If the DVD contains a mechanism that has to be activated before it can be used, then damage to the DVD is more likely to render it unplayable. I wouldn't buy a DVD on that basis. It's not like I have to buy DVDs, after all... they're a luxury good.
And the only computer game I regularly play is open source. The games I've paid for mostly sit on the bookshelf, so I more or less quit buying them.
And... how on earth would this fight piracy? It's just another copy protection variant, and it's inherently impossible to make an unbreakable copy protection mechanism... and once it's broken, it's broken. All it takes is one person to put the cracked version up on the Internet somewhere and it's "game over".
One reason that there's no supply of high level backup tools for Linux (or for UNIX in general) is that there's a plethora of REALLY GOOD server level backup tools that are far more reliable and versatile than anything in Windows. I used AMANDA for backups for years, so that's what I'll talk about, but I know there are plenty of alternatives for people with different requirements. I found AMANDA worked extremely well for our tape-oriented environment, and the way it took over the whole scheduling situation and made backups *and* restores invisible... even in situations where the Amanda software wasn't available... is wonderful.
It would help if Linux file systems provided a backup API, allowing a non-root user to perform a backup without modifying file system attributes, the way you can with UFS dump and restore... but even with just tar/pax and scripted front ends like AMANDA you're way ahead of Windows native backup.
I'm really amazed that he considers the lack of a *need* for a commercial remote backup solution an advantage for Windows.
When a critical mass of applications which enable an entity to go about it's business no longer work on XP, the entity will move to a platform which will allow the userbase to get the job done.
Why would that happen, when applications are written for the platform users are using... and too many users are using XP to alienate them. The only application vendor with an incentive to drop XP is Microsoft. Everyone else... well... Windows 2000 is still supported by just about everyone and I suspect there's an awful lot that still run on Windows 9x.
This isn't like the Windows 9x/Me to 2000/XP shift, where there were good solid business reasons for dumping the old OS.
I think the author's over-enthusiastic about the possibilities for OpenOffice and open source software (see the other recent article about the problems with Linux on the desktop), but there really is no compelling case for Vista for the foreseeable future.
For 90% of users (basically, non-gamers and a few other folks), the middle of the line PCs would do nicely.
But for one thing, I suspect bottom-of-the-line would be fine. It's gone from games pushing the bleeding edge to websites pushing the median. Apart from websites with ever-more-complex flash and DHTML/AJAX scripts, I suspect that I'd still be happy with my old ever-upgraded "Beige G4" and something like a Toshiba Libretto, since (with one exception - a game) apart from little home/office apps pretty much all the "heavy lifting" I do outside work is server-side... or web-based.
I have a friend who's considering buying a new laptop because he bought one with integrated graphics a year ago. More recently he started to do some 3d work and has found his integrated graphics card completely unable to cope with even simple stuff. He would love to have something like this right now.
Nod.
I've been thinking that I should have gotten a plain Macbook instead of my Macbook Pro, because my Pro runs so hot... and OS X already has this capability: the main difference between running 3d on my G4 Mac Mini with a Radeon 9200 and the Intel Mac mini with an Intel GMA950 is that for some things the Intel is faster and for some things the G4 is faster... they both have pretty much the same OpenGL functionality.
Because when they designed it, they (understandably so) figured it was pointless.
When they designed DirectX? Back in the '90s, when most video cards didn't even do 3d?
I don't mean "you mean Vista didn't do this already" or "didn't DirectX 10 do this already", I mean "why didn't they do this back when they came up with Direct3d".
My first Mac running OS X was a Powermac 7600 running OS X 10.1, and it was already doing OpenGL in software back then. On a 132 MHz PowerPC 604e (not even a G3). In OS 9 it was Quickdraw rather than OpenGL, but again it was all the same whether it was software Quickdraw or hardware accelerated Quickdraw.
This has nothing to do with "doing less in the GPU". This is all about "reducing the distinction between GPU and the CPU ".
