Apparently you didn't start reading/. until after the incident where somebody (supposedly) leaked the Windows NT and 2K source code several years back. It's been a while, but I don't remember there being a lot of comments about freedom fighters. Mostly I remember comments about why Open Source coders shouldn't look at the source code - either because familiarity with the windows code base might taint their ability to contribute to various open source programs, or out of fear that looking at the Windows source code might rob you of your ability to write decent code anymore... (Of course, as with any discussion on Slashdot, there were probably about three clowns for each serious post.)
I think a more than fair value is that 25% of those 75% have Office 2007 or the compatibility pack installed.
In my experience you've overshot the mark significantly. I know about 3 people with Office 2007, and I never even heard of the compatibility pack before today.
I know what it's called, and what it does. What I want to know, is who thought it would be a great idea to have playing music from somebody else's shared library be handled by a daemon that also happens to be responsible for discovery and configuration of network settings. Other than the fact that they involve the network, I don't understand what the two have in common, and I find it rather silly that I can't play music from somebody else's computer unless I enable a network configuration daemon that I don't want.
SharpDevelop is IMO nearly as good as VS2005 (on par with the Express Editions, at least), I just wish that the MonoDevelop guys would catch up with their version. Last time is used it, it was... unimpressive.
So you're saying that once I upgrade to a 3G cellphone, my network performance should be high enough to support real time voice communication with other people? I can't wait!
So just when we are finally getting to the point where we can put some stunning effects (that are also very functional and helpful in managing your desktop) that even put OS X to shame in some departments (I'm not claiming total superiority, that would be unspeakably foolish), and we get whining because "What if they don't want it?" In order to be accepted, Linux has to work, and be pretty out of the box. This kind of thing has to happen in order to work. I'll give you that crashes are a problem that need to be addressed, but overall it is a necessary step.
It's not a matter of not wanting it. I would love to have it. But the NVidia card on my laptop can't do it. So unless they also have some substantially improved NVidia drivers in the new release, this is a bad thing. And saying that it can be disabled in four clicks (or even one click) isn't very useful, when the problem that keeps me from using it currently is that it makes my mouse cursor disappear.
Another good question: (this applies to 7.04 too) Why do I need to be running a daemon to view iTunes shared libraries, and why is the daemon that views iTunes shared libraries the same one responsible for Wireless auto-discovery/configuration?
Can somebody please explain the logic behind this one to me? Because it sure would be nice to be able to enable or disable the two of those independently of each other.
The only thing I can figure out is that they found inspiration in Sun's version numbering for Java releases, and decided that they had to do one better. Or is that 0.1?
"Sorry dad. I was dropping my girlfriend off from the movie, and there was an accident on the way to her house. By the time we got there, it was almost 10:00, and the car died right as I was pulling out of the driveway. I couldn't go anywhere once the car quit, so I just had to stay at her house all night."
However Linus has stated publicaly and in emails to developers that they should not seek out patent filings due to tripple damages of willful infringement... It will not be good for Linus in court.
This is pretty standard legal advice when it comes to software and patents, and if you work for a company that has its own lawyers to tell you such things, they have probably told you just thatLinux contributors that may not get the same legal advice at their day job don't go and freak out. This can't be used to show that Linus had willful intent- all it shows is that he has gotten the same legal advice as anyone else who writes software for a living.
As of the end of 2005, the capacity of all of the wind mills in the entire state of California totaled 2100 MW. All of the wind farms in the United States totaled just over 9000 MW. The largest single wind farm in the United States at that time had a 300 MW capacity. (http://www.awea.org/news/Annual_Industry_Rankings_Continued_Growth_031506.html)
These two new reactors will supply almost a third as much power as all of the wind mills in the entire country two years ago.
I'm all for wind power- my house is wind powered- but realistically, it just doesn't have the energy density to be more than a niche player in the electric power business.
We already have the technology to reduce the lifespan (and thus time required for isolation) of nuclear waste down to centuries or even decades. For some reason, it's easier for people to try and imagine shoving our nuclear waste into a deep hole in the ground for the next hundred millennia or so than to do something useful with it (i.e. create more power) as well as reduce its lifespan.
