So, by the same analogy, a lot of unemployed farmers in the Midwest and auto-workers in the Great Lakes area moved and now make up Silicon Valley?
And with NAFTA, a lot of high-tech industries suddenly moved south of the U.S.-Mexico border to take advantage of cheaper labor?
There are other factors to consider when you talk about people moving for jobs.
In addition, we have the same problems in the U.S. Coming from the South (U.S.), for example, I find that a lot of people have an aversion to moving "up East" (Northeast/New England) or "out West" (California, etc.) because of culture.
This idea comes up on almost every Slashdot education-related story, mostly after I bring the idea up.
College teaches you how to do research, how to read a journal article, how to develop ideas from that research, how to write it down, how to credit people, and how to solve advanced problems.
It is not so much "how to learn" as it is "how to develop and use advanced (college-level) thought processes."
You can easily argue that people learn how to write papers and how to solve advanced problems in high school. Anyone who has been through both high school and then graduated from college can tell you that there is no comparison. People continue to develop intellectually through college. College helps you develop that increased ability.
In the place that I work, several people who used to work here had college degrees in CS from respectable colleges. And you know what? They couldn't cut it AT ALL on the job. Sure, they knew the fundamentals, but they didn't know how to apply those to their work.
That is what things like internships and "the first job" are for. As hundreds of others have pointed out in this thread, college is not about getting, for example, the programming skills for the rest of your life. The idea is completely different. Colleges realize they are not trade schools, and nor can they replace on-the-job experience. But they provide something completely different.
Which makes them pretty much worthless on the job.
No, they have potential. They need to be trained for the specific job, just like an employee who never went to college. You do train your new employees, do you not?
A degree will only help to:
1) Get your foot in the door.
2) Back up the skills you actually have.
You forgot one:
3) Know how to learn.
I would argue that #3 is the most important, and what you are not allowing your new employees to do.
For the most part, there is a definite corollation between having the degree and having a certain set of skills. Yes, it is entirely possible to have this set of skills (and the resulting mentality) without going to college. It is fairly rare, however.
In some companies, mostly smaller ones where you "know the ownner," you can prove this without the degree. Any company larger than that, however, is going to require a degree simply because they do not have the time and ability to check for these things. Far easier to just check for the degree and assume (checking in the interview) that the required skills are there. This is not a decision based in laziness, but rather economics. It is cheaper to just check for the degree, and it is cheaper not to risk training a high-school grad.
My point? The degree opens up an awful lot. You may be able to advance in a company that is small enough to assess your abilities without the degree, but changing companies will be difficult.
It seems to me that so many people without their degree on this thread seem to be saying "the degree is just a chance for THE MAN to keep people in line." Have you ever thought that, perhaps, a well-rounded college education is actually a benifitial thing?
There also seems to be a lot of "I was able to do it, so you should too." Wrong. If the guy is in a company that will not allow it, that is not going to change. he could change companies, but that is going to require him proving himself to the new company (since he does not have the degree) before he is able to prove that he is worthy of advancement.
Not to say that virus writers don't do damage or even that they are not criminals
The writer agrees that they are criminals. The poster simply says that the writers are not terrorists, as the original article implies. I agree completely.
Anyone calling them "terrorists" is just as guilty of using the Sept. 11 attacks for their own good as Saturn is in their latest line of commercials, trying to sell more cars "because it is our duty as Americans."
Treat them as criminals, not terrorists. There is a huge difference, and hopefully the American people can remember that difference when we start trying Middle-Easterners for expired visas.
To put this argument another way, if you break into my car, should you be tried as a terrorist?
What always gets me are studies done on web site use, showing that people are more and more frequently going to more commercial sites. Of course! When was the last time you went to a person homepage? What sort of ratio is this compared to places like Slashdot and CNN.com?
The web being the ideal "person to person" communication device is obviously incorrect. The telephone does a better job that the web. Various chats do a much better job than the web, and they have been around longer than the web. Email is another great example.
Because an encrypted file system is going to prevent the physical theft of your computer?
Taking a computer with an encrypted filesystem is going to allow time to break the system. In addition, the loss of the computer is still going to cost you in time to make up the lost data.
