Good point, but that actually is the traditional look for animation. The cell technique lends itself very well to highly detailed backgrounds, and less detailed main characters, because the backgrounds don't need to change as much. Cell animation means that the characters are printed on celluloid, with a transparent background, and then can be moved around on a detailed background.
There was a great Heinlein story about very long-lived people. Actually, in many of his stories. Anyways, the people were long-lived because they bred themselves to be long-lived. But when they were discovered by the society as a whole, the society thought that they had some secret medical advantage. In the end, with the joint effort of the world, they had found the "secret" -- actually inventing a new method.
The point is, we can usually find a way around any limit, even if our convictions that we can are not based on reality.
Too true. Still waiting for a browser that implements all of CSS...not even AMAYA (the W3C's browser) has achieved this yet. Ironically, MSIE is far more standards compliant than Netscape Navigator.
PDF isn't exactly opensource, but it is an open standard. That's why software applications like GhostView and xPDF are around. I don't know about Display PDF, but the Solaris (Open Windows?) windowing environment uses Display Postscript, which is pretty cool.
You are making the basic mistake of assuming that the "computers" you program are Computors in general. This movie has nothing to do with computers. The field that is actually relevant here is Cognitive Science, as David was not programmed in the traditional sense, but does represent advanced understanding of how cognition takes place. It would have been more unrealistic if there were a non-destructive way to program in limits or reset the "software" (which I think does not exist).
Framemaker is alive and well on several other Unix platforms, including Solaris. I believe that some of Adobe's other products are also available for Solaris or Irix.
Re:*BSD is dying -- Kevin, give it a rest!
on
FreeBSD on DVD
·
· Score: 1
This is probably an amusing fake. Note how the author of this post is also anonymous. Further:
A) The BSD is dying posts don't really discredit anything but the authors anyhow.
B) I've seen some of the posts that weren't anonymous
GRASS has been available for GNU/Linux for some time. In fact, at my work we use GRASS with SUSE Linux rather than the SUN Workstations that we have because of the superior speed.
I don't see how this is redundant. This was the first post on this topic. I suggest anybody who hasn't reads Killobyte, by Piers Anthony. It was a quite interesting insight into the gaming world, written well before the popularity of online games reached its current height.
I'd say this says more about the problems of standardized tests than it does about open source v closed source.
It is astonishing how much meaning we attach to a test where you sit down for 1 or two hours. It might be a bad day, you may have just crammed the night before; either way, the score won't indicate what you know. And then to make decisions about a students career based on this exam is simply criminal. How the students actually perform in the classroom and on homework and projects should have told these adminstrators right away that something was wrong. No test should substitute for actually interacting with the teachers and students.
You'd think we already knew this, but unfortunately the trend is towards ever more standardized tests. Sadly, this is a trend the our "President" is encouraging, at the expense of real progress. Unfortunately, in my state so is the board of Regents and Commissioner of Education.
This sounds very much like what Umberto Eco did with his novel about the Templars, Focault's Pendulum. It was a somewhat satirical novel about the people that believe in conspiracy theories and secret cults. This reviewer sounds like a character in his novel:-)
Of course, Eco's profession is semiotics, so it is his job to find signs. Kubrick did have very deep films, but some of the connections this reviewer is drawing seem to be a bit of a reach.
syntax can make a big difference. Look at the benefit of the (mod) syntax in mathematics. It makes the concept of divisibility much more useful, and many applications would probably never have been discovered without that syntax.
OOP is also greatly aided by syntax, although it may be possible in some languages that don't directly support it. I'm just pointing out that a new way of looking at a problem is never a bad thing.
The point of most modern programming languages is to solve problems quickly, but in terms of the programmers time, not the time it takes the machine to execute the code. Compromises can be made where it is not too difficult to implement a more (computationally) efficient method, but in general the machine is worth much less than the person. Of course, a compiler should use as many tricks as possible for optimization, but a language should only make them when there is a significant speed advantange relative to a small programming efficiency loss.
Do we really need that list of programming languages to grow?
Yes. The beauty of programming languages is that there is one for every purpose. As the uses for a computer increase in number and change in nature, it is natural that new languages get invented to better fit those uses. Of course, old languages die hard, but the language most used is the relevant one.
With that said, the curse of all programming is the so-called general purpose language, that tries to be all things and ends up nothing.
In the rest of your post, what you say seems true - but doesn't imply that we have too many programming languages. Rather, think of the long list of languages as a search for the many best solutions, each version getting a bit better. Having many languages to choose from is a blessing, not a curse.
The Stirling engine is one of the oldest kinds of external combustion engines, invented way back in 1816. It is very simple, much less complex than the internal combustion engine that is more popular and was first used for steam power. I remember in HS our ecology class was researching it's use with hydrogen created by solar power and hydrolysis to use as a renewable energy source, but the wasted energy is incredible. It is still useful because of how many different types of fuel can be used with it, it is safe, and the pollution level is low. At any rate, it is certainly not the next "great thing"
More info here , though from a biased perspective.
Fair use has been well defined through precedent and copyright law. It covers all of the exceptions to copyright law. Some of these have historically included education and parody. With computers, a backup copy has become part of these provisions as well.
Here is the relevant law:
Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified in that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.
In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include --
the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
the nature of the copyrighted work;
the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.
IANAL, but according to NYS law, you cannot prosecute for computer trespass unless there is a barrier that was broken by the intruder to access your computer. This is a key element to the crime. With no password, you really are screwing yourself.
My university was the first in the nation to have an extensive wireless network. I guess the cutting edge cuts both ways...
but on the other hand, we are very security minded. Anybody dumb enough not to use kerberos authentication may deserve what they get, since it is pretty simple to use.
Still, I would not be surprised if some clever folk on campus had already discovered the possibilities - several people transmit their passwords over unsecured Telnet already, and I know that some of those passwords are intercepted.
Consumer advocate Ralph Nader had been protesting this bill all along. The negative publicity this would have created would have been horrendous. It is quite possible that political reasons motivated President Clinton rather than anything else. It seems like this bill would have been handy for the government's use, although suppressive of free speech.
Slashdot Mirror
Good point, but that actually is the traditional look for animation. The cell technique lends itself very well to highly detailed backgrounds, and less detailed main characters, because the backgrounds don't need to change as much. Cell animation means that the characters are printed on celluloid, with a transparent background, and then can be moved around on a detailed background.
The point is, we can usually find a way around any limit, even if our convictions that we can are not based on reality.
What do you mean? No Such Agency
Too true. Still waiting for a browser that implements all of CSS...not even AMAYA (the W3C's browser) has achieved this yet. Ironically, MSIE is far more standards compliant than Netscape Navigator.
PDF isn't exactly opensource, but it is an open standard. That's why software applications like GhostView and xPDF are around. I don't know about Display PDF, but the Solaris (Open Windows?) windowing environment uses Display Postscript, which is pretty cool.
I think WordPerfect and Wordstar were around waay before Microsoft Word.
How about Gstreamer? I believe Slashdot has reported on this a few times already.
You are making the basic mistake of assuming that the "computers" you program are Computors in general. This movie has nothing to do with computers. The field that is actually relevant here is Cognitive Science, as David was not programmed in the traditional sense, but does represent advanced understanding of how cognition takes place. It would have been more unrealistic if there were a non-destructive way to program in limits or reset the "software" (which I think does not exist).