Even Apple had an ergonomic keyboard back in 1992 -- except theirs was adjustable and sported an astonishing $250 price tag.
But at US$250 in 1992 dollars, nobody was going to buy that keyboard on a large scale.
When the Natural Keyboard came out in late 1995, I believe the cost was around US$80. You can get the Natural Keyboard Elite for around US$40 nowadays.
I think the problem with StarOffice is that they don't have their business apps well-designed like you get with Microsoft Office apps. Now you know why Microsoft spends a fortune on their Usability Lab, which has almost no competition from other companies.
That keyboard sucks IMO. I hit the 'y' half the time with my left hand, which makes the whole thing a pain in the neck. and its just uncomfortable for me.
Yes, it does take some getting used to, but after using the MS Natural Keyboard for a while going back to a regular keyboard is not a fun experience given that it feels like going back to something narrow and uncomfortable.
And i believe that a few companies(HP,IBM, and a few others) have already started an Open Source Lab in Western US.
That's good, but they need to have a single unified research lab for Open Source software so we don't end up with a duplication of efforts (and all the hassles that implies).
I think despite what most people here on/. think about Microsoft as a company,:) you have to admit a lot of their research has created some very good ideas.
For example, the Microsoft Natural Keyboard and the improvements in the design of the Microsoft Mouse came out of this group. And MS Research has done a lot to dramatically improve the look and feel of Windows, especially the placement of menus, icons, etc.
I believe that the Linux supporters and developers should seriously look at creating an Open Source equivalent of Microsoft Research (companies like Dell and IBM could provide the initial seed money for such a lab). Imagine tightly-controlled research that could result in dramatic improvements in the usability of Linux on both the graphical and command line level, and developing keyboards and mouse pointers geared towards the needs of Linux users.
I think in sum total the reasons why the wealthy often own private jets are as follows:
1. Much higher flexibility in terms of travel schedules. By no longer being tied down to airline schedules they can go anywhere in the world often at a few hour's notice. With the arrival of the long-range Gulfstream V and Bombardier Global Express business jets, most of the world is easily within one fuel stop of anywhere in the continental USA. For example, if Apple CEO Steve Jobs needs to be in Singapore on business, he could fly his private Gulfstream V there from its likely home airport (San Jose International Airport) with only one fuel stop in Japan.
2. Private jets offer security and privacy not possible with commercial flights. Many famous Hollywood celebrities now fly private jets to avoid the security headaches to moving them through commercial airport terminals. Besides, many Hollywood celebrities have their own private jets, too. Think about it: would you want to subject a star like Michael Jackson to the public spaces of airport terminals and all the security headaches that implies?
What makes the Harry Potter books such fun reads is the very fact the novels have flat-out great scene descriptions, something that really sparks the imagination of readers. That's why I find these novels to be always so re-readable.
Anyway, Pottermania in terms of new books will explode again when the fifth novel, Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix, comes out in March 2002. Expect at least a 6.5 to 7 million initial hardback print run worldwide for the English-language versions whenit comes out then.
Perhaps next year they will give it to American Gods.:)
It'll be real interesting to see if Neil Gaiman will be at ConJosé as a nominee, given that American Gods will likely get nominated given Gaiman's major name recognition in the science fiction community.
You should have read some of the snide comments on the rec.arts.sf.written newsgroup about Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire winning the 2001 Hugo for Best Novel. (sigh)
I think people are conveniently forgetting that Hugos can encompass both science fiction and fantasy novels (for the most part). You do have to admit that the fourth Harry Potter novel was a very good read, indeed.:-)
It's going to be interesting to see if IBM can get Linux to work on the computers that run the New York Stock Exchange.
This by the far the ultimate test of Linux itself in a commercial environment, given that NYSE share volumes run into the billions of shares traded per day. I wonder will the 2.4.x kernel be ready to handle this massive load, one that used to be handled by proprietary UNIX variants and IBM's MV/MVS.