At any rate, the cost of disposal is already included in the electricity rates in the US, and the power companies are paying the government the mandated fee for disposal. That the government isn't actually using that money for disposal is probably not really very surprising to anyone, but also not the fault of the power companies or an inherent flaw of nuclear power.
As far as why they chose nuclear power vs. solar, wind, etc. why don't you go on Google and look for a list of how many solar and wind power plants are out there that will generate 2500 MW of electricity... Hint: I'd be very surprised if you find any. It's been a while since I looked at the numbers, but off the top of my head, anything above about 1500 MW is pretty much guaranteed to be either coal or nuclear, and of the two, I much prefer nuclear. Around 1500 and lower, you'll probably start to see large oil and natural gas plants. Solar and wind power might start to enter the picture in the 500-750 MW region. (Again, these are mostly WAGs based on my memory from looking at the statistics over a year ago, but you get the idea...)
It gets even sadder... As far as I can tell, the only reason Norm Kent is even mentioned is because (according to JT) both Norm Kent and the Florida Bar Association have a history of harassing JT. It appears that the case in question is between JT and the Bar, and Norm Kent has nothing to do with it except in JT's head.
So really, he honestly believes that by doing this he is discrediting the Florida Bar Association.
The only thing this proves is that the Slashdot editors don't even bother to do a cursory glance at TFA before posting anything, but we all knew that anyway...
I disagree. Perhaps it should be easier to turn off - I don't know how difficult it actually is. It would probably also be good to show the option to turn it off very prominently.
But by all means, it should default to on. The problem with having automatic updates for any product default to off is that by and large any time a user does not understand what an option means or why it is important, they will always leave it at the default setting. These are exactly the people who need automatic updates to be turned on the most. Meanwhile, people who actually understand the need to check for security updates and understand the tradeoffs are free to turn them off and look for updates themselves.
This is why Microsoft changed Windows Automatic Updates from default off to default on with XP SP2 - They realized that the people who needed the functionality the most were exactly the people who were least likely to turn it on. (Same with Ubuntu, by the way, and probably most other Linux distros...)
The only time automatic updates are a problem are when there is no obvious way to disable them, or when they overreach in what data they use to determine whether you need an update. (I do find it a little irritating that in Windows, every app has to have it's own update tool- Java and iTunes are are particularly obnoxious- but that's a totally rant...) It sounds like in this case, it is true that there is not an obvious way to disable them (unless you read this guys forum), so that should probably be addressed, but there is at least some way to turn them off for the time being. It does not sound like he is being unreasonable in what information he is using to determine compatible updates, though.
Based on the OP's description, I was picturing the "King's Quest" style adventure games, a genre which started out interesting before it completely devolved into solving bizarre puzzles, finding obscure clues, and using random objects in completely implausible ways that generally required a hint book to figure out.
I don't really "hate" Java, I just said that I find the Java icon incredibly irritating - because most of the time when I see it, its sitting in the system tray on my computer (often multiple times) telling me that it wants me to upgrade my installed version of Java (when it really means that it wants to install a new version along side the three that are already there).
What does your bank do for people who don't have cell phones, or people who use the pre-paid phones? I know of a few banks who offer something like that as an option, but the ones that I know of don't give out a Java program, they give out a physical token http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:RSA-SecurID-Tokens.jpg. I can't imagine there are many banks here that would require their customers to have a cell phone at all, much less a certain kind.
As far as "running small programs on a mission critical device"- the last time I had a need to run something on my cell phone that wasn't pre-installed, it was a PalmOS device (this was three phones ago), and there was no shortage of software available at the time. For better or worse, Palm OS seems to have been mostly replaced by Windows Mobile (or whatever they call it these days) which seems to be pretty popular among everyone I know who wants their phone to do anything more than make phone calls and send text messages.