Unless, of course, you are saving to a network drive not physically attached to you computer, in which case the encrypted data will not matter to the physical thieves.
One of the better solutions is to use an encrypted filesystem on a portable Firewire drive. Then you have something that will fit in your pocket that you can easily move between computers at home and work.
Of course, then you or your employer is paying more for computers and upgrades.
So Apple should become more like Be and try to sell a better OS for the Intel platform?
Apple comes up with a business plan to compete, on a small scale, with M$ and Linux users around the world complain about expensive hardware? They are *competing* with Microsoft (yes, you are complaining about hardware costs, and I am commenting on software competition - but, for the most part, with Apple you need to combine the two together - Apple is in the hardware and software market, and each computer sold is a unit of both).
No, BeOS demonstrated that it is going to be very difficult to design, write, sell, and support an alternative OS for the Intel market. Even Redhat and others are having problems, and they do not do the vast majority of R&D and writing on the Linux kernel.
Also look at it this way: Apple's hardware is well designed, and relatively fast. People who comment on Apple losing the "bang for the buck" competition never think that design is a desireable feature worth paying for.
Depends on how much you are out there...
on
Clever New Windows Worm
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
There are several factors to consider. The first is you mail provider. If they are quick to block out the newest viruses at the server, you obviously will not get it.
The other is how much your email address is out there. Some of the viruses would go through the web cache and grab email addresses from there. If your email address is out there a lot, you are going to get more viruses. 99% of the SirCam, Nimda, and so on that I got (probably a couple hundred) came from people I did not know.
None of this has anything at all to do with Linux.
That is part of the problem with trying to use Linux. I get my kernal from one group of individuals, my window manager from another, my drivers from some guy in North Carolina, and all of it bundled by a distribution company.
When common-users (and even tech-minded Windows and Mac users) install Linux, it is *the entire* experience that they are going to judge on, much like the original poster. Linux advocates need to get that into their head.
Your post reminds me of ThankGeeks' T-Shirts: "It is a hardware problem," "It is a software problem."
You are forgetting a *huge* advantage that the PS2 has over the other two: maturity of games. Developers have had an additional year to develop games.
Right now the PS2 has better games, but that is because developers have had that year to get used to the system and it abilities. Give the Xbox and Gamecube 6 months and then compare games.
For now, I would agree with you. Having played all three, I like the games on the PS2 the best (GTA3 rocks), but I realize that there are going to be a great number of games released for the other two in the coming months that might change that opinion.
I take exception to the statement about the BBS scene. Later BBSs may have been like that, but most of the BBSs I frequented in the early 90's (1991-1993) were populated usually by fairly well spoken people. Yes, teenagers, myself included, made up a large part of that population, but most of them had nothing to gain by being stupid with their computers. Most of them had shown intelligence and initiative in getting their computers online.
If anything, they wanted to continue showing off that intelligence. It was a way for geeks to get together. In high school, this was huge.
I must strongly protest the discussed removal of the Macintosh related groups. I use the groups for my WORK which, among other things, involves looking into the feasiblity of using the Macintosh as an inexpensive graphics terminal IN THE UNIX ENVIRONMENT.
Add about fifteen years, and you have Apple putting the Mac look-and-feel on top of a *nix core.
I really wish Google would add a "First mention" search button, or at least allow you to reverse the order of display.
I bought my Handspring Visor Platinum about a month ago and like it a lot. Since I already have a Samsung SCH-3500 phone, and I pay Sprint $35 for connectivity, I have no desire to repeat charges (by buying a VisorPhone, or paying for a wireless modem and service for the Handspring).
So I searched and found Gomadic, which makes cables for connecting Palm and other devices to cell phones.
Since I already have a dial-in ISP account and a lot of minutes from Sprint, the cable is a one-time cost to get wireless on the Handspring.
The cable came in yesterday and I have not yet had a chance to get it up and working yet.
This sort of solution makes a lot of sense for people not wanting to repeat charges (for an ISP, etc.)
What about this: Suppose someone announced a CPU running at 2x the mHz, but was only running at about 75% of the currently shipping CPUs?
There are factors that have to be taken into consideration other than capacity and price.
The way I look at is this: For the extra money for the iPod, you get things like a smaller size, a nicer interface, better uses (being able to use it to transfer data files, to boot from, etc.), and better sync'ing with Macs (the intended audience).