I mean, really, both Mac and Linux have software OpenGL so the video card acts as an accelerator... your software is faster with a good video card but you could get all the Quartz effects even on a Powermac 7500, and you can get T&L even on the horrible GMA 950. Sure, it takes up a whole core and makes the system slower than a G4 with a Radeon 9200, but it works.
I had no idea that Microsoft had completely passed the whole job of 3d graphics off on the video card makers.
It might have already been on Mythbusters. My kid watches those Discovery Channel pop science shows and I saw it in passing... and the image stuck in my head.
You are working on the assumption that what you see is an authentic photo of someone actually working.
It doesn't matter whether it was staged or not, it only matters that it contained code words relevant to what we now know was an active intelligence operation at that time it was taken.
It's NOT running Unix, it's running Apple's proprietary fork of BSD with no X support and a boatload of bizarre and arbitrary filesystem naming changes.
None of that means "it's not UNIX". If you think the iPhone isn't running UNIX then some of the UNIX versions I've used over the past 30 years would explode your brain like a watermelon full of liquid nitrogen.
I know the "in thing" these days is to suck Steve Jobs [...]
If you think I suck Steve Jobs, tell that to all the Apple Fanbois who regularly mod me down for being insufficiently loyal to the Steve. Just because you don't like a UNIX implementation doesn't make it "not UNIX".
Installing it is a part of the jailbreak procedure.
That's an implementation detail. It's still easier than reverse engineering the whole damn thing and re-doing that every time there's a hardware update.That's all part of "And if you're willing to jailbreak the phone to install Linux on it, why aren't you willing to jailbreak the phone to install Darwin apps on it?"
If you don't want to play the jailbreak game you shouldn't get an iPhone.
The hardware isn't THAT good, and it's not exactly cheap, either. You can get an OpenMoko phone for less *and* support free software in the process... instead of rewarding Apple for shipping a typical closed cellphone.
It's already running UNIX, it's just a matter of getting to that root prompt. And if you're willing to jailbreak the phone to install Linux on it, why aren't you willing to jailbreak the phone to install Darwin apps on it?
Because the fact that it's already based on an open source UNIX isn't good enough for some people, they need to make sure it's running the politically correct open source UNIX.
If the source was available, drivers never need become abandonware, your 'older' cards would still be supported, and people would start, maybe just start, to really see the freedom that people like Stallman talk about.
In my last job but one we had quite a selection of multi-port serial cards with open source drivers that had been abandoned by FOSS kernels. Video cards, oh, probably some kernel hero will keep updating the driver for the latest kernel API. Second-rank SCSI controllers? Maybe. Hardware that's really obscure (I mean, who uses serial ports any more)? The only people working on the drivers are the manufacturer and eventually even they get tired of updating the drivers for older cards, and the way the kernel APIs change it's more cost-effective to buy new cards than keep maintaining the drivers yourself.
There is no magic bullet. Free software lowers the cost of maintenance, but it doesn't eliminate it... and when it's used as an excuse to change APIs for political reasons it can actually increase it.
I choose not to use ad-block because I choose to remain aware of the crap that companies like Vibrant are implementing, and the sites that have the lack of ethics necessary to use their services. Slashdot should not be rewarding sites that use abusive techniques with links.
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If the DVD contains a mechanism that has to be activated before it can be used, then damage to the DVD is more likely to render it unplayable. I wouldn't buy a DVD on that basis. It's not like I have to buy DVDs, after all... they're a luxury good.
And the only computer game I regularly play is open source. The games I've paid for mostly sit on the bookshelf, so I more or less quit buying them.
And... how on earth would this fight piracy? It's just another copy protection variant, and it's inherently impossible to make an unbreakable copy protection mechanism... and once it's broken, it's broken. All it takes is one person to put the cracked version up on the Internet somewhere and it's "game over".
As I sugggested in the other thread, it really sounds like they're going to reinvent TCP (poorly).