Re:OK -- so how about a Test suite ?
on
IBM Wants Linux
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
You have some very valid points indeed.
My concern is that are the current programmers who are cooperating on writing the Linux kernel know how to write kernel code that will take advantage of IBM mainframe hardware? Programming for multiprocessor x86 server boxes is one thing, but programming for IBM mainframes with their POWER CPU design, massively parallel CPU architecture and high bandwidth I/O everywhere is quite something else, especially if you want it to run with the type of extreme reliability mainframe users demand.
Besides, all the Linux browsers do a HORRIBLE job rendering text. It's either so small that you can barely read it or it's just big and clunky. And don't even get me started on the screen "flashes" as you scroll down a page. Ugh.
You can really say that again.:-(
I've run Netscape Communicator 4.78 in Red Hat Linux 7.2 and frankly, the text display on many commercial web pages really suck like a vacuum cleaner. -_- Somehow, something about Linux GUI's is causing Communicator 4.78 not to select the right text size. The flashes you see scrolling up and down the page is there even with the Mozilla 0.9.3 build for Windows--quite annoying.
Say what you want about Microsoft including their browser with Windows 95 OSR2 and later, but you have to admit MS engineers have really done their homework in creating a browser that renders pages fast and displays web page elements correctly.
Well, when Windows and Internet Explorer are around 85% of the marketshare for web browsing, small wonder why most web designers usually test against IE and Netscape Communicator 4.7x versions for rendering accuracy.
Hopefully, web designers will add Mozilla 1.0 to the list by late this year. (crossing fingers)
I think for compatibility reasons, Netscape 4.7x releases are pretty much the best browser in terms of rendering accuracy. At least on the Windows side, Netscape Communicator 4.78 is still a bit better than Netscape 6.1 in terms of rendering most commercial web pages.
I hope that once Mozilla 1.0 is released later this year it will become the basis for the new standard for web browsers running under Linux.
While I do applaud Opera's small system requirement footprint, it has some trouble rendering the more complex commercial web pages.
I still personally contend that using a pencil is still not a good idea given that pencil marks can be erased--fast way to fraud!
Using permanent ink stamps is way better because you cannot erase the mark, which means unambigious selection of choice on the voting ballot that can be read on both hand counts and machine counts.
Besides, they should have canned the punch card ballot at least ten years ago, because even back in the early 1990's several researchers complained about the problems with punched card ballots which can cause way too many errors in counts.
Unfortunately, I wouldn't trust ballots filled out in pencil due to the fact the marks can be erased.
I think the best solution is to use a paper ballot where you select the choice by using a small ink stamp. Unambiguous, and best of all the filled-out ballot can be easily read by both machine and visual inspection.
Unfortunately, the USA style of government is not the parliamentary system that is used in much of the world.
Besides, a parlimentary representative republic might not work here in the USA because we'll end up with just as many political parties as Italy--and you know how stable that government is.
I'm going to watch with great interest how Sun is going to get their own Java VM on Windows XP.
Will Sun make a web site available that will allow the download of a Java VM for Windows XP users?
Re:The Hindenburg accident wasn't due to the hydro
on
Return of the Zeppelins
·
· Score: 4, Informative
In the case of the Hindenberg, not that much.
You are forgetting the fatal flaw of the Hindenberg: the canvas outer covering used a doping compound of aluminum powder and nitrocellulose. Given that these are two prime ingredients for modern solid rocket fuel, even if the Hindenberg had been filled with helium the airship was essentially a flying bomb waiting to happen.
I think within 15-20 years we will see luxury airships carry 125-150 passengers on 3-4 day flights. Would you want to cruise at about 35-50 knots about 3,000 feet altitude around the Hawaiian Islands? I'm sure a lot of people do (including me).:)
With the use of non-flammable helium and the use of modern aerospace materials for airships, such an airship is well with the range of current technology. The Zeppelin NT points the way for to build such a thing with the time period I mentioned above.
