs connection, just recording src, dest, size and time is a huge amount of space compared to just incrementing "bytes downloaded/uploaded" counters.