Once you factor these things in, the iPod is a good deal.
If all you want to go on is storage capactiy and price, the Treo is a good deal. By that rational, though, you could just get an older laptop and throw a 60 gig hard drive into it. Then you get 12x the capacity of the iPod. But I would not like to lug that around with me on the train.
Despite being a Mac guy, I bought a Nike PSA-60 today. 32 megs for $80 minus a $50 mail-in rebate. Throw in an overly-expensive 64 meg MMC card, and I have a 96 meg MP3 player for under $100.
Yes, I could get other MP3 players. But this one has a nice form factor and is small. Sometimes size is a concern.
I agree. I would much rather be able to hook my laptop or PDA up to my cell phone and use that.
My current phone is a Samsung SCH-3500 on Sprint's network. I bought it because I read it got good reception and did everything I wanted it to - voice dialing, and Caller-ID I can see without flipping the phone open. It is also small enough that I can keep it in my pocket during the day.
There is going to be a struggle to figure out what size screen everyone wants. If it is such a useful product (phone, PDA, etc.) that I am going to keep it on my person every hour of the day, it had better be small enough that I can do so comfortably. At the same time, if it is going to do everything, I want to do those things (browse the web, check contact information, and take notes) in comfort. This generally means a large enough screen and a decent input device.
These two things are always going to be at odds with each other. About the only soultion I can come up with is either a highly-foldable screen or some sort of projection device (the hologram-type imaging you see in SciFi movies).
I have my Samsung phone and my Handspring Visor Neo. Until someone comes up with a device integrating those those with the form-factor of the phone (or even smaller) and with the screen size of the Visor, I will stick with the seperate parts.
Having played Super Monkey Ball, Rogue Leader, and Wave Racer on the Game Cube, I would say I like Wave Racer the best, especially for multi-player.
I do not see what all of the hype about Super Monkey Ball is. That music is *so* annoying. The game just seems so annoying.
Wave Racer adds on a vs. stunt mode over the 64 version, with things that actually add on to the competition (rings that get smaller after people go through them).
Although it is difficult to play with more than two people. The screen simply gets too small to see much with 3 or 4 players.
I read all four books and liked them. I did not think they were earth-shattering, but they were good, especially the fourth book.
I decided to go opening day just to get caught up in it. Trying to avoid children, I decided on the 1:30pm showing, before school got out. As it turns out, it was a 1:20 showing, so I arrived halfway through the previews.
There were about fiftenn people in the theatre, including two children. One of the kids sat right behind me. He must have been about five, but acted very well the entire time, better than a lot of adults I have sat in front of.
The movie was good. I would say that it was better than Mosters, Inc., which I saw last weekend.
The major problems I had with it was that it did not seem to "flow" very well. This, I think, is a result of my next complaint - the movie seemed to follow the book too closely. It is difficult to floow a book that closely when the books, as with most any books, involve a lot of characters thinking to themselves.
One good example was the Sorting Hat. In the book, Harry and the hat have an internal dialog. In the movie, this conversation takes place aloud, and completely changes the idea of it.
I was impressed at how closely came, image-wise, to my thoughts on what everything looked like. Hagrid's cabin was almost dead-on, as was the Gryffindor commons room could not have been more exact to the image in my head.
I also did not like the toning down of a lot of the adult characters. Dumbledore was apparently re-written as a very minor character, despite the role he plays in the book.
In all, I was impressed with the movie and will probably end up buying it on DVD. One of the better movies made this year, but, given the competition, that does not mean much.
Re:From the "Reminds me of this classic prose" guy
on
Review: Harry Potter
·
· Score: 4, Informative
Nice to see one of my comments get a 5 rating *WHEN SOMEONE ELSE POSTS IT*.
I am guess that is what you mean by "Reminds me of this classic prose"?
If you notice, my signature says that I claim a copyright on each post (in addition to the disclaimer at the bottom of each Slashdot page which says that comments are property of the poster).
You did not give me any credit for the post, nor ask my permission.
To follow-up *to my own post*, I purchased the third book in paperback and read it, along with a borrowed fourth book, and saw the movie yesterday. I will post another original comment elsewhere on the thread.