Re:The Hindenburg accident wasn't due to the hydro
on
Return of the Zeppelins
·
· Score: 3, Informative
To be more specific, the doping material on the canvas covering used on the pre-World War II Zeppelins as a way to reflect heat and keep out moisture was a combination of aluminum powder and nitrocellulose.
It was a NASA engineer (who knew that aluminum powder and nitrocellulose are propellents in solid rocket motors) that discovered this fact from looking at a piece of the Hindenberg's canvas covering that managed to survive the crash. He noticed that the stuff burned exactly like solid rocket fuel, and using modern material analysis deduced the doping compounds I mentioned above. In short, the Hindenberg was a flying bomb waiting to happen.
It should be noted that the Zeppelin company did its own internal report (completely in 1938) that noted the doping compound's penchant to burn quickly, but the Nazi government quickly supressed the findings.
I think what makes a strip like Sluggy Freelance so well-liked is the fact that Pete Abrams--because he's not tied to the demands of newspaper syndicates--can do very, very long story arcs (remember from 1999 the time machine with the Year 2000 problem that eventually led to the Stormbreaker Saga, one that took nearly six months to complete?) and play around with the panel format in an experimental fashion.
No wonder why it's probably just about the best-known online comic around.
If they can make a production version that can cruise at 100,000 feet all day, it would be the perfect platform for peacetime border surveillence.
In fact, I've heard that the US Customs Service is real interested in such a UAV flying that high, since at 100,000 feet it could cover thousands of miles of border and coastline easily for drug interdiction work.
I think the pro-stem cell advocates are knocking at the wrong door for research money.
I wonder why they're not going to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation with its US$17 billion in available funds to get the grant money to create new stem cells without having to be on the Federal dole? After all, Bill Gates has expressed MAJOR interest in advances in medicine, and the Gates Foundation could easily dole out US$2 billion to keep researchers going for at least a decade in this field.
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Even Apple had an ergonomic keyboard back in 1992 -- except theirs was adjustable and sported an astonishing $250 price tag.
But at US$250 in 1992 dollars, nobody was going to buy that keyboard on a large scale.
When the Natural Keyboard came out in late 1995, I believe the cost was around US$80. You can get the Natural Keyboard Elite for around US$40 nowadays.
I think the problem with StarOffice is that they don't have their business apps well-designed like you get with Microsoft Office apps. Now you know why Microsoft spends a fortune on their Usability Lab, which has almost no competition from other companies.
That keyboard sucks IMO. I hit the 'y' half the time with my left hand, which makes the whole thing a pain in the neck. and its just uncomfortable for me.
Yes, it does take some getting used to, but after using the MS Natural Keyboard for a while going back to a regular keyboard is not a fun experience given that it feels like going back to something narrow and uncomfortable.
And i believe that a few companies(HP,IBM, and a few others) have already started an Open Source Lab in Western US.
That's good, but they need to have a single unified research lab for Open Source software so we don't end up with a duplication of efforts (and all the hassles that implies).
I think despite what most people here on /. think about Microsoft as a company, :) you have to admit a lot of their research has created some very good ideas.
For example, the Microsoft Natural Keyboard and the improvements in the design of the Microsoft Mouse came out of this group. And MS Research has done a lot to dramatically improve the look and feel of Windows, especially the placement of menus, icons, etc.
I believe that the Linux supporters and developers should seriously look at creating an Open Source equivalent of Microsoft Research (companies like Dell and IBM could provide the initial seed money for such a lab). Imagine tightly-controlled research that could result in dramatic improvements in the usability of Linux on both the graphical and command line level, and developing keyboards and mouse pointers geared towards the needs of Linux users.
