For the most part, there's no formal QA testing that goes on for OSS projects. However, they seem remarkably solid in alot of cases. Here's my theory.
The 'popular' (ie, widely used) OSS products are used by mass amounts of people on a day to day basis. Some people will spot problems. Some percentage of those who spot the problems will either fix the problem, or report it to the package maintainer - either way, it'll get fixed.
If instead you look at obscure very-rarely used open source software, you'll find heinous bugs - often the software has obviously not been run through its paces. With such a small audience of people, it's less likely that bugs will get fixed and released back into the mainstream.
If the software ever gains a significant following, more people will be using it and finding bugs, and fixing them or reporting them so that they can be fixed.
It's not formal QA, it's natural selection at work, and it does work.
I subscribed to DSL in the last half of last year, and USWest just sent me a kit like this. It included a 3com 10/100 ethernet card, a Cisco 675 DSL 'modem', some phone line filters, an ethernet cable, and an RJ45->serial cable (for talking to the modem for configuration).
Also included were a manual for the Cisco box, and a photocopied setup guide.
Setup was extremely simple, about 10 minutes if I recall. Strangely the installation caused me to become ill and call in sick to work.:)
Azerov
The new Cyrix chips supposedly can run fanless
on
IBM Wary of Crusoe?
·
· Score: 1
You might check them out for a quiet PC solution, though I'm not sure when they'll be for sale in retail channels. Their performance isn't great (some benchmarks had a celeron 500 beating an 800 cyrix), but like you say, you probably won't miss the extra horsepower most of the time.
According to the article, the point here is to try to locate students who are bright, but haven't had the means to obtain a high level of education. (Maybe they had to drop out to support their family, or something along those lines). This is a way of measuring intelligence, drive, problem solving skills, etc. rather than knowledge.
My DSL line operates in PPP mode, and I can tell you without a doubt there is no '140ms extra ping time' because of it. Frequently I get a 20 or 30 ping to servers, and it's almost always under 120.
There is overhead added by PPP, but it scales with the speed of the transport, and is not very high.
I don't remember the name of the program, but there was a C compiler for the Apple II series that didn't require more than 64k (possibly 48k) to run. 1MB is huge!
Slashdot Mirror
For the most part, there's no formal QA testing that goes on for OSS projects. However, they seem remarkably solid in alot of cases. Here's my theory.
The 'popular' (ie, widely used) OSS products are used by mass amounts of people on a day to day basis. Some people will spot problems. Some percentage of those who spot the problems will either fix the problem, or report it to the package maintainer - either way, it'll get fixed.
If instead you look at obscure very-rarely used open source software, you'll find heinous bugs - often the software has obviously not been run through its paces. With such a small audience of people, it's less likely that bugs will get fixed and released back into the mainstream.
If the software ever gains a significant following, more people will be using it and finding bugs, and fixing them or reporting them so that they can be fixed.
It's not formal QA, it's natural selection at work, and it does work.
Azerov
nt
On several occassions, I've downloaded a couple songs from Napster by a particular artist, decided I liked the music, and went out and bought the CD.
It's easy enough to find a specific song on Napster, but finding an entire album is another thing. IMO it's a great try-before-you-buy tool.
Azerov
Guys, how can it be alive if it's just filled with gas?
I subscribed to DSL in the last half of last year, and USWest just sent me a kit like this. It included a 3com 10/100 ethernet card, a Cisco 675 DSL 'modem', some phone line filters, an ethernet cable, and an RJ45->serial cable (for talking to the modem for configuration).
:)
Also included were a manual for the Cisco box, and a photocopied setup guide.
Setup was extremely simple, about 10 minutes if I recall. Strangely the installation caused me to become ill and call in sick to work.
Azerov
You might check them out for a quiet PC solution, though I'm not sure when they'll be for sale in retail channels. Their performance isn't great (some benchmarks had a celeron 500 beating an 800 cyrix), but like you say, you probably won't miss the extra horsepower most of the time.
Azerov
.. but they're good classic games like Nethack and Hunt. :)
Azerov
It was probably on the way to the bathroom - I know storms do that to me. :)
Az
According to the article, the point here is to try to locate students who are bright, but haven't had the means to obtain a high level of education. (Maybe they had to drop out to support their family, or something along those lines). This is a way of measuring intelligence, drive, problem solving skills, etc. rather than knowledge.
Azerov
My DSL line operates in PPP mode, and I can tell you without a doubt there is no '140ms extra ping time' because of it. Frequently I get a 20 or 30 ping to servers, and it's almost always under 120.
There is overhead added by PPP, but it scales with the speed of the transport, and is not very high.
I don't remember the name of the program, but there was a C compiler for the Apple II series that didn't require more than 64k (possibly 48k) to run. 1MB is huge!