I honestly couldn't tell you how many phones sold in the US do or do not support Java, because I have never bothered to look. It's just not a selling feature to anyone that I know. Maybe outside the US having Java on your phone is actually useful for something. Here, as far as I can tell, it's just yet another way for your service provider to charge you more money for extra sh*t that you don't need, because there's generally no way to get any software onto your phone other than buying it through them at ridiculous prices. And if you do have a way to get programs onto your phone other then through your phone provider, then you probably have a windows or palm based phone anyway, so you don't care so much about Java.
I'll grant that I'm pretty sure there is a Java Runtime on my current cell phone (I vaguely remember seeing that irritating logo on the box when I bought it) but I'd be quite surprised if I've ever used it. And I'm still trying to figure out what the part about banks writing a password generator has to do with anything at all.
Night-time electric demands are substantially lower than daytime loads. If your electric company meters your electricity based on the time of day, you'll notice that night time rates are often nearly an order of magnitude lower than afternoon rates. I've seen some mid-size office buildings where they install giant tanks of water or some kind of gel underground. They run a refrigeration system at night when electricity is the cheapest, and use it to chill these underground tanks. Then during peak hours, when electricity is the most expensive, they can use them to cool the building instead of their air conditioners. Even given the efficiency losses guaranteed by such a system, it is still substantially cheaper than a traditional system, and probably better for the environment overall, since it reduces the peak load that the power company has to build for, and the wasted energy probably would have been wasted anyway, because nobody needs it. If a power company found that half of their residential customers were moving to grid tied electric systems, they probably still wouldn't have to worry about their night time loads exceeding their daytime loads.
$1/W to manufacture. The actual cost to the consumer would be quite a bit higher (probably at least double), so your comparison to the price of a piece of glass in a store is not exactly meaningful.
Windows are only a replacement for electricity generation when you are using the electricity produced to power lightbulbs, which is not true of very many homeowners. Adding a few more windows to you house will do nothing to power your computer, television, oven... Plus, in most places where solar power is really a feasible option, I expect the homeowners would be more worried about heat gain via the windows, as it will only increase their cooling load. And that goes especially for office spaces, which rarely need to be heated.
You are probably correct that most people will get more mileage out of the money spent on adding insulation to your house, but again, you are addressing a completely different problem...
Slashdot Mirror
Never thought I would live to see that statement on Slashdot back when I used Enlightenment...
I think the GP is yet another confirmation that Slashdot needs a "-1, Wrong" mod. Or perhaps a slightly more diplomatic "-1, Factually Incorrect".
It's still just a text editor...
Apparently you didn't start reading /. until after the incident where somebody (supposedly) leaked the Windows NT and 2K source code several years back. It's been a while, but I don't remember there being a lot of comments about freedom fighters. Mostly I remember comments about why Open Source coders shouldn't look at the source code - either because familiarity with the windows code base might taint their ability to contribute to various open source programs, or out of fear that looking at the Windows source code might rob you of your ability to write decent code anymore... (Of course, as with any discussion on Slashdot, there were probably about three clowns for each serious post.)
http://slashdot.org/articles/04/02/12/2114228.shtml
In my experience you've overshot the mark significantly. I know about 3 people with Office 2007, and I never even heard of the compatibility pack before today.
I know what it's called, and what it does. What I want to know, is who thought it would be a great idea to have playing music from somebody else's shared library be handled by a daemon that also happens to be responsible for discovery and configuration of network settings. Other than the fact that they involve the network, I don't understand what the two have in common, and I find it rather silly that I can't play music from somebody else's computer unless I enable a network configuration daemon that I don't want.
SharpDevelop is IMO nearly as good as VS2005 (on par with the Express Editions, at least), I just wish that the MonoDevelop guys would catch up with their version. Last time is used it, it was... unimpressive.
So you're saying that once I upgrade to a 3G cellphone, my network performance should be high enough to support real time voice communication with other people? I can't wait!
It's not a matter of not wanting it. I would love to have it. But the NVidia card on my laptop can't do it. So unless they also have some substantially improved NVidia drivers in the new release, this is a bad thing. And saying that it can be disabled in four clicks (or even one click) isn't very useful, when the problem that keeps me from using it currently is that it makes my mouse cursor disappear.