I think in sum total the reasons why the wealthy often own private jets are as follows:
1. Much higher flexibility in terms of travel schedules. By no longer being tied down to airline schedules they can go anywhere in the world often at a few hour's notice. With the arrival of the long-range Gulfstream V and Bombardier Global Express business jets, most of the world is easily within one fuel stop of anywhere in the continental USA. For example, if Apple CEO Steve Jobs needs to be in Singapore on business, he could fly his private Gulfstream V there from its likely home airport (San Jose International Airport) with only one fuel stop in Japan.
2. Private jets offer security and privacy not possible with commercial flights. Many famous Hollywood celebrities now fly private jets to avoid the security headaches to moving them through commercial airport terminals. Besides, many Hollywood celebrities have their own private jets, too. Think about it: would you want to subject a star like Michael Jackson to the public spaces of airport terminals and all the security headaches that implies?
Wrongo. :-)
What makes the Harry Potter books such fun reads is the very fact the novels have flat-out great scene descriptions, something that really sparks the imagination of readers. That's why I find these novels to be always so re-readable.
Anyway, Pottermania in terms of new books will explode again when the fifth novel, Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix, comes out in March 2002. Expect at least a 6.5 to 7 million initial hardback print run worldwide for the English-language versions whenit comes out then.
Perhaps next year they will give it to American Gods. :)
It'll be real interesting to see if Neil Gaiman will be at ConJosé as a nominee, given that American Gods will likely get nominated given Gaiman's major name recognition in the science fiction community.
You should have read some of the snide comments on the rec.arts.sf.written newsgroup about Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire winning the 2001 Hugo for Best Novel. (sigh)
:-)
I think people are conveniently forgetting that Hugos can encompass both science fiction and fantasy novels (for the most part). You do have to admit that the fourth Harry Potter novel was a very good read, indeed.
It's going to be interesting to see if IBM can get Linux to work on the computers that run the New York Stock Exchange.
This by the far the ultimate test of Linux itself in a commercial environment, given that NYSE share volumes run into the billions of shares traded per day. I wonder will the 2.4.x kernel be ready to handle this massive load, one that used to be handled by proprietary UNIX variants and IBM's MV/MVS.
You have some very valid points indeed.
My concern is that are the current programmers who are cooperating on writing the Linux kernel know how to write kernel code that will take advantage of IBM mainframe hardware? Programming for multiprocessor x86 server boxes is one thing, but programming for IBM mainframes with their POWER CPU design, massively parallel CPU architecture and high bandwidth I/O everywhere is quite something else, especially if you want it to run with the type of extreme reliability mainframe users demand.
Besides, all the Linux browsers do a HORRIBLE job rendering text. It's either so small that you can barely read it or it's just big and clunky. And don't even get me started on the screen "flashes" as you scroll down a page. Ugh.
:-(
You can really say that again.
I've run Netscape Communicator 4.78 in Red Hat Linux 7.2 and frankly, the text display on many commercial web pages really suck like a vacuum cleaner. -_- Somehow, something about Linux GUI's is causing Communicator 4.78 not to select the right text size. The flashes you see scrolling up and down the page is there even with the Mozilla 0.9.3 build for Windows--quite annoying.
Say what you want about Microsoft including their browser with Windows 95 OSR2 and later, but you have to admit MS engineers have really done their homework in creating a browser that renders pages fast and displays web page elements correctly.
Well, when Windows and Internet Explorer are around 85% of the marketshare for web browsing, small wonder why most web designers usually test against IE and Netscape Communicator 4.7x versions for rendering accuracy.
Hopefully, web designers will add Mozilla 1.0 to the list by late this year. (crossing fingers)
I think for compatibility reasons, Netscape 4.7x releases are pretty much the best browser in terms of rendering accuracy. At least on the Windows side, Netscape Communicator 4.78 is still a bit better than Netscape 6.1 in terms of rendering most commercial web pages.
I hope that once Mozilla 1.0 is released later this year it will become the basis for the new standard for web browsers running under Linux.
While I do applaud Opera's small system requirement footprint, it has some trouble rendering the more complex commercial web pages.