Aw, Bullwinkle, that trick never works!
This time for sure, Rocky!
On the Internet nobody knows you're a sock puppet.
Oh, sorry, they do. Never mind. Hi Darl!
One reason that there's no supply of high level backup tools for Linux (or for UNIX in general) is that there's a plethora of REALLY GOOD server level backup tools that are far more reliable and versatile than anything in Windows. I used AMANDA for backups for years, so that's what I'll talk about, but I know there are plenty of alternatives for people with different requirements. I found AMANDA worked extremely well for our tape-oriented environment, and the way it took over the whole scheduling situation and made backups *and* restores invisible... even in situations where the Amanda software wasn't available... is wonderful.
It would help if Linux file systems provided a backup API, allowing a non-root user to perform a backup without modifying file system attributes, the way you can with UFS dump and restore... but even with just tar/pax and scripted front ends like AMANDA you're way ahead of Windows native backup.
I'm really amazed that he considers the lack of a *need* for a commercial remote backup solution an advantage for Windows.
When a critical mass of applications which enable an entity to go about it's business no longer work on XP, the entity will move to a platform which will allow the userbase to get the job done.
Why would that happen, when applications are written for the platform users are using... and too many users are using XP to alienate them. The only application vendor with an incentive to drop XP is Microsoft. Everyone else... well... Windows 2000 is still supported by just about everyone and I suspect there's an awful lot that still run on Windows 9x.
This isn't like the Windows 9x/Me to 2000/XP shift, where there were good solid business reasons for dumping the old OS.
I think the author's over-enthusiastic about the possibilities for OpenOffice and open source software (see the other recent article about the problems with Linux on the desktop), but there really is no compelling case for Vista for the foreseeable future.
For 90% of users (basically, non-gamers and a few other folks), the middle of the line PCs would do nicely.
But for one thing, I suspect bottom-of-the-line would be fine. It's gone from games pushing the bleeding edge to websites pushing the median. Apart from websites with ever-more-complex flash and DHTML/AJAX scripts, I suspect that I'd still be happy with my old ever-upgraded "Beige G4" and something like a Toshiba Libretto, since (with one exception - a game) apart from little home/office apps pretty much all the "heavy lifting" I do outside work is server-side... or web-based.
How much are they losing per subscriber?
*boggle*
So not sure why MS never shipped a consumer version.
My guess is they wanted to charge extra for it and never figured out a way to do it.
I have a friend who's considering buying a new laptop because he bought one with integrated graphics a year ago. More recently he started to do some 3d work and has found his integrated graphics card completely unable to cope with even simple stuff. He would love to have something like this right now.
Nod.
I've been thinking that I should have gotten a plain Macbook instead of my Macbook Pro, because my Pro runs so hot... and OS X already has this capability: the main difference between running 3d on my G4 Mac Mini with a Radeon 9200 and the Intel Mac mini with an Intel GMA950 is that for some things the Intel is faster and for some things the G4 is faster... they both have pretty much the same OpenGL functionality.
Because when they designed it, they (understandably so) figured it was pointless.
When they designed DirectX? Back in the '90s, when most video cards didn't even do 3d?
I don't mean "you mean Vista didn't do this already" or "didn't DirectX 10 do this already", I mean "why didn't they do this back when they came up with Direct3d".
My first Mac running OS X was a Powermac 7600 running OS X 10.1, and it was already doing OpenGL in software back then. On a 132 MHz PowerPC 604e (not even a G3). In OS 9 it was Quickdraw rather than OpenGL, but again it was all the same whether it was software Quickdraw or hardware accelerated Quickdraw.
This has nothing to do with "doing less in the GPU". This is all about "reducing the distinction between GPU and the CPU ".
On the Mac you just use OpenGL, and it gets handled in software or hardware. I suspect that Microsoft will do the same thing.
I just wonder why they took so long to get around to it.
