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User: JabberWokky

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  1. Re:Commercial development requires payments. on UserLinux May Go Without KDE · · Score: 1
    Not directly, but there was the Harmony project which lost momentum when Qt was GPLed. It was not harassed, and was led by several KDE developers who also had a relationship with Trolltech. There is also the fact that if Trolltech every goes out of business or removes Qt from QPL/GPL, then the last release goes to a BSD license.

    In my observation, Trolltech Gets It, whatever the "It" of open source is. Yes, they operate for profit, but they do not hide anything, leave all their code for open review, encourage free use of it for free projects and also encourage Free use of it for Free projects.

    KDElibs are all LGPL. So are the KOffice libraries. All the apps are GPL.

    --
    Evan

  2. Re:Commercial development requires payments. on UserLinux May Go Without KDE · · Score: 1
    So why not BSD license your Qt source? That is allowed under the QPL (not the GPL, but you get to choose one of three licenses when you do Qt work).

    Perhaps you don't understand - Qt is free to use with any open source license. If OSI says it's an open source license, you can use it. Doing that is incompatable with the GPL, according to RMS, so it's also explicitly licensed under the GPL as well. The third license is for release under closed source licenses, and that does cost money. But any open source license is free. Read the QPL.

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    Evan

  3. Re:I am NOSTRADAMUS on SCO UnixWare 7.1.3 Review · · Score: 2, Interesting
    SCO's distro was pretty good. It hasn't been updated in a long time, but I ran a server on Caldera 1.2 and 1.3, and it was a fine 2.0.x era distribution.

    Their Unix, however, is not as good. FAS is based on it, and is the standard system for florists and gift basket type shops. I've had some recent experience with it, and it's not that fun to deal with. Okay, but not great. I'd prefer AIX any day. Or Linux, for that matter.

    --
    Evan

  4. Does this mean...? on Free IBM Computers For UK Households · · Score: 1
    Does this mean that you can build your own NOC for free?

    ...of course, you're open to crackers three minutes every hour, but hey, you got that 30 hour a week thing sewn up.

    --
    Evan

  5. Re:The things people complain about X... on First Xouvert Milestone Released · · Score: 1
    to use this in kde you're gonna need 3.2 which is still in beta

    Works for me, and it's sitting in my kicker tray right now in 3.1.1. I'm even using SuSE 8.2 rather than 9.0 (although I did an Online Update).

    --
    Evan

  6. Re:ELQ on Java Desktop System Review · · Score: 1
    I would say it's easily sincere. She's quite attractive. She's not an airbrushed plastic pinup model, no. But then, that doesn't appeal to everybody. She's got that wholesome cute geek appeal. The kind of face that is nice to look at over a cup of coffee and a late night conversation.

    --
    Evan "Spent many hours with my own SO doing just that last night"

  7. Re:Why the will pick Gnome. on Novell, RedHat and Sun Commit to a Linux Desktop · · Score: 1
    Ah, yes... KDE still depends on X for things like interprocess communication (DCOP runs over X, which is another reason for KDE4 to go to D-BUS). There is the KDE-nox branch, but that's mostly embedded stuff like Konqueror and KOrganizer. So some of the X dependancies have been moved out. There's just not much impetus to do more, especially now that Apple is shipping X with OSX.

    --
    Evan

  8. Re:Why the will pick Gnome. on Novell, RedHat and Sun Commit to a Linux Desktop · · Score: 3, Informative
    They are not only ported, but actively updated to the latest version. It's pretty common to see AIX, OSX and other non-Linux binaries listed in the KDE announcements.

    --
    Evan

  9. Re:For the love of all that's good and holy on L.A. County Bans Use Of "Master/Slave" Term · · Score: 1
    I do believe the confederate flag contributed to our current flag. So flying that flag, especially on the State level is an affront to the USA and those who died to win The Civil War.

    Some of the state flags in the South pull from the Stars and Bars. Look at Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, or the old Georgia flag. For that matter, the same debate that we are having here was raised in Georgia. Some people looked at it as racist, some as a symbol of heritage.

    Ask someone from the South if flying the flag is an affront to those that lost their lives.

    Typically the ones that loose the war are not allowed to fly their flags.

