Likewise for DVD menus and copyright sequences. I immediately thought of this when I read about the article. OK, DVDs aren't games, but don't insult full-time workers off by making them sit through a fancy sequence for the seventh time.
Interesting point... So, by your reasoning, anything a person says or writes is biased, unless they point out all and every single arguement for and against whatever it is?
Interesting point too. Yes, you would have to point out all arguments to be completely unbiased. This is of course, theoretical nonsense.
In practice, "unbiased" would be approximated by a balanced argument covering both sides, even if one side was concluded to be superior "overall". The poster, on the other hand, has used the existence of one argument (less prominent a target) to justify his overall position (it's safer). Now, for any typical definition of "biased", that's what I call seriously biased!
Yes it's very biased, he's probably just a bit naieve if he believes that one true statement is enough to win an argument. I'll tell you why. "Still, I feel safer using Firefox since malicious persons are much more unlikely to target any vulnerabilites."
Yep, maybe that's a bit true (debatable though). But it's only one of dozens of reasons why Firefox is safer than IE, and there are also dozens of reasons why IE is safer than Firefox. To wit:
"I feel safer using IE since very intelligent, highly paid, people work all day on its security features"
"I feel safer using Firefox since any developer can fix the problem and publish a patch immediately"
"I feel safer using IE because its designed for a single platform"
"I feel safer using Firefox since its open source review process hardens code before it is published".
"I feel safer using IE because its harder for malicious people to discover flaws in closed-source software
My point? His statement is biased because he's pointed out only one average argument in favour of Firefox, whereas there are many arguments that can be made in either direction.
Anyone who says this is irrelevant, we should focus on the technology etc, has failed to understand that software is about more than technical details.
Managers don't understand the details - they don't bother to learn that 5.0 is really 1.5, and they make decisions based on their high level views.
Sun has hurt Java's name, and let its developers down, with this absurd naming move, a repeat of the shambolic schizophrenic 1.2/2.0 business years ago.
So now we have Java 2 Version 5????? Employers will want to know why developers haven't done any version 3 and version 4. And it will certainly confuse the crap out of them.
Java has a good name for professionalism, but whoever came up with this ought to hang their head in shame.
Apple's not exactly mainstream, but it pushes technologies into the manistream. If I had a dollar for every "candy coloured" gadget that came out in the late nineties...
Yeah, they certainly made a mes of the Newton. I'm not saying they succeeded in everything they kicked off, I'm just saying they put their butts on the line and go all-out with upcoming technologies.
In the case of Newton, they made it big news. There were PDAs before, mostly industrial, but Apple were making a big fanfare about being the first mainstream PDA.
As it happened, all the publicity backfired big time.
Apple will make this a standard component first, in the same way as they picked up on other trends and mainstreamed them, e.g. window-based UI, 17" screen, PDA.
Just wait a bit and we'll have some real American Slashdot style news, like interviews with uberhackers Alan Cox and Linus Torvalds, or a story on Alan Turing, or the latest news on Mandrake, SuSE, and Knoppix.
Shortly followed by tales of robots playing soccer, the latest in anime, and 5G mobile phones.
A bit OT, but are there any indexes or search engines for online radio content?
Seems to me online radio once had a lot of potential, maybe still does, but has gone nowhere in the past few years. I thought it would pick up with every man and his dog carrying an MP3 player, but apparently not.
HOPE SO! Blogging has moved so fast that the tangled web of RSS protocols is confusing to RSS publishers and users alike.
Far more important than their individual features would be a single standard, so that publi7shing tools could stop bothering about compatibility issues and get on with features people care about.
Only Google has the power to create an RSS standard. Google, you're our only hope!
Once someone gets famous for doing X, they think they can speak authoritatively on all subjects.
This problem exists, but is not valid in this case.
See, I'd agree if the interview was with Britney or Tiger - their opinion on the future counts for nothing. But you're talking about Bill Joy. When a deservedly prominent computer scientist - or, for that matter, biologist, economist, etc. - talks about the future, I'll listen.
Re:Apple
on
OQO Examined
·
· Score: 3, Informative
As soon as Apple make one, my PowerBook's for sale.
Apple will be shivering in its boots. With unconditional love like this who needs competitors.
Apple *could have* released this, because the founder is ex-Apple, but Steve Jobs rejected it:
Within weeks of leaving his job at Apple Computer (AAPL) in 1999 -- as a lead developer for Apple's PowerBooks -- Jory Bell pitched his former boss, Steve Jobs, his killer idea: a portable PC slightly bigger than a deck of cards that would pack all the punch of a high-end laptop, cost less than $1,500, and give Apple a chance to license its operating system to a product that could render traditional handhelds like the Palm Pilot obsolete.
I thought that was a bad move when I first read it, but in hindsight, he possibly saw a conflict with the IPod strategy.
In any event, you'll probably get your wish as the IPod is halfway there anyway. It's got the hard drive and some basic PDA functions, now it just needs full-blown PDA action.