As a follow-up to my own comment and an attempt to answer some of the ideas brought up in the replies:
1) While 64/66 may be found in servers, many more desktop PCs are sold every year. The situation is this: Suppose you buy a motherboard with 32/66 and you want a card that supports 64/33. It is the problem that always occurs with two differing standards.
2) I suppose I used to term "standards" in a less than perfect way. While there may be set specs for 64/33 and 32/66, right now you are much more likely to find one or the other in desktop PCs. The better question might be "Which one will become more popular until a replacement (64/66 or something even better) comes along?"
3) RF issues in PCI slots, from what I have read, have to do with the actual physical slot, not with the chipset or with cabling.
From the article: "The TX2 is the first Ultra ATA133 controller card that has support for 66MHz PCI motherboards (32-bit @ 66MHz as opposed to the current 32-bit @ 33MHz - not the same as 64-bit @ 33MHz). Granted there are no 32-bit 66MHz PCI motherboards available at this point in time (they'll be here "when they're done") but when they are available this card will be able to take advantage of the extra hertz."
It seems that we have two competing PCI slot standards - 64-bit/33MHz and 32-bit/66MHz. I assume that eventually we will see 64-bit/66MHz.
I remember an article from a few years ago talking about what the next step in PCI slots would be, and it spoke to these two steps. The argument against 64-bit slots was that it would have to change the physical dimensions of the slot to accomodate the additional bits being passed. The problem with 66MHz slots was cross-talk and RF interference between two adjacent slots.
Since these new ATA/133 cards are backwards compatible with 33MHz slots, I must assume they found a way to reduce RF interference. The existence of 64-bit PCI slots means that industry has found a way to move 64-bits using the older physical architecture.
That said, which of the standards do Slashdot readers think will catch on? Or will the two compete until a 64-bit/66Mhz standard is agreed upon?
Slashdot Mirror
So, by the same analogy, a lot of unemployed farmers in the Midwest and auto-workers in the Great Lakes area moved and now make up Silicon Valley?
And with NAFTA, a lot of high-tech industries suddenly moved south of the U.S.-Mexico border to take advantage of cheaper labor?
There are other factors to consider when you talk about people moving for jobs.
In addition, we have the same problems in the U.S. Coming from the South (U.S.), for example, I find that a lot of people have an aversion to moving "up East" (Northeast/New England) or "out West" (California, etc.) because of culture.
This idea comes up on almost every Slashdot education-related story, mostly after I bring the idea up.
College teaches you how to do research, how to read a journal article, how to develop ideas from that research, how to write it down, how to credit people, and how to solve advanced problems.
It is not so much "how to learn" as it is "how to develop and use advanced (college-level) thought processes."
You can easily argue that people learn how to write papers and how to solve advanced problems in high school. Anyone who has been through both high school and then graduated from college can tell you that there is no comparison. People continue to develop intellectually through college. College helps you develop that increased ability.
In the place that I work, several people who used to work here had college degrees in CS from respectable colleges. And you know what? They couldn't cut it AT ALL on the job. Sure, they knew the fundamentals, but they didn't know how to apply those to their work.
That is what things like internships and "the first job" are for. As hundreds of others have pointed out in this thread, college is not about getting, for example, the programming skills for the rest of your life. The idea is completely different. Colleges realize they are not trade schools, and nor can they replace on-the-job experience. But they provide something completely different.
Which makes them pretty much worthless on the job.
No, they have potential. They need to be trained for the specific job, just like an employee who never went to college. You do train your new employees, do you not?
A degree will only help to:
1) Get your foot in the door.
2) Back up the skills you actually have.
You forgot one:
3) Know how to learn.
I would argue that #3 is the most important, and what you are not allowing your new employees to do.
For the most part, there is a definite corollation between having the degree and having a certain set of skills. Yes, it is entirely possible to have this set of skills (and the resulting mentality) without going to college. It is fairly rare, however.
In some companies, mostly smaller ones where you "know the ownner," you can prove this without the degree. Any company larger than that, however, is going to require a degree simply because they do not have the time and ability to check for these things. Far easier to just check for the degree and assume (checking in the interview) that the required skills are there. This is not a decision based in laziness, but rather economics. It is cheaper to just check for the degree, and it is cheaper not to risk training a high-school grad.