    The war we are speaking of, however, was a nearly even internal split between states that had nearly soverign status. We are a United States. The "losers" were also part of the "winners". Had the state lines been redrawn, it would have been different. There was no "regim change".

    What are people trying to say when they fly that flag? Asside from the racist overtones?

    I see, at a glance, no racist overtones. I do not deny that others do, or that if I muse on the south, I think of it. But my kneejerk response is to think of the positive aspects of the South. I see pride in a united culture where small talk occurs before work talk, where the pace of life is a little slower, where hunting is a matter of fact rather than a matter of debate, where I can order kale and grits with good smoked ribs for lunch.

    In short, while you stand outside and look at the symbol and see racism against blacks, remember that there is a good deal more to the South. Yes, the racism is still recent; recent enough so there are living examples of what once was. But the French do not look at their culture and think of the bloodly guillotine, the Spanish do not see the Spanish Inquisition, and Americans that look at their flag do not turn their head in shame because of the way the Native Americans were massacred. No... you look at your flag with pride. Likely you have a state, province or other local flag that you can look at with pride as well, despite knowing that there were atrocities within the regional borders.

    When the Stars and Bars are raised, most know that there will be racist overtones ascribed by some, just as the Stars and Stripes will have imperialistic and cultural supremicist overtones to many. That does not disqualify nor negate the pride in a symbol that also represents a fine and cultured land that, like every other history, is full of both shameful and glorious events.

    --
    Evan

  10. Re:For the love of all that's good and holy on L.A. County Bans Use Of "Master/Slave" Term · · Score: 1
    Your "symbol of imprisonment" is viewed quite differently by many who raise the Stars and Bars. Some people would say the Christian cross is a "symbol of oppression". That doesn't mean that the waitress who just served me is wearing hate jewelry. To her, it's a symbol of faith. To many Southerners, the Stars and Bars is a symbol of heritage. You're the one with the negative feelings regarding it, just as some people regard virtually any symbol as negative. Should we ban the American flag because some British dislike what they feel it stands for? Or visa versa? You may think it stands for something negative, but those who raise it as a symbol of pride in their culture do not. Again, it's a flag. Do you see the French flag as a "symbol of execution" because the guillotine killed so many during the revolution? Or the Spanish flag as a "symbol of imprisionment", callous to the Moors who were treated so horribly during the Spanish Inquisition?

    All cultures have blood on their hands and shameful passages written in time. The symbol reflects the viewer's opinions. You are the one projecting the negative associations.

    --
    Evan

  11. Re:sex shops too? on L.A. County Bans Use Of "Master/Slave" Term · · Score: 1
    This actually worries me. Would BDSM practioners in LA be able to sue the county for fostering an unwelcome environment? The Leather Pride and SSC groups should really at least write a letter.

    --
    Evan

  12. Re:For the love of all that's good and holy on L.A. County Bans Use Of "Master/Slave" Term · · Score: 1
    It doesn't help any that some dumbasses in the south still fly the confederate battle flag...

    Yeah - those horrible people flying their state flag or taking pride in their ancestors. Unless you're from a non-western region, your ancestors are shameful, eh? It's not like the American south doesn't have a fine history of celebrated cuisine, music, arts and culture. Yes, it has racism. So does Mexican culture. Fucking Mexican immigrants with their flags on their cars, eh? Oh, no... in your words they are just "dumbasses" for taking pride in their ancestry that happens to have negative associations as well as positive ones. And can you believe the nerve of those people with pride in their Indian heritage... they have a class system! "Dumbasses" again, right?

    --
    Evan

  13. Re:"...this is a game in which you play as a forei on Medal Of Honor - Rising Sun Readied For Japan · · Score: 1
    So, in essense, we won because our attrocities outweighed their attrocities?

    Yes.

    That is what war is: My side tries to kill your side as quickly and as bloodily as possible so you either stop or don't exist. War is the worst side of humanity, where we do everything possible to shatter the other side - break their minds, hearts, bodies and culture.

    What did you think it was?

    About the only advance in warfare's morality are the recent "stopping before genocide" that popped up in the last 2,000 years, the "treat your prisioners well" that has been around for about 500, "leave medical personel and wounded alone" in the last 100 years and the growing (but very shaky) 50 or so year old "don't use NBC weapons".

