> Finland is the first country in the world to test universal basic incomes at national level.
That's simply not true. France has created the RMI more than 30 years ago (1988), which is basically equivalent to an universal income, except it was not only for 2000 people but for anyone aged 25+ (1.3 million people benefited from it in France in 2010). It's been replaced by the RSA in 2009 and is now at 559,74 €, identical to Finland's universal basic income (more if you're in a relationship or you've children). The difference with the RMI is that the RSA now forces people to actively seek work, which has always been the goal in the first place.
CGA also supported 640x200 (128,000 pixels) in two colors, here it's 400x150 (60,000 pixels) in monochrome, less than half what CGA provided 36 years ago.
the human eye can detect the *presence* of detail at considerably higher detail than it can actually resolve what that detail is
While UHD TVs have enough resolution (96 pixels/degree) to emulate the ability to resolve what the detail is like letters on a Snellen chart for people with normal or average visual acuity (60-80 pixels/degree), they are not enough for people approaching maximal visual acuity (150 pixels/degree).
And they're very far from supporting Vernier acuity/hyperacuity (450 pixels/degree), which may be argued as giving the ability to resolve what detail is, like for Veronica Seider who could identify people at a 1 mile distance.
most television providers still deliver their content at 720p
Depends on where you live, in France TV is broadcasted at 1080p for all the free 27 channels. Also Ultra HD 4K Blu-ray discs have been available for more than a year already.
Why in the sam hill would I pony up the money for a 10K TV
HDMI is not only used for TV but also for VR, HDMI 2.0 is not enough to support recent headsets like the Pimax 8K X with a single cable, HDMI 2.1 is required for that.
Giving access to your house doesn't look lire a good idea but having something that replaces (or sits next to) your mailbox and that is secure looks like a good idea to me.
In France there are Amazon Lockers as well and while useful, you don't necessarily live near one and/or want to do the extra distance after work to get your package. Having these lockers next to your home or block would be useful, I would be glad to have one.
> The limit of human vision useful for discriminating useful detail is 10 degrees of arc at a resolution of 60 pixels per degree or 600 x 600 per eye.
The limit of Human vision is way higher than that. 60 pixels per degree is only normal visual acuity (20/20), average visual acuity is 85 pixels per degree and the limit is around 150 pixels per degree (what US fighter pilots have in average). And that's only for the ability to resolve pixels, for lines there is Vernier acuity at 450 pixels per degree.
Also 10 of field of view is quite small, the Human field of view is 210x135 binocular without eye movement.
1915 actually, with shorts and extracts from the "Jim, the Penman" movie (Edwin S. Porter/William E. Waddell). In 1922 it was the first public demonstration of a full feature movie, "The Power of Love" (Harry K. Fairall/Robert F. Elder). There had already been showing of the 3D version of "L'Arrivée du Train" by the brothers Lumiere in 1903 but it was for only one person at a time, not an audience.
> One person lamented that computer games nowadays are tied to internet DRM like Steam, that some crucial DCC software is available to rent only now (e.g. Photoshop) and that many "basic freedoms" of the old-school computer nerd are increasingly disappearing.
DRM did already exist in the 80s. In the form of cartridges (MSX, C64, Vic-20, Atari 800XL, TI-99/4A), bad sectors and weak bits on floppy disks, non-standard loaders for cassette tapes, dongles on the parallel port for pro software, etc.
> Another said that Windows 10's spyware aspects made him give up on his beloved PC platform and that he will use Linux and Android devices only from now on
What's the problem then, he has a choice. Nobody is forced to use Windows 10. In the 80s you didn't have much choice for the OS, now you can chose between a multitude of OS, often for free.
> A third complained about zero privacy online, internet advertising, viruses, ransomware, hacking, crapware.
Zero privacy is a user choice, you can easily browse anonymously, disable cookies, use ad-blockers and anti-virus and chose to not use social networks that you think invade your privacy. Also computer viruses and hacking already existed in the 80s.
> I lamented that the hardware industry still hasn't given us anything resembling photorealistic realtime 3D graphics
> and that the current VR trend arrived a full decade later than it should have.
Suitable displays didn't exist a decade ago, several HMDs were released at this period like the eMagin Z800 in 2005, Headplay Visor in 2007 and Vuzix VR920 in 2008. But it was nowhere enough in terms of FOV, resolution and latency to succeed, same thing for the Sony HMZ-T1, SMD ST1080 and Vuzix VR1200 headsets released in 2011/2012.
> A point of general agreement was that big tech companies in particular don't treat computer users with enough respect anymore.
They've always been after your money and have always used all the possible legal tactics to get it, that's just the means that have changed since the apparition of Internet. The laws and the people simply need to adapt and do what is necessary to prevent abuses.