Another good question: (this applies to 7.04 too)
Why do I need to be running a daemon to view iTunes shared libraries, and why is the daemon that views iTunes shared libraries the same one responsible for Wireless auto-discovery/configuration?
Can somebody please explain the logic behind this one to me? Because it sure would be nice to be able to enable or disable the two of those independently of each other.
The only thing I can figure out is that they found inspiration in Sun's version numbering for Java releases, and decided that they had to do one better. Or is that 0.1?
Brilliant plan, genius.
"Sorry dad. I was dropping my girlfriend off from the movie, and there was an accident on the way to her house. By the time we got there, it was almost 10:00, and the car died right as I was pulling out of the driveway. I couldn't go anywhere once the car quit, so I just had to stay at her house all night."
This is pretty standard legal advice when it comes to software and patents, and if you work for a company that has its own lawyers to tell you such things, they have probably told you just thatLinux contributors that may not get the same legal advice at their day job don't go and freak out. This can't be used to show that Linus had willful intent- all it shows is that he has gotten the same legal advice as anyone else who writes software for a living.
It's because gravity pulls the bad stuff down to the bottom of the globe, where it all collects.
Duh!
As of the end of 2005, the capacity of all of the wind mills in the entire state of California totaled 2100 MW. All of the wind farms in the United States totaled just over 9000 MW. The largest single wind farm in the United States at that time had a 300 MW capacity. (http://www.awea.org/news/Annual_Industry_Rankings_Continued_Growth_031506.html)
These two new reactors will supply almost a third as much power as all of the wind mills in the entire country two years ago.
I'm all for wind power- my house is wind powered- but realistically, it just doesn't have the energy density to be more than a niche player in the electric power business.
We already have the technology to reduce the lifespan (and thus time required for isolation) of nuclear waste down to centuries or even decades. For some reason, it's easier for people to try and imagine shoving our nuclear waste into a deep hole in the ground for the next hundred millennia or so than to do something useful with it (i.e. create more power) as well as reduce its lifespan.
At any rate, the cost of disposal is already included in the electricity rates in the US, and the power companies are paying the government the mandated fee for disposal. That the government isn't actually using that money for disposal is probably not really very surprising to anyone, but also not the fault of the power companies or an inherent flaw of nuclear power.
As far as why they chose nuclear power vs. solar, wind, etc. why don't you go on Google and look for a list of how many solar and wind power plants are out there that will generate 2500 MW of electricity... Hint: I'd be very surprised if you find any. It's been a while since I looked at the numbers, but off the top of my head, anything above about 1500 MW is pretty much guaranteed to be either coal or nuclear, and of the two, I much prefer nuclear. Around 1500 and lower, you'll probably start to see large oil and natural gas plants. Solar and wind power might start to enter the picture in the 500-750 MW region. (Again, these are mostly WAGs based on my memory from looking at the statistics over a year ago, but you get the idea...)
It gets even sadder... As far as I can tell, the only reason Norm Kent is even mentioned is because (according to JT) both Norm Kent and the Florida Bar Association have a history of harassing JT. It appears that the case in question is between JT and the Bar, and Norm Kent has nothing to do with it except in JT's head.
So really, he honestly believes that by doing this he is discrediting the Florida Bar Association.
The only thing this proves is that the Slashdot editors don't even bother to do a cursory glance at TFA before posting anything, but we all knew that anyway...
I disagree. Perhaps it should be easier to turn off - I don't know how difficult it actually is. It would probably also be good to show the option to turn it off very prominently.
But by all means, it should default to on. The problem with having automatic updates for any product default to off is that by and large any time a user does not understand what an option means or why it is important, they will always leave it at the default setting. These are exactly the people who need automatic updates to be turned on the most. Meanwhile, people who actually understand the need to check for security updates and understand the tradeoffs are free to turn them off and look for updates themselves.
This is why Microsoft changed Windows Automatic Updates from default off to default on with XP SP2 - They realized that the people who needed the functionality the most were exactly the people who were least likely to turn it on. (Same with Ubuntu, by the way, and probably most other Linux distros...)