I mean, really, both Mac and Linux have software OpenGL so the video card acts as an accelerator... your software is faster with a good video card but you could get all the Quartz effects even on a Powermac 7500, and you can get T&L even on the horrible GMA 950. Sure, it takes up a whole core and makes the system slower than a G4 with a Radeon 9200, but it works.
I had no idea that Microsoft had completely passed the whole job of 3d graphics off on the video card makers.
It might have already been on Mythbusters. My kid watches those Discovery Channel pop science shows and I saw it in passing... and the image stuck in my head.
You are working on the assumption that what you see is an authentic photo of someone actually working.
It doesn't matter whether it was staged or not, it only matters that it contained code words relevant to what we now know was an active intelligence operation at that time it was taken.
How to make a watermelon full of liquid nitrogen explode:
Option 1: Drop it.
Option 2: Put a soda bottle 1/4 full of liquid nitrogen in the middle, cap it, and wait for it to warm up.
It's NOT running Unix, it's running Apple's proprietary fork of BSD with no X support and a boatload of bizarre and arbitrary filesystem naming changes.
None of that means "it's not UNIX". If you think the iPhone isn't running UNIX then some of the UNIX versions I've used over the past 30 years would explode your brain like a watermelon full of liquid nitrogen.
I know the "in thing" these days is to suck Steve Jobs [...]
If you think I suck Steve Jobs, tell that to all the Apple Fanbois who regularly mod me down for being insufficiently loyal to the Steve. Just because you don't like a UNIX implementation doesn't make it "not UNIX".
Doofus.
Installing it is a part of the jailbreak procedure.
That's an implementation detail. It's still easier than reverse engineering the whole damn thing and re-doing that every time there's a hardware update.That's all part of "And if you're willing to jailbreak the phone to install Linux on it, why aren't you willing to jailbreak the phone to install Darwin apps on it?"
If you don't want to play the jailbreak game you shouldn't get an iPhone.
The hardware isn't THAT good, and it's not exactly cheap, either. You can get an OpenMoko phone for less *and* support free software in the process... instead of rewarding Apple for shipping a typical closed cellphone.
Direct 2.0 seems to be a safer path, perhaps Obama is actually on top of this...
I already installed Linux on my iPaq, I'll trade you my iPaq for your iPhone and you can save yourself a bunch of hassles.
It's already running UNIX, it's just a matter of getting to that root prompt. And if you're willing to jailbreak the phone to install Linux on it, why aren't you willing to jailbreak the phone to install Darwin apps on it?
Because the fact that it's already based on an open source UNIX isn't good enough for some people, they need to make sure it's running the politically correct open source UNIX.
If the source was available, drivers never need become abandonware, your 'older' cards would still be supported, and people would start, maybe just start, to really see the freedom that people like Stallman talk about.
In my last job but one we had quite a selection of multi-port serial cards with open source drivers that had been abandoned by FOSS kernels. Video cards, oh, probably some kernel hero will keep updating the driver for the latest kernel API. Second-rank SCSI controllers? Maybe. Hardware that's really obscure (I mean, who uses serial ports any more)? The only people working on the drivers are the manufacturer and eventually even they get tired of updating the drivers for older cards, and the way the kernel APIs change it's more cost-effective to buy new cards than keep maintaining the drivers yourself.
There is no magic bullet. Free software lowers the cost of maintenance, but it doesn't eliminate it... and when it's used as an excuse to change APIs for political reasons it can actually increase it.
I don't have adblock, but I didn't run into any particular problems with the advertising in the article.
You didn't happen to let your mouse stray over any of the double-underlined words, then.
They have an in-page pop-up that floats over the text you're trying to read if they think you're hovering your mouse over them.
I choose not to use ad-block because I choose to remain aware of the crap that companies like Vibrant are implementing, and the sites that have the lack of ethics necessary to use their services. Slashdot should not be rewarding sites that use abusive techniques with links.