Also it depends on how you look at it. If you're a developer/hacker, big companies like Microsoft, Apple, Oracle, Facebook, Google, IBM, Epic, Valve, etc. have greatly lowered the access to computing tools and information (free programming languages, game engines, SDKs, IDEs, databases, Web frameworks, forums, documentation, free tutorials, etc.) and have mostly embraced the open source movement.
> What do Slashdotters think? Is computing still as cool and fun as it once was, or has something "become irreversibly lost" as computing evolved into a multi-billion dollar global business?
For me it's as cool and even cooler than in the 80s when I started programming. Today you can experiment with a lot of computing technologies basically for free : AR, VR, 3D, computer vision, game creation, Web programming, 3D printing, drones, Raspberry, Arduino, etc. Information is also much easier to find today thanks to Internet.
But if you're only a end-user who doesn't know anything besides Windows 10 and doesn't want to learn anything else, then yes, I guess I can understand why you would see computing as less cool and fun than in the 80s.
Maybe it's only because old IT workers who are still there are the best and most motivated from their generation, others may have moved to other fields or positions (management for example). This natural selection has not yet operated on the newest generation, I guess in 20 years the same study will give similar results.
The ViewMaster is only a 3D viewer though, Google Cardboard is a virtual reality device.
The difference is immersion, which requires head-tracking and a wide field of view. The ViewMaster only had a ~40-60 field of view, Google Cardboard V2 has been designed for a 80 field of view, which is the minimum required for immersion (see : http://www.leepvr.com/sid1992....).
And it's quite obvious that they are crappy compared to what is available now considering the past 20 years of technological progress. The contrary would have been quite surprising.
> Your brain detects objects in your peripheral field and evaluates if and how they (or you) are moving. Interfering with this process can cause you to misjudge relative motion and could cause you to stumble; it might even get you hit by a car one day."
Really? With the tiny FOV existing and future AR glasses are using (17 for Google Glass, ~40 for HoloLens and Magic Leap) how is it supposed to interfere with peripheral vision? The human field of view is ~270 horizontal.
They were actually working on VR long before the Oculus Rift started.
No, Valve was not working on VR long before the Oculus Rift started.
The first protoype of the Oculus Rift was shown in November 2010 (PR1), Valve didn't work on VR until the Virtual Insanity panel at QuakeCon in 2012, as Michael Abrash explained on his blog. They built their first HMD prototype in April 2013, the month after the DK1 was released.
Previously Valve was working on wearable devices and AR. The castAR project was not about VR either and still isn't, until they're able to show the VR clip they've promised in their Kickstarter in 2013.
You obviously don't know what you're talking about, it's beyond me how a post like this can be modded insightful.
If you don't want to invest much time in learning GUI programming I think you'd better use an IDE rather than a GUI library.
If you know a bit of Pascal language, Lazarus (Delphi clone) could be a good choice for example. It's lightweight, produces fast executables (compiled language) and is cross-platform (native GUI on MS Windows, GTK+ on Linux). It also provides a canvas with basic drawing functions, but you can still use OpenGL as a canvas for more complex (and faster) rendering.
I think it's one of the best tools available to rapidely produce simple cross-platform applications.
I don't know MS Reporting Services, so I don't know if they are on par with it, but there are several free reporting tools available already, like BIRT, JasperReports, iReport, OpenReports, Pentaho, SpagoBI, etc. Did you have a look at them ?
Your monitor is probably about 2 feet in front of you, so that is (54/7)*2 = 15.4 inches. So it's like having a 15 inch monitor. The article is wrong about the viewing distance, Dreamax specifications talk about a 54" diagonal seen at 2 meters, which is 6,56167979 feet, not 7 feet.
I'm looking at my monitor from 62 cm (2,034120735 feet), for me it gives : (54/6,56167979)*2,034120735 = 16,740000001"
Slashdot Mirror
> Finland is the first country in the world to test universal basic incomes at national level.
That's simply not true. France has created the RMI more than 30 years ago (1988), which is basically equivalent to an universal income, except it was not only for 2000 people but for anyone aged 25+ (1.3 million people benefited from it in France in 2010). It's been replaced by the RSA in 2009 and is now at 559,74 €, identical to Finland's universal basic income (more if you're in a relationship or you've children). The difference with the RMI is that the RSA now forces people to actively seek work, which has always been the goal in the first place.
CGA also supported 640x200 (128,000 pixels) in two colors, here it's 400x150 (60,000 pixels) in monochrome, less than half what CGA provided 36 years ago.
the human eye can detect the *presence* of detail at considerably higher detail than it can actually resolve what that detail is
While UHD TVs have enough resolution (96 pixels/degree) to emulate the ability to resolve what the detail is like letters on a Snellen chart for people with normal or average visual acuity (60-80 pixels/degree), they are not enough for people approaching maximal visual acuity (150 pixels/degree).