It'll be real interesting to see how Sun and IBM will offer their Java VM's for Windows XP users.
Will they set up a special web page for Windows XP users to download a Java VM designed to work with Windows XP?
I still personally contend that using a pencil is still not a good idea given that pencil marks can be erased--fast way to fraud!
Using permanent ink stamps is way better because you cannot erase the mark, which means unambigious selection of choice on the voting ballot that can be read on both hand counts and machine counts.
Besides, they should have canned the punch card ballot at least ten years ago, because even back in the early 1990's several researchers complained about the problems with punched card ballots which can cause way too many errors in counts.
Unfortunately, I wouldn't trust ballots filled out in pencil due to the fact the marks can be erased.
I think the best solution is to use a paper ballot where you select the choice by using a small ink stamp. Unambiguous, and best of all the filled-out ballot can be easily read by both machine and visual inspection.
I think the best method is very simple: have 8.5" x 11" sized ballots that use ink stamps to select the choices on the election ballots.
Such a ballot is readable by both machine and hand counts, saving a lot of hassle.
Unfortunately, the USA style of government is not the parliamentary system that is used in much of the world.
Besides, a parlimentary representative republic might not work here in the USA because we'll end up with just as many political parties as Italy--and you know how stable that government is.
I'm going to watch with great interest how Sun is going to get their own Java VM on Windows XP.
Will Sun make a web site available that will allow the download of a Java VM for Windows XP users?
In the case of the Hindenberg, not that much.
You are forgetting the fatal flaw of the Hindenberg: the canvas outer covering used a doping compound of aluminum powder and nitrocellulose. Given that these are two prime ingredients for modern solid rocket fuel, even if the Hindenberg had been filled with helium the airship was essentially a flying bomb waiting to happen.
I think within 15-20 years we will see luxury airships carry 125-150 passengers on 3-4 day flights. Would you want to cruise at about 35-50 knots about 3,000 feet altitude around the Hawaiian Islands? I'm sure a lot of people do (including me). :)
With the use of non-flammable helium and the use of modern aerospace materials for airships, such an airship is well with the range of current technology. The Zeppelin NT points the way for to build such a thing with the time period I mentioned above.
To be more specific, the doping material on the canvas covering used on the pre-World War II Zeppelins as a way to reflect heat and keep out moisture was a combination of aluminum powder and nitrocellulose.
It was a NASA engineer (who knew that aluminum powder and nitrocellulose are propellents in solid rocket motors) that discovered this fact from looking at a piece of the Hindenberg's canvas covering that managed to survive the crash. He noticed that the stuff burned exactly like solid rocket fuel, and using modern material analysis deduced the doping compounds I mentioned above. In short, the Hindenberg was a flying bomb waiting to happen.
It should be noted that the Zeppelin company did its own internal report (completely in 1938) that noted the doping compound's penchant to burn quickly, but the Nazi government quickly supressed the findings.
I think what makes a strip like Sluggy Freelance so well-liked is the fact that Pete Abrams--because he's not tied to the demands of newspaper syndicates--can do very, very long story arcs (remember from 1999 the time machine with the Year 2000 problem that eventually led to the Stormbreaker Saga, one that took nearly six months to complete?) and play around with the panel format in an experimental fashion.
No wonder why it's probably just about the best-known online comic around.
If they can make a production version that can cruise at 100,000 feet all day, it would be the perfect platform for peacetime border surveillence.
In fact, I've heard that the US Customs Service is real interested in such a UAV flying that high, since at 100,000 feet it could cover thousands of miles of border and coastline easily for drug interdiction work.
I think the pro-stem cell advocates are knocking at the wrong door for research money.
I wonder why they're not going to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation with its US$17 billion in available funds to get the grant money to create new stem cells without having to be on the Federal dole? After all, Bill Gates has expressed MAJOR interest in advances in medicine, and the Gates Foundation could easily dole out US$2 billion to keep researchers going for at least a decade in this field.