My point? The degree opens up an awful lot. You may be able to advance in a company that is small enough to assess your abilities without the degree, but changing companies will be difficult.
It seems to me that so many people without their degree on this thread seem to be saying "the degree is just a chance for THE MAN to keep people in line." Have you ever thought that, perhaps, a well-rounded college education is actually a benifitial thing?
There also seems to be a lot of "I was able to do it, so you should too." Wrong. If the guy is in a company that will not allow it, that is not going to change. he could change companies, but that is going to require him proving himself to the new company (since he does not have the degree) before he is able to prove that he is worthy of advancement.
Did you even read the post?
Not to say that virus writers don't do damage or even that they are not criminals
The writer agrees that they are criminals. The poster simply says that the writers are not terrorists, as the original article implies. I agree completely.
Anyone calling them "terrorists" is just as guilty of using the Sept. 11 attacks for their own good as Saturn is in their latest line of commercials, trying to sell more cars "because it is our duty as Americans."
Treat them as criminals, not terrorists. There is a huge difference, and hopefully the American people can remember that difference when we start trying Middle-Easterners for expired visas.
To put this argument another way, if you break into my car, should you be tried as a terrorist?
What always gets me are studies done on web site use, showing that people are more and more frequently going to more commercial sites. Of course! When was the last time you went to a person homepage? What sort of ratio is this compared to places like Slashdot and CNN.com?
The web being the ideal "person to person" communication device is obviously incorrect. The telephone does a better job that the web. Various chats do a much better job than the web, and they have been around longer than the web. Email is another great example.
Because an encrypted file system is going to prevent the physical theft of your computer?
Taking a computer with an encrypted filesystem is going to allow time to break the system. In addition, the loss of the computer is still going to cost you in time to make up the lost data.
Unless, of course, you are saving to a network drive not physically attached to you computer, in which case the encrypted data will not matter to the physical thieves.
One of the better solutions is to use an encrypted filesystem on a portable Firewire drive. Then you have something that will fit in your pocket that you can easily move between computers at home and work.
Of course, then you or your employer is paying more for computers and upgrades.
So Apple should become more like Be and try to sell a better OS for the Intel platform?
Apple comes up with a business plan to compete, on a small scale, with M$ and Linux users around the world complain about expensive hardware? They are *competing* with Microsoft (yes, you are complaining about hardware costs, and I am commenting on software competition - but, for the most part, with Apple you need to combine the two together - Apple is in the hardware and software market, and each computer sold is a unit of both).
No, BeOS demonstrated that it is going to be very difficult to design, write, sell, and support an alternative OS for the Intel market. Even Redhat and others are having problems, and they do not do the vast majority of R&D and writing on the Linux kernel.
Also look at it this way: Apple's hardware is well designed, and relatively fast. People who comment on Apple losing the "bang for the buck" competition never think that design is a desireable feature worth paying for.
There are several factors to consider. The first is you mail provider. If they are quick to block out the newest viruses at the server, you obviously will not get it.
The other is how much your email address is out there. Some of the viruses would go through the web cache and grab email addresses from there. If your email address is out there a lot, you are going to get more viruses. 99% of the SirCam, Nimda, and so on that I got (probably a couple hundred) came from people I did not know.
Was anyone else as impressed by the soundtrack as I was? The music was set perfectly to the movie.
I want to go to the movie again, in part just to hear the sound.
I agree. The lines were read almost exactly as Agent Smith would have read them.
The other problem I had was that sometimes cuts between scenes seemed less than ideal. Could they not hire decent negative cutters?
None of this has anything at all to do with Linux.
That is part of the problem with trying to use Linux. I get my kernal from one group of individuals, my window manager from another, my drivers from some guy in North Carolina, and all of it bundled by a distribution company.
When common-users (and even tech-minded Windows and Mac users) install Linux, it is *the entire* experience that they are going to judge on, much like the original poster. Linux advocates need to get that into their head.
Your post reminds me of ThankGeeks' T-Shirts: "It is a hardware problem," "It is a software problem."
You are forgetting a *huge* advantage that the PS2 has over the other two: maturity of games. Developers have had an additional year to develop games.