    All of these are very much based on a premise that it's a war you can afford to lose. Put a society in a cornered position, and they fight as dirty as possible. If my country were under attack by overwhelming forces, I'd sanction the worst atrocities that anybody could come up with. It's called survival, and my family always comes first.

    The key is always remember this and thus avoid war as much as possible. Do not forget Shoah.

    --
    Evan

  14. Re:And this is a surprise? on Medal Of Honor - Rising Sun Readied For Japan · · Score: 1
    You mean the Japanese version, where you piloted a Zero and tried to take out the US Navy? Yeah, they did pretty well. What's your point?

    --
    Evan "I spent hours in front of 194* games" at Duke

  15. Re:Are you channeling a troll, sir? on Gateway Forges Partnership With SuSE · · Score: 1
    Don't get me wrong , mplayer is one true amazing product, but compiling it, installing it with win32 dlls, realplayer dlls, quicktime support is a royal PITA.

    Ignoring the people who are saying to use apt-get (since SuSE uses apt-rpm, and that as a secondary system), just download the SuSE RPM and install it... there are several sites that have SuSE RPMs for the latest releases.

    --
    Evan

  16. Re:Strike up the band? on Gateway Forges Partnership With SuSE · · Score: 1
    Ditto here. I called their Oakland office to inquire as to when 8.2 would be out and got the correct way to pronounce it. I was Soo-Sea until then, Soo-Saey from that call, and after the Novell conference I just attended, Soo-Saw seems to the most correct.

    I think.

    --
    Evan

  17. Re:so there is a starting rpg.. on From RPG Shortcomings To A RPG Renaissance? · · Score: 2, Insightful
    True. I worried a bit after posting that that people would think I was implying that computer games could never do roleplay, or that I was saying that computers or mechanics have no place in roleplay (in fact, computers do a great job of handling the mundane aspects of the necessary mechanics). Muds are a good example, both text and graphic. Neither lend themselves to subtle inflection and timing of voice nor watching the meta struggle in another person as they work out their action. It's a matter of bandwidth. Social contact, body language, inflection... these are very high bandwidth forms of communication.

    But my key point was that computer games were immature in the defining aspects of RPGs, and that he was mistaking side mechanics intended to foster RPGs as the core thing that makes a game an RPG. Ironically, a good story can seriously get in the way, since it dominates and constricts your actions. You miss the great storylines involving the tavern cat - the storylines that never existed until the moment that the words started tumbling out of peple's mouth, were never even conceieved of until the events smoothly flowed into story. MUDs do a pretty good job of it. But they owe more to the individuals playing than the system itself.

    --
    Evan "Made a note to check out Eternal Stuggle" E.

  18. Re:so there is a starting rpg.. on From RPG Shortcomings To A RPG Renaissance? · · Score: 5, Insightful
    though rpg has been for years(forever) been meaning "a game where you level up when you kill monsters"

    Funny, I can think of plenty of roles to play that do not require 'levels' nor 'killing' nor 'monsters'. Computerized role playing games are horribly immature and tend to make up for it by leaning on non-roleplay activities as a major facet of the game. Sure, there are now traditional aspects of CRPGs that are not role play, but I would hardly call them the defining aspect.

    Simply put, the point of a Role Playing Game is to play a role. A character - as Willie said, "the play's the thing / Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king" - a character allows *you* to grow and explore various aspects of yourself. It's a reflection or a tangent or a cutting stroke across your own being. When you place yourself fully into a role, you learn about yourself by finding out how you would behave were you to have taken a different path. Sometimes a very different path out of fantasy, science fiction or another era of history.

    As I say, computer role playing games are very immature at this point, with the best of the breed being mere storytellers. There is no consensual story picked up by the part of the players - indeed, there is usually one player following a script, and the selling feature of many titles is that the player can choose from a small wardrobe what costume they will wear.

    That's not roleplaying - that's mere mechanics.