And they're very far from supporting Vernier acuity/hyperacuity (450 pixels/degree), which may be argued as giving the ability to resolve what detail is, like for Veronica Seider who could identify people at a 1 mile distance.
most television providers still deliver their content at 720p
Depends on where you live, in France TV is broadcasted at 1080p for all the free 27 channels. Also Ultra HD 4K Blu-ray discs have been available for more than a year already.
Why in the sam hill would I pony up the money for a 10K TV
HDMI is not only used for TV but also for VR, HDMI 2.0 is not enough to support recent headsets like the Pimax 8K X with a single cable, HDMI 2.1 is required for that.
Giving access to your house doesn't look lire a good idea but having something that replaces (or sits next to) your mailbox and that is secure looks like a good idea to me.
In France there are Amazon Lockers as well and while useful, you don't necessarily live near one and/or want to do the extra distance after work to get your package. Having these lockers next to your home or block would be useful, I would be glad to have one.
> The limit of human vision useful for discriminating useful detail is 10 degrees of arc at a resolution of 60 pixels per degree or 600 x 600 per eye.
The limit of Human vision is way higher than that. 60 pixels per degree is only normal visual acuity (20/20), average visual acuity is 85 pixels per degree and the limit is around 150 pixels per degree (what US fighter pilots have in average). And that's only for the ability to resolve pixels, for lines there is Vernier acuity at 450 pixels per degree.
Also 10 of field of view is quite small, the Human field of view is 210x135 binocular without eye movement.
Oculus Story Studio, not Oculus VR Studio.
1915 actually, with shorts and extracts from the "Jim, the Penman" movie (Edwin S. Porter/William E. Waddell). In 1922 it was the first public demonstration of a full feature movie, "The Power of Love" (Harry K. Fairall/Robert F. Elder). There had already been showing of the 3D version of "L'Arrivée du Train" by the brothers Lumiere in 1903 but it was for only one person at a time, not an audience.
> One person lamented that computer games nowadays are tied to internet DRM like Steam, that some crucial DCC software is available to rent only now (e.g. Photoshop) and that many "basic freedoms" of the old-school computer nerd are increasingly disappearing.
DRM did already exist in the 80s. In the form of cartridges (MSX, C64, Vic-20, Atari 800XL, TI-99/4A), bad sectors and weak bits on floppy disks, non-standard loaders for cassette tapes, dongles on the parallel port for pro software, etc.
> Another said that Windows 10's spyware aspects made him give up on his beloved PC platform and that he will use Linux and Android devices only from now on
What's the problem then, he has a choice. Nobody is forced to use Windows 10. In the 80s you didn't have much choice for the OS, now you can chose between a multitude of OS, often for free.
> A third complained about zero privacy online, internet advertising, viruses, ransomware, hacking, crapware.
Zero privacy is a user choice, you can easily browse anonymously, disable cookies, use ad-blockers and anti-virus and chose to not use social networks that you think invade your privacy. Also computer viruses and hacking already existed in the 80s.
> I lamented that the hardware industry still hasn't given us anything resembling photorealistic realtime 3D graphics
Look at this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
> and that the current VR trend arrived a full decade later than it should have.
Suitable displays didn't exist a decade ago, several HMDs were released at this period like the eMagin Z800 in 2005, Headplay Visor in 2007 and Vuzix VR920 in 2008. But it was nowhere enough in terms of FOV, resolution and latency to succeed, same thing for the Sony HMZ-T1, SMD ST1080 and Vuzix VR1200 headsets released in 2011/2012.
> A point of general agreement was that big tech companies in particular don't treat computer users with enough respect anymore.
They've always been after your money and have always used all the possible legal tactics to get it, that's just the means that have changed since the apparition of Internet. The laws and the people simply need to adapt and do what is necessary to prevent abuses.
Also it depends on how you look at it. If you're a developer/hacker, big companies like Microsoft, Apple, Oracle, Facebook, Google, IBM, Epic, Valve, etc. have greatly lowered the access to computing tools and information (free programming languages, game engines, SDKs, IDEs, databases, Web frameworks, forums, documentation, free tutorials, etc.) and have mostly embraced the open source movement.
> What do Slashdotters think? Is computing still as cool and fun as it once was, or has something "become irreversibly lost" as computing evolved into a multi-billion dollar global business?
For me it's as cool and even cooler than in the 80s when I started programming. Today you can experiment with a lot of computing technologies basically for free : AR, VR, 3D, computer vision, game creation, Web programming, 3D printing, drones, Raspberry, Arduino, etc. Information is also much easier to find today thanks to Internet.
But if you're only a end-user who doesn't know anything besides Windows 10 and doesn't want to learn anything else, then yes, I guess I can understand why you would see computing as less cool and fun than in the 80s.