Right now the PS2 has better games, but that is because developers have had that year to get used to the system and it abilities. Give the Xbox and Gamecube 6 months and then compare games.
For now, I would agree with you. Having played all three, I like the games on the PS2 the best (GTA3 rocks), but I realize that there are going to be a great number of games released for the other two in the coming months that might change that opinion.
Sony, as a member of the MPAA and RIAA, probably cares a great deal about you playing out-of-region DVDs.
I take exception to the statement about the BBS scene. Later BBSs may have been like that, but most of the BBSs I frequented in the early 90's (1991-1993) were populated usually by fairly well spoken people. Yes, teenagers, myself included, made up a large part of that population, but most of them had nothing to gain by being stupid with their computers. Most of them had shown intelligence and initiative in getting their computers online.
If anything, they wanted to continue showing off that intelligence. It was a way for geeks to get together. In high school, this was huge.
From this post:
I must strongly protest the discussed removal of the Macintosh related groups. I use the groups for my WORK which, among other things, involves looking into the feasiblity of using the Macintosh as an inexpensive graphics terminal IN THE UNIX ENVIRONMENT.
Add about fifteen years, and you have Apple putting the Mac look-and-feel on top of a *nix core.
I really wish Google would add a "First mention" search button, or at least allow you to reverse the order of display.
I bought my Handspring Visor Platinum about a month ago and like it a lot. Since I already have a Samsung SCH-3500 phone, and I pay Sprint $35 for connectivity, I have no desire to repeat charges (by buying a VisorPhone, or paying for a wireless modem and service for the Handspring).
So I searched and found Gomadic, which makes cables for connecting Palm and other devices to cell phones.
Since I already have a dial-in ISP account and a lot of minutes from Sprint, the cable is a one-time cost to get wireless on the Handspring.
The cable came in yesterday and I have not yet had a chance to get it up and working yet.
This sort of solution makes a lot of sense for people not wanting to repeat charges (for an ISP, etc.)
It works on iCab on the Mac running the Flash plug-in.
Luckily iCab allows filtering of plug-ins based on domain,so it is easy to turn off.
What about this: Suppose someone announced a CPU running at 2x the mHz, but was only running at about 75% of the currently shipping CPUs?
There are factors that have to be taken into consideration other than capacity and price.
The way I look at is this: For the extra money for the iPod, you get things like a smaller size, a nicer interface, better uses (being able to use it to transfer data files, to boot from, etc.), and better sync'ing with Macs (the intended audience).
Once you factor these things in, the iPod is a good deal.
If all you want to go on is storage capactiy and price, the Treo is a good deal. By that rational, though, you could just get an older laptop and throw a 60 gig hard drive into it. Then you get 12x the capacity of the iPod. But I would not like to lug that around with me on the train.
Despite being a Mac guy, I bought a Nike PSA-60 today. 32 megs for $80 minus a $50 mail-in rebate. Throw in an overly-expensive 64 meg MMC card, and I have a 96 meg MP3 player for under $100.
Yes, I could get other MP3 players. But this one has a nice form factor and is small. Sometimes size is a concern.
I agree. I would much rather be able to hook my laptop or PDA up to my cell phone and use that.
My current phone is a Samsung SCH-3500 on Sprint's network. I bought it because I read it got good reception and did everything I wanted it to - voice dialing, and Caller-ID I can see without flipping the phone open. It is also small enough that I can keep it in my pocket during the day.
There is going to be a struggle to figure out what size screen everyone wants. If it is such a useful product (phone, PDA, etc.) that I am going to keep it on my person every hour of the day, it had better be small enough that I can do so comfortably. At the same time, if it is going to do everything, I want to do those things (browse the web, check contact information, and take notes) in comfort. This generally means a large enough screen and a decent input device.
These two things are always going to be at odds with each other. About the only soultion I can come up with is either a highly-foldable screen or some sort of projection device (the hologram-type imaging you see in SciFi movies).
I have my Samsung phone and my Handspring Visor Neo. Until someone comes up with a device integrating those those with the form-factor of the phone (or even smaller) and with the screen size of the Visor, I will stick with the seperate parts.