HP has always jumped back, forth, and sideways in their "embracing" strategies. One day, they'll promote Java, the next day you'll hear nothing about it. Same with Linux. Compare that to IBM - they have a strong, consistent, stance on both Java and Linux.
Part of this inconsistency is likely due to politics behind the Compaq merger. But it's gone on longer than that - for example, whatever happened to all their embedded consumer devices (I think it was branded "cool city")? All this indicates HP has big political problems, which is causing it to lack any direction.
Something quite annoying about ITunes/IPod is tracks always start playing at start of track. For audiobooks, this is pain - they should start where you left off.
A little-known trick lets you do this, but why won't apple support it officially?
My company won't pay for minibar usage or in-room movies, and they probably won't pay for inflight net access either.
Sucks on both of the first counts, but any company that won't pay for a professional's net access needs to look at its books. When you add up salary, airline ticket, accommodation, living expenses, company overheads, $30 is bloody negligible.
Having said that, I can see most companies saynig the same thing, as most companies need to take a serious look at their books!
Old skool airlines price for business first - the passengers out back are there to make the numbers. 30 bucks is negligible for business travellers. Especially those who spend half their time in the air.
Everyone here is looking at it as whether it's worth 30 bucks. More to the point, easy net access reduces a major barrier to business travel. Workers are more productive, can respond to stuff as it happens, and managers can be more confident they're actually working rather than catching up on the latest blockbusters.
Less barriers, more flights. That's what the industry desperately needs right now.
Now if only the whole industry could get its act together and reduce the waiting times at either end of the trip...
Could a computer or robot be said to have a "mind" the way a human does?
Define "mind" and I'll tell you if a computer has one.
What is the difference between "mind" and "software"?
Define software, and I'll use tell you how it differs from your definition of mind.
Not trolling, just demonstrating that this sort of deep philosophical questioning (which often happens in AI) usually just boils down to a trivial game of words.
Slashdot Mirror
Likewise for DVD menus and copyright sequences. I immediately thought of this when I read about the article. OK, DVDs aren't games, but don't insult full-time workers off by making them sit through a fancy sequence for the seventh time.
Time is critical, there are dishes to wash.
Interesting point... So, by your reasoning, anything a person says or writes is biased, unless they point out all and every single arguement for and against whatever it is?
Interesting point too. Yes, you would have to point out all arguments to be completely unbiased. This is of course, theoretical nonsense.
In practice, "unbiased" would be approximated by a balanced argument covering both sides, even if one side was concluded to be superior "overall". The poster, on the other hand, has used the existence of one argument (less prominent a target) to justify his overall position (it's safer). Now, for any typical definition of "biased", that's what I call seriously biased!
"Still, I feel safer using Firefox since malicious persons are much more unlikely to target any vulnerabilites."
Yep, maybe that's a bit true (debatable though). But it's only one of dozens of reasons why Firefox is safer than IE, and there are also dozens of reasons why IE is safer than Firefox. To wit:
My point? His statement is biased because he's pointed out only one average argument in favour of Firefox, whereas there are many arguments that can be made in either direction.
Anyone who says this is irrelevant, we should focus on the technology etc, has failed to understand that software is about more than technical details.
Managers don't understand the details - they don't bother to learn that 5.0 is really 1.5, and they make decisions based on their high level views.
Sun has hurt Java's name, and let its developers down, with this absurd naming move, a repeat of the shambolic schizophrenic 1.2/2.0 business years ago.
So now we have Java 2 Version 5????? Employers will want to know why developers haven't done any version 3 and version 4. And it will certainly confuse the crap out of them.
Java has a good name for professionalism, but whoever came up with this ought to hang their head in shame.
Apple's not exactly mainstream, but it pushes technologies into the manistream. If I had a dollar for every "candy coloured" gadget that came out in the late nineties ...
Yeah, they certainly made a mes of the Newton. I'm not saying they succeeded in everything they kicked off, I'm just saying they put their butts on the line and go all-out with upcoming technologies.
In the case of Newton, they made it big news. There were PDAs before, mostly industrial, but Apple were making a big fanfare about being the first mainstream PDA.
As it happened, all the publicity backfired big time.
Apple will make this a standard component first, in the same way as they picked up on other trends and mainstreamed them, e.g. window-based UI, 17" screen, PDA.
Add:
* Increasing web access from mobile phones and PDAs - where the browser market is wide open. Opera is big and Nokia just pumped $$$ into Mozilla.
Why use web based Weather feeds when you can pick the data off the satellite's directly??
Maybe it's just me, but I could think of so many answers to that question.
Just wait a bit and we'll have some real American Slashdot style news, like interviews with uberhackers Alan Cox and Linus Torvalds, or a story on Alan Turing, or the latest news on Mandrake, SuSE, and Knoppix.
...
Shortly followed by tales of robots playing soccer, the latest in anime, and 5G mobile phones.
I can see a trend
A bit OT, but are there any indexes or search engines for online radio content?