The only time automatic updates are a problem are when there is no obvious way to disable them, or when they overreach in what data they use to determine whether you need an update. (I do find it a little irritating that in Windows, every app has to have it's own update tool- Java and iTunes are are particularly obnoxious- but that's a totally rant...) It sounds like in this case, it is true that there is not an obvious way to disable them (unless you read this guys forum), so that should probably be addressed, but there is at least some way to turn them off for the time being. It does not sound like he is being unreasonable in what information he is using to determine compatible updates, though.
Based on the OP's description, I was picturing the "King's Quest" style adventure games, a genre which started out interesting before it completely devolved into solving bizarre puzzles, finding obscure clues, and using random objects in completely implausible ways that generally required a hint book to figure out.
http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=195224&cid=15996979
I don't really "hate" Java, I just said that I find the Java icon incredibly irritating - because most of the time when I see it, its sitting in the system tray on my computer (often multiple times) telling me that it wants me to upgrade my installed version of Java (when it really means that it wants to install a new version along side the three that are already there).
What does your bank do for people who don't have cell phones, or people who use the pre-paid phones? I know of a few banks who offer something like that as an option, but the ones that I know of don't give out a Java program, they give out a physical token http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:RSA-SecurID-Tokens.jpg. I can't imagine there are many banks here that would require their customers to have a cell phone at all, much less a certain kind.
As far as "running small programs on a mission critical device"- the last time I had a need to run something on my cell phone that wasn't pre-installed, it was a PalmOS device (this was three phones ago), and there was no shortage of software available at the time. For better or worse, Palm OS seems to have been mostly replaced by Windows Mobile (or whatever they call it these days) which seems to be pretty popular among everyone I know who wants their phone to do anything more than make phone calls and send text messages.
I honestly couldn't tell you how many phones sold in the US do or do not support Java, because I have never bothered to look. It's just not a selling feature to anyone that I know. Maybe outside the US having Java on your phone is actually useful for something. Here, as far as I can tell, it's just yet another way for your service provider to charge you more money for extra sh*t that you don't need, because there's generally no way to get any software onto your phone other than buying it through them at ridiculous prices. And if you do have a way to get programs onto your phone other then through your phone provider, then you probably have a windows or palm based phone anyway, so you don't care so much about Java.
How is Java a _must_ for any mobile device?
I'll grant that I'm pretty sure there is a Java Runtime on my current cell phone (I vaguely remember seeing that irritating logo on the box when I bought it) but I'd be quite surprised if I've ever used it. And I'm still trying to figure out what the part about banks writing a password generator has to do with anything at all.
Night-time electric demands are substantially lower than daytime loads. If your electric company meters your electricity based on the time of day, you'll notice that night time rates are often nearly an order of magnitude lower than afternoon rates. I've seen some mid-size office buildings where they install giant tanks of water or some kind of gel underground. They run a refrigeration system at night when electricity is the cheapest, and use it to chill these underground tanks. Then during peak hours, when electricity is the most expensive, they can use them to cool the building instead of their air conditioners. Even given the efficiency losses guaranteed by such a system, it is still substantially cheaper than a traditional system, and probably better for the environment overall, since it reduces the peak load that the power company has to build for, and the wasted energy probably would have been wasted anyway, because nobody needs it. If a power company found that half of their residential customers were moving to grid tied electric systems, they probably still wouldn't have to worry about their night time loads exceeding their daytime loads.
$1/W to manufacture. The actual cost to the consumer would be quite a bit higher (probably at least double), so your comparison to the price of a piece of glass in a store is not exactly meaningful.
Windows are only a replacement for electricity generation when you are using the electricity produced to power lightbulbs, which is not true of very many homeowners. Adding a few more windows to you house will do nothing to power your computer, television, oven... Plus, in most places where solar power is really a feasible option, I expect the homeowners would be more worried about heat gain via the windows, as it will only increase their cooling load. And that goes especially for office spaces, which rarely need to be heated.
You are probably correct that most people will get more mileage out of the money spent on adding insulation to your house, but again, you are addressing a completely different problem...