It hasn't died. The C translation by Jim Gillogly is available in the FreeBSD source tree. The translation from Fortran to C was pretty basic. I've never seen so many goto statements since the days of BASIC.
It's true! RadioShack stops being nosy. At first I didn't believe it, but a devil ice-skated by selling a Linux that was ready for the desktop and said it was true.
Re:Usability isnt the issue, Quality is the issue.
on
Fresco M1 Released
·
· Score: 2
People who care about "real work" performance are programmers, and business men, not a teenager who wants to surf the web with pretty fonts etc.
Then may I suggest that the teenagers stick with OSX while we programmers and businessmen get on with the real work.
At first I didn't like replacing Glorfindel with Arwen. But the more I think about it, the more I realize it makes sense for cinema. There are an awful lot of characters already, and another heavy dude isn't needed. There wasn't any way getting around Haldir, but there is a way to get around Glorfindel. Replace him with Legolas (as in the animation) or with Arwen.
There just doesn't seem to be much innovation in free software UI design. The default behavior seems to be to "make it like Windows".
I used to think that the developers were behind this plot. Then after spending a few months on kde-look.org, I realized that it's the users who want this crap. One of the most frequent use of the "other" category at kde-look is to post mockups of what Kicker, the main menu, or some random dialog should look like. Many of them make those Longhorn screenshots look like models of simplicity and elegance.
Not a troll, but *why* is Arwen in The Two Towers?? Are those supposed to be flashbacks for Aragorn?
I get the sense that they are partly a flashback, but mainly a separate plot thread involving the elves leaving for the Undying Lands.
And I still haven't figured out why Jackson is pushing Arwen so much.
This has been answered by PJ many times. Tolkien's work has many great themes. Among them are the end of the things and the beginning of others. The story of Arwen and Aragon is the perfect vehicle to bring these to cinema.
Or did you think that LOTR was just some geek hobbit jaunt through Middle Earth?
You only know a narrow band of the computer industry? Then you're a fucking technician.
You're right. God forbid I can't disassemble my Mom's CDROM drive and find out what's making the racket. Since I can't I must be a nobody.
And you're right about it being a problem in the computer industry. Just look at automobiles. Why, in that industry everyone in the plant is expected to be able to design an award winning model, assemble it themselves, then at place at Nascar in their creation.
When you're down visiting for Christmas I need you to open up my CD drive and see what's making all that racket, because you're a programmer and know all about computers!
You're on the verge of understanding liberatianism. The problem isn't the big corporations having enough money to buy politicians. The problem is that the politicians are putting "for sale" signs on their foreheads.
The the government did not have the power to sell legislation, then it wouldn't matter a hill of beans what Sony wanted to do, because the market (you and I) would be in charge.
This whole DRM juggernaut would be just another failed idea if the politicians didn't pimp our representation out to Sony, Disney, MPAA, RIAA, etc.
p.s. Actually, the market is STILL in charge. We don't have to buy music. That's our ultimate trump card. The consumer can always choose not to consume.
Re:Nanotechnology could destroy the universe
on
Don't Stymie Nanotech
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
What would a self-replicating nano-machine do if it went out of control?
That scenario is only possible with "free-roaming" nanites. These are the most complex type, and the ones with the most restrictive parameters.
1) They need energy. Their fuel will only last so long. If they use solar energy (some super-chlorophyl), they have to face the next problem:
2) They need appropriate building materials. Most nanites are designed to build a certain thing. This is part of their physical design, and not just some program. Unless that certain thing is simple (carbon fiber) they'll need more than air and dirt to build with. But what if they're programmed to build more nanites and those nanites need only air to build with:
3) They are their own competition. At this stage they're an artificial life form. Bacteria don't overrun the planet because bacteria compete with bacteria. Why go through all the hassle of separating out your needed trace element from the environment, when you can just disassemble that nanite over there? And if these guys might actually be edible to bacteria...
In summary, a free-roaming nanite designed to reproduce indefinitely using any randomly available material is just too complex, with too little economic value, and has too many naturally occuring constraints, to be a worry. It makes cool science fiction, but then again, so did little green men living on Mars.
You kids don't know how nice you have it now adays
Ach! I remember the good old days. One of my chores was to port my daily 4.2BSD kernel code to SunOS 1.0. If I didn't have it done by noon, my pa would whip me with SysV init scripts.