Seems to me online radio once had a lot of potential, maybe still does, but has gone nowhere in the past few years. I thought it would pick up with every man and his dog carrying an MP3 player, but apparently not.
Will RSS and Atom finally converge?
HOPE SO! Blogging has moved so fast that the tangled web of RSS protocols is confusing to RSS publishers and users alike.
Far more important than their individual features would be a single standard, so that publi7shing tools could stop bothering about compatibility issues and get on with features people care about.
Only Google has the power to create an RSS standard. Google, you're our only hope!
Once someone gets famous for doing X, they think they can speak authoritatively on all subjects.
This problem exists, but is not valid in this case.
See, I'd agree if the interview was with Britney or Tiger - their opinion on the future counts for nothing. But you're talking about Bill Joy. When a deservedly prominent computer scientist - or, for that matter, biologist, economist, etc. - talks about the future, I'll listen.
As soon as Apple make one, my PowerBook's for sale.
Apple will be shivering in its boots. With unconditional love like this who needs competitors.
Apple *could have* released this, because the founder is ex-Apple, but Steve Jobs rejected it:
Within weeks of leaving his job at Apple Computer (AAPL) in 1999 -- as a lead developer for Apple's PowerBooks -- Jory Bell pitched his former boss, Steve Jobs, his killer idea: a portable PC slightly bigger than a deck of cards that would pack all the punch of a high-end laptop, cost less than $1,500, and give Apple a chance to license its operating system to a product that could render traditional handhelds like the Palm Pilot obsolete.
I thought that was a bad move when I first read it, but in hindsight, he possibly saw a conflict with the IPod strategy.
In any event, you'll probably get your wish as the IPod is halfway there anyway. It's got the hard drive and some basic PDA functions, now it just needs full-blown PDA action.
I don't read much into this.
HP has always jumped back, forth, and sideways in their "embracing" strategies. One day, they'll promote Java, the next day you'll hear nothing about it. Same with Linux. Compare that to IBM - they have a strong, consistent, stance on both Java and Linux.
Part of this inconsistency is likely due to politics behind the Compaq merger. But it's gone on longer than that - for example, whatever happened to all their embedded consumer devices (I think it was branded "cool city")? All this indicates HP has big political problems, which is causing it to lack any direction.
Introduction: I've been accused of astroturfing.
Middle: JBoss is great, JBoss rocks, JBoss has great developers
...
JBoss is King, long reign JBoss, love the JBoss.
Conclusion: OK, no more astroturfing.
Not once does he explain why it was done, but then he hardly even touches on the issue.
Perhaps a direct apology would see the $10M VC be yanked from under Fleury's schitzophrenic hands?
Something quite annoying about ITunes/IPod is tracks always start playing at start of track. For audiobooks, this is pain - they should start where you left off.
A little-known trick lets you do this, but why won't apple support it officially?
Download.com Music (mistaken by some for the new MP3.com)
Not to be mistaken for CNet's mp3.com.com.
Which does, of course, exist, but is not redirected to Download.com Music.
Agree they're not comfortable. And even worse, the air pressure makes your head light, whic hcauses loss of concentration.
For people who spend a lot of time travelling, though, there's not much option.
My company won't pay for minibar usage or in-room movies, and they probably won't pay for inflight net access either.
Sucks on both of the first counts, but any company that won't pay for a professional's net access needs to look at its books. When you add up salary, airline ticket, accommodation, living expenses, company overheads, $30 is bloody negligible.
Having said that, I can see most companies saynig the same thing, as most companies need to take a serious look at their books!
Old skool airlines price for business first - the passengers out back are there to make the numbers.
...
30 bucks is negligible for business travellers. Especially those who spend half their time in the air.
Everyone here is looking at it as whether it's worth 30 bucks. More to the point, easy net access reduces a major barrier to business travel. Workers are more productive, can respond to stuff as it happens, and managers can be more confident they're actually working rather than catching up on the latest blockbusters.
Less barriers, more flights. That's what the industry desperately needs right now.
Now if only the whole industry could get its act together and reduce the waiting times at either end of the trip
With about 12 stories a day on the subject, about time.
Note to worldwide media: It's a search engine, yes it has a colorful logo, but get back to your news and stuff.
Requirements are what the customer wants.
Design is how the analyst thinks it should be done.
A specification is the medium used to communicate these. It might be oral, written, multimedia, knock yourself out.
You can have a written requirements specification (which is what the article's talking about), a design specification on a whiteboard, etc etc
it'll take a while before their average user receives enough email to get close to that much
Not to mention compression. A huge amount of mail must be duplicated thanks to spam, group-mails, and copious forwarding of jokes and petitions.
Could a computer or robot be said to have a "mind" the way a human does?
Define "mind" and I'll tell you if a computer has one.
What is the difference between "mind" and "software"?
Define software, and I'll use tell you how it differs from your definition of mind.
Not trolling, just demonstrating that this sort of deep philosophical questioning (which often happens in AI) usually just boils down to a trivial game of words.