Maybe it's only because old IT workers who are still there are the best and most motivated from their generation, others may have moved to other fields or positions (management for example). This natural selection has not yet operated on the newest generation, I guess in 20 years the same study will give similar results.
it's as good as a ViewMaster.
The ViewMaster is only a 3D viewer though, Google Cardboard is a virtual reality device.
The difference is immersion, which requires head-tracking and a wide field of view. The ViewMaster only had a ~40-60 field of view, Google Cardboard V2 has been designed for a 80 field of view, which is the minimum required for immersion (see : http://www.leepvr.com/sid1992....).
google cardboard is more comfortable and easier to use than the crappy vr gear we had in the 1990s, which cost many thousands of dollars.
Consumer HMDs in the 90s didn't cost many thousand of dollars, they were under $1000. You obviously don't know what you're talking about.
- VictorMaxx Stuntmaster (1993) : $219
- Victormaxx CyberMaxx (1994) : $699
- Victormaxx CyberMaxx 2.0 (1995) : $889
- Virtual IO i-glasses (1995) : $799
- Forte VFX1 (1995) : $995
- Philips Scuba (1997) : $299
And it's quite obvious that they are crappy compared to what is available now considering the past 20 years of technological progress. The contrary would have been quite surprising.
Looks similar to this one : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Which is at $350 on Amazon : http://www.amazon.com/Wheels-B...
It can be found for ~$150 on Aliexpress IIRC.
> The resulting virtual reality product is set to hit the shelves around Christmas 2015.
Not it's for Q1 2016 : https://www.oculus.com/en-us/b...
> Your brain detects objects in your peripheral field and evaluates if and how they (or you) are moving. Interfering with this process can cause you to misjudge relative motion and could cause you to stumble; it might even get you hit by a car one day."
Really? With the tiny FOV existing and future AR glasses are using (17 for Google Glass, ~40 for HoloLens and Magic Leap) how is it supposed to interfere with peripheral vision? The human field of view is ~270 horizontal.
They were actually working on VR long before the Oculus Rift started.
No, Valve was not working on VR long before the Oculus Rift started.
The first protoype of the Oculus Rift was shown in November 2010 (PR1), Valve didn't work on VR until the Virtual Insanity panel at QuakeCon in 2012, as Michael Abrash explained on his blog. They built their first HMD prototype in April 2013, the month after the DK1 was released.
Previously Valve was working on wearable devices and AR. The castAR project was not about VR either and still isn't, until they're able to show the VR clip they've promised in their Kickstarter in 2013.
You obviously don't know what you're talking about, it's beyond me how a post like this can be modded insightful.
If you don't want to invest much time in learning GUI programming I think you'd better use an IDE rather than a GUI library.
If you know a bit of Pascal language, Lazarus (Delphi clone) could be a good choice for example. It's lightweight, produces fast executables (compiled language) and is cross-platform (native GUI on MS Windows, GTK+ on Linux). It also provides a canvas with basic drawing functions, but you can still use OpenGL as a canvas for more complex (and faster) rendering.
I think it's one of the best tools available to rapidely produce simple cross-platform applications.
I don't know MS Reporting Services, so I don't know if they are on par with it, but there are several free reporting tools available already, like BIRT, JasperReports, iReport, OpenReports, Pentaho, SpagoBI, etc. Did you have a look at them ?
I'm looking at my monitor from 62 cm (2,034120735 feet), for me it gives :
(54/6,56167979)*2,034120735 = 16,740000001"
This is better than looking at my 17" CRT monitor (actually 15,90") since they lie on the real diagonals (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_display#Diagonal_size ).
The equivalent monitor size viewed at 2 feet would be :
fov = 2 * atan((54/2)/(200/2,54)) = 37,853683264 degrees
diagonal = tan(fov/2) * (2 * 12) * 2 = 16,4592"
A little bit worse than looking at a 17" LCD monitor, but still better than looking at a 17" CRT monitor...
" MPlayer is a linux only app "
t a/
No, MPlayer isn't a Linux only app, it works on many Unices, MacOS X and MS Windows. Latest version (1.0pre6) is available here for MS Windows : http://www.mplayerhq.hu/MPlayer/releases/win32-be
> Secondly, under the GPL for non-commercial usage only
Wrong, see this.
Under the GNU GPL you could even sell copies of the Linux version of QT.
and don't forget pornview :v iew
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/utils/porn
Debian may not be desktop ready, but it sure is prOn ready...
Their first title "We like the moon", is already a hit :
We like the moon
apt-get install curl
a fb6ae049ae214fc034aad839a91985ea187bea5786f362d841 a61948bf2688f01f87fb6fdf0e7ceb61c22186fb/nova_eu_3 0[12-14]c[01-08]_mp4_300.mov -O
curl http://a768.g.akamai.net/5/768/142/3f9e9589/1a1a1