...it always involved opening a terminal at some point.
Then you need to stick with your single-user-on-one-machine-at-home "desktop" distros.
I never want to have to touch a terminal.
99% of the time you'll never need a terminal for a single-user-on-one-machine-at-home system. But that remaining 1% of the time accounts for 99% of the possible things you can do with your system.
The typical Windows and Mac config dialog allows you to make common configuration changes. The better dialogs allow you to make even uncommon config changes. But no GUI dialog is going to cover every possible configuration option. That's where the terminal comes in handy. Even if you don't use it, your system's administrator will.
Text configuration is a blessing for server farms but a nightmare for newbies with a fresh install.
Yeah, but you can always stick a GUI on top of the text configuration. You can't always do the opposite. MacOSX is a UNIX. With pure BSD heritage. Yet it's more suitable for the desktop than Windows. Do you realize that Windows is the only operating system with more than a few dozen users that isn't a UNIX or Unix clone?
How about an open, common XML format for configuration files?
Good idea, and a heck of a lot of UNIX is moving in that direction. But it won't solve the problem of inconsistent and obscure config files. XML is alphabet, not a dictionary. It will make it easy to parse a config file, but it won't magically bestow upon the application the meaning of the config file.
Convert sendmail to XML, and the sendmail.cf.xml file will still be incomprehensible.
No, that's not what's stopping me. A package is not a backup. A package is a means to install the software. What I want is to be able to install Gentoo in fifteen minutes, then rebuild all the parts in the background while I'm surfing slashdork.
It does me no good to build it on my harddrive, dump it to a CD, then copy the CD back to my harddrive. What's the sense in that?
I know BSD is a more thought of as a server OS, but I've heard plently of BSD users claim its makes a fine desktop as well. If that's every going to happen they definitely need to start working on making it more user friendly.
What do you mean, "if that's ever going to happen"? It already has! It's my desktop system right now! It may not be the desktop system for your grandma, but then again, I'm not your grandma.
And FreeBSD *IS* user friendly. Do not mistake pretty pictures for usability. The FreeBSD installer is straight forward and sensible. The documentation is complete and thorough. Configuration is simple. The only drawback is that it expects you to educate yourself on system administration. But actually, that's a Good Thing(tm).
You mean 1 and 3, not 1-3. Unless things have recently changed, Gentoo does not have [binary] packages. I'd change my second OS from Slackware to Gentoo if they had that...
Because KDE and GNOME are not a part of the operating system. In fact, they aren't a part of any Linux based OS either!
KDE and GNOME are third party software. You can find them in the ports system, along with 7000+ more third party packages. I would hate to see the size of the release notes if they had to document every change to every port and package!
p.s. Microsoft, GNU, and the Linux distributions have done an admirable job in obfuscating the definition of "operating system". Just because it comes with the OS does not make it a part of the OS.
If you kill someone in self defense, is that the same as cold-blooded premeditated murder? The system sees circumstance as important. Being a monopoly is one of these circumstances.
One a particular action is performed for a particular purpose with a particular motive, then the law should treat all instances of that action the same. This is much different than self-defense versus murder. The physical actions may be similar, but the motives and purposes are most definitely not.
Both Company A and Company B can engage in exclusive contracts with distributors, with the purpose of expanding market share, and the motivation to drive Company C out of business, yet one will be breaking the law and the other will not.
What if Microsoft had NOT been found to be monopoly by the courts? Would their business practices then be considered okay? Of course not!
Microsoft is in such a position to not succept itself to market pressure as easily.
The key words are "...as easily." There is a reason why MS doesn't charge $2000 for WinXP. No one would by it. One real competitor that Microsoft has is itself. They have to keep their prices low enough so that people will find it worth the money to upgrade.
In addition, I hear Gates and Ballmer do a bit of sweating over Linux. Open Source operating systems and office suites are market pressures from an unexpected direction.
Slashdot Mirror
It hasn't died. The C translation by Jim Gillogly is available in the FreeBSD source tree. The translation from Fortran to C was pretty basic. I've never seen so many goto statements since the days of BASIC.
It's true! RadioShack stops being nosy. At first I didn't believe it, but a devil ice-skated by selling a Linux that was ready for the desktop and said it was true.