    --
    Evan

  19. Re:It would seem that Qtopia is becoming the stand on Sharp Zaurus SL-C860 Announced For Japan · · Score: 1
    Qtopia like its parent QT is written in C++, a farily controversial language amongst linux developers, it also uses Meta Objects which are an even more controversial addition to the language. This threatens to isolate many developers who would not use such a tool because of personal preference, with no fallback into an ISO standard complient c++ environment or a c environment.

    Signals and Slots are the metaphor of Qt, yes. And it's true that in order to use the GUI, you have to use the GUI library. It's also true that Qt is written in C++, but Qt apps do not have to be. KDE is an example - every KDE app is a Qt application, but they can be written in C++, C, Python, Perl and other languages. PyQt is quite a nice package. If you think you have to use C++ to program a Qt app, you're sorely mistaken.

    Qtopia is also licenced under the same licence scheme as QT, dual licenced under the GPL and QPL. This sceme allows development of open source applications using the GPL and proprietary applications using the QPL after per-developer fees have been payed.

    The QPL is a Open Source Inititive certified license. It gives you different rights than the GPL, but it is a very open and friendly license that meets all the OSI criteria. In addition, it's applicable to the full, freely downloadable Qt source. I.e., the QPL is another open source license you can use at no cost to write and distribute your software under, if you happen not to like the GPL.

    You're thinking of the commercial license, which allows you to release your software under any license you care to make up. Binary only, EULAs, guarentees and warrantees (which are not allowed under the LGPL), patented algorithms (again, the LGPL does not allow these), etc. If you choose to abandon Open Source, be prepared to pay.

    Thirdly in order to port the application to another platform, an activity in-keeping with the Free Software spirit, licence fees must be payed even for an open application.

    Wrong. Qt is GPLed. It runs under Windows, OSX and other OSes. Qt for Windows is a different product entirely that has support for DirectX and other Windows specific features. Qt itself, however, runs just dandy on any modern OS, and the community has ported it to experimental and very niche OSes.

    It should also be noted, since you're hitting on many of the famous Qt myths that if Trolltech were to go out of business or get bought out, not only will the GPLed code stay with the community, there is the KDE Free Qt Foundation, which mandates that in the event of a buy-out, merger, bankrupty or even lack of prompt releases, the latest codebase immedately reverts to the BSD licence.

    --
    Evan

  20. Re:Courtroom Drama?? on SCO Fires back, Subpoenas Stallman, Torvalds et al · · Score: 5, Informative

    Stallman's precision is less than that of most members of the law profession. The legal system is quite used to Stallman's habit of precise definition and preambles of defining semantics before answering. That's how law works, and to a certain extent, is what constitutes law. The phrase "Intellectual Property" pisses Stallman off because it has no meaning, whereas "Patents, Copyright and Trademark", are three seperate concepts. In law, that's so true there are seperate law offices that work for each of the three... and using the phrase "intellectual property" without referring to one of those three in precision will get you laughed out of court.

  21. You are not alone on Computer-Controlled Embroidery Machines? · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I've sat with about 15 or so people who could afford one and wanted one, but were stymied by the fact that we had no way of getting past the marketspeak and were loath to drop the money on a non-quantifiable and non-open system.

    Imagine being able to load up an xcf image of the Denton High path (from Brad Majors in RHPS) or a couple gifs of Tank Police insignia and just kick it to CUPS. Now that would be beautiful.

    It's an occasional topic at convention costuming panels, and the convention wisdom is "they are great, but only if you want Garfield or flowers". It's a shame, really.

    --
    Evan

  22. Re:Collaborative mapping on Who Makes MapQuest's Maps? · · Score: 2, Funny
    Ah. You've been to Sacramento, then?

    --
    Evan

  23. Re:Please, oh god, please on Longhorn's Flash Killer? · · Score: 1
    Right back atcha...

    uhh...

  24. Re:The pressing issue: on Novell Announces Agreement to Acquire SUSE · · Score: 1
    ...you'd better hope that judge is a good one because a poorly informed decision that doesn't uphold the copyleft principle could blow the open source community apart.

    The judge for the SCO case was chosen months ago. He's a good judge.

    --
    Evan

  25. Re:Offtopic on LinuxAnt's DriverLoader Loads Centrino Drivers · · Score: 1

    Mine are all coming up broken. Have been all day, along with the topic icons. I've been browsing elsewhere with zero problems.