Having played Super Monkey Ball, Rogue Leader, and Wave Racer on the Game Cube, I would say I like Wave Racer the best, especially for multi-player.
I do not see what all of the hype about Super Monkey Ball is. That music is *so* annoying. The game just seems so annoying.
Wave Racer adds on a vs. stunt mode over the 64 version, with things that actually add on to the competition (rings that get smaller after people go through them).
Although it is difficult to play with more than two people. The screen simply gets too small to see much with 3 or 4 players.
I read all four books and liked them. I did not think they were earth-shattering, but they were good, especially the fourth book.
I decided to go opening day just to get caught up in it. Trying to avoid children, I decided on the 1:30pm showing, before school got out. As it turns out, it was a 1:20 showing, so I arrived halfway through the previews.
There were about fiftenn people in the theatre, including two children. One of the kids sat right behind me. He must have been about five, but acted very well the entire time, better than a lot of adults I have sat in front of.
The movie was good. I would say that it was better than Mosters, Inc., which I saw last weekend.
The major problems I had with it was that it did not seem to "flow" very well. This, I think, is a result of my next complaint - the movie seemed to follow the book too closely. It is difficult to floow a book that closely when the books, as with most any books, involve a lot of characters thinking to themselves.
One good example was the Sorting Hat. In the book, Harry and the hat have an internal dialog. In the movie, this conversation takes place aloud, and completely changes the idea of it.
I was impressed at how closely came, image-wise, to my thoughts on what everything looked like. Hagrid's cabin was almost dead-on, as was the Gryffindor commons room could not have been more exact to the image in my head.
I also did not like the toning down of a lot of the adult characters. Dumbledore was apparently re-written as a very minor character, despite the role he plays in the book.
In all, I was impressed with the movie and will probably end up buying it on DVD. One of the better movies made this year, but, given the competition, that does not mean much.
Nice to see one of my comments get a 5 rating *WHEN SOMEONE ELSE POSTS IT*.
1 226 is my original comment.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?cid=2248277&sid=2
I am guess that is what you mean by "Reminds me of this classic prose"?
If you notice, my signature says that I claim a copyright on each post (in addition to the disclaimer at the bottom of each Slashdot page which says that comments are property of the poster).
You did not give me any credit for the post, nor ask my permission.
To follow-up *to my own post*, I purchased the third book in paperback and read it, along with a borrowed fourth book, and saw the movie yesterday. I will post another original comment elsewhere on the thread.
As a follow-up to my own comment and an attempt to answer some of the ideas brought up in the replies:
1) While 64/66 may be found in servers, many more desktop PCs are sold every year. The situation is this: Suppose you buy a motherboard with 32/66 and you want a card that supports 64/33. It is the problem that always occurs with two differing standards.
2) I suppose I used to term "standards" in a less than perfect way. While there may be set specs for 64/33 and 32/66, right now you are much more likely to find one or the other in desktop PCs. The better question might be "Which one will become more popular until a replacement (64/66 or something even better) comes along?"
3) RF issues in PCI slots, from what I have read, have to do with the actual physical slot, not with the chipset or with cabling.
From the article: "The TX2 is the first Ultra ATA133 controller card that has support for 66MHz PCI motherboards (32-bit @ 66MHz as opposed to the current 32-bit @ 33MHz - not the same as 64-bit @ 33MHz). Granted there are no 32-bit 66MHz PCI motherboards available at this point in time (they'll be here "when they're done") but when they are available this card will be able to take advantage of the extra hertz."
It seems that we have two competing PCI slot standards - 64-bit/33MHz and 32-bit/66MHz. I assume that eventually we will see 64-bit/66MHz.
I remember an article from a few years ago talking about what the next step in PCI slots would be, and it spoke to these two steps. The argument against 64-bit slots was that it would have to change the physical dimensions of the slot to accomodate the additional bits being passed. The problem with 66MHz slots was cross-talk and RF interference between two adjacent slots.
Since these new ATA/133 cards are backwards compatible with 33MHz slots, I must assume they found a way to reduce RF interference. The existence of 64-bit PCI slots means that industry has found a way to move 64-bits using the older physical architecture.
That said, which of the standards do Slashdot readers think will catch on? Or will the two compete until a 64-bit/66Mhz standard is agreed upon?