People who care about "real work" performance are programmers, and business men, not a teenager who wants to surf the web with pretty fonts etc.
Then may I suggest that the teenagers stick with OSX while we programmers and businessmen get on with the real work.
At first I didn't like replacing Glorfindel with Arwen. But the more I think about it, the more I realize it makes sense for cinema. There are an awful lot of characters already, and another heavy dude isn't needed. There wasn't any way getting around Haldir, but there is a way to get around Glorfindel. Replace him with Legolas (as in the animation) or with Arwen.
Whenever I mention to someone at work that I'm running FreeBSD, they all want to see what it looks like.
"But... but... that's looks just like Mandrake!"
"No, not really. If you look close you'll see that every icon has tiny little horns and a pitchfork..."
There just doesn't seem to be much innovation in free software UI design. The default behavior seems to be to "make it like Windows".
I used to think that the developers were behind this plot. Then after spending a few months on kde-look.org, I realized that it's the users who want this crap. One of the most frequent use of the "other" category at kde-look is to post mockups of what Kicker, the main menu, or some random dialog should look like. Many of them make those Longhorn screenshots look like models of simplicity and elegance.
They are constrained tautologies designed to provide you with a cosy and unchallenging little universe where you can retreat from real life.
Sort of like the FSF then?
Not a troll, but *why* is Arwen in The Two Towers?? Are those supposed to be flashbacks for Aragorn?
I get the sense that they are partly a flashback, but mainly a separate plot thread involving the elves leaving for the Undying Lands.
And I still haven't figured out why Jackson is pushing Arwen so much.
This has been answered by PJ many times. Tolkien's work has many great themes. Among them are the end of the things and the beginning of others. The story of Arwen and Aragon is the perfect vehicle to bring these to cinema.
Or did you think that LOTR was just some geek hobbit jaunt through Middle Earth?
DONT LOOK AT THE MOVIE POSTER EITHER THEN!!!
And don't look at the title sequence either, or you might catch a glimpse of the name of an actor playing a character who by all rights must be dead.
You only know a narrow band of the computer industry? Then you're a fucking technician.
You're right. God forbid I can't disassemble my Mom's CDROM drive and find out what's making the racket. Since I can't I must be a nobody.
And you're right about it being a problem in the computer industry. Just look at automobiles. Why, in that industry everyone in the plant is expected to be able to design an award winning model, assemble it themselves, then at place at Nascar in their creation.
When you're down visiting for Christmas I need you to open up my CD drive and see what's making all that racket, because you're a programmer and know all about computers!
You're on the verge of understanding liberatianism. The problem isn't the big corporations having enough money to buy politicians. The problem is that the politicians are putting "for sale" signs on their foreheads.
The the government did not have the power to sell legislation, then it wouldn't matter a hill of beans what Sony wanted to do, because the market (you and I) would be in charge.
This whole DRM juggernaut would be just another failed idea if the politicians didn't pimp our representation out to Sony, Disney, MPAA, RIAA, etc.
p.s. Actually, the market is STILL in charge. We don't have to buy music. That's our ultimate trump card. The consumer can always choose not to consume.
What would a self-replicating nano-machine do if it went out of control?
That scenario is only possible with "free-roaming" nanites. These are the most complex type, and the ones with the most restrictive parameters.
1) They need energy. Their fuel will only last so long. If they use solar energy (some super-chlorophyl), they have to face the next problem:
2) They need appropriate building materials. Most nanites are designed to build a certain thing. This is part of their physical design, and not just some program. Unless that certain thing is simple (carbon fiber) they'll need more than air and dirt to build with. But what if they're programmed to build more nanites and those nanites need only air to build with:
3) They are their own competition. At this stage they're an artificial life form. Bacteria don't overrun the planet because bacteria compete with bacteria. Why go through all the hassle of separating out your needed trace element from the environment, when you can just disassemble that nanite over there? And if these guys might actually be edible to bacteria...
In summary, a free-roaming nanite designed to reproduce indefinitely using any randomly available material is just too complex, with too little economic value, and has too many naturally occuring constraints, to be a worry. It makes cool science fiction, but then again, so did little green men living on Mars.
You kids don't know how nice you have it now adays
Ach! I remember the good old days. One of my chores was to port my daily 4.2BSD kernel code to SunOS 1.0. If I didn't have it done by noon, my pa would whip me with SysV init scripts.
Proven in court. Why would they turn away from monopolistic behavior when their punishment for it is negligable?
Where is the law that says convicted monopolists must participate in industry consortiums?
...it always involved opening a terminal at some point.
Then you need to stick with your single-user-on-one-machine-at-home "desktop" distros.
I never want to have to touch a terminal.
99% of the time you'll never need a terminal for a single-user-on-one-machine-at-home system. But that remaining 1% of the time accounts for 99% of the possible things you can do with your system.
The typical Windows and Mac config dialog allows you to make common configuration changes. The better dialogs allow you to make even uncommon config changes. But no GUI dialog is going to cover every possible configuration option. That's where the terminal comes in handy. Even if you don't use it, your system's administrator will.
Text configuration is a blessing for server farms but a nightmare for newbies with a fresh install.
Yeah, but you can always stick a GUI on top of the text configuration. You can't always do the opposite. MacOSX is a UNIX. With pure BSD heritage. Yet it's more suitable for the desktop than Windows. Do you realize that Windows is the only operating system with more than a few dozen users that isn't a UNIX or Unix clone?
How about an open, common XML format for configuration files?
Good idea, and a heck of a lot of UNIX is moving in that direction. But it won't solve the problem of inconsistent and obscure config files. XML is alphabet, not a dictionary. It will make it easy to parse a config file, but it won't magically bestow upon the application the meaning of the config file.
Convert sendmail to XML, and the sendmail.cf.xml file will still be incomprehensible.
No, that's not what's stopping me. A package is not a backup. A package is a means to install the software. What I want is to be able to install Gentoo in fifteen minutes, then rebuild all the parts in the background while I'm surfing slashdork.
It does me no good to build it on my harddrive, dump it to a CD, then copy the CD back to my harddrive. What's the sense in that?
I know BSD is a more thought of as a server OS, but I've heard plently of BSD users claim its makes a fine desktop as well. If that's every going to happen they definitely need to start working on making it more user friendly.
What do you mean, "if that's ever going to happen"? It already has! It's my desktop system right now! It may not be the desktop system for your grandma, but then again, I'm not your grandma.
And FreeBSD *IS* user friendly. Do not mistake pretty pictures for usability. The FreeBSD installer is straight forward and sensible. The documentation is complete and thorough. Configuration is simple. The only drawback is that it expects you to educate yourself on system administration. But actually, that's a Good Thing(tm).
You mean 1 and 3, not 1-3. Unless things have recently changed, Gentoo does not have [binary] packages. I'd change my second OS from Slackware to Gentoo if they had that...
Because KDE and GNOME are not a part of the operating system. In fact, they aren't a part of any Linux based OS either!
KDE and GNOME are third party software. You can find them in the ports system, along with 7000+ more third party packages. I would hate to see the size of the release notes if they had to document every change to every port and package!
p.s. Microsoft, GNU, and the Linux distributions have done an admirable job in obfuscating the definition of "operating system". Just because it comes with the OS does not make it a part of the OS.
If you kill someone in self defense, is that the same as cold-blooded premeditated murder? The system sees circumstance as important. Being a monopoly is one of these circumstances.
One a particular action is performed for a particular purpose with a particular motive, then the law should treat all instances of that action the same. This is much different than self-defense versus murder. The physical actions may be similar, but the motives and purposes are most definitely not.
Both Company A and Company B can engage in exclusive contracts with distributors, with the purpose of expanding market share, and the motivation to drive Company C out of business, yet one will be breaking the law and the other will not.
What if Microsoft had NOT been found to be monopoly by the courts? Would their business practices then be considered okay? Of course not!
monopolies are considered bad for capitalism by most economists.
Taxation is also considered bad for capitalism by most economists. So what?
Microsoft is in such a position to not succept itself to market pressure as easily.
The key words are "...as easily." There is a reason why MS doesn't charge $2000 for WinXP. No one would by it. One real competitor that Microsoft has is itself. They have to keep their prices low enough so that people will find it worth the money to upgrade.
In addition, I hear Gates and Ballmer do a bit of sweating over Linux. Open Source operating systems and office suites are market pressures from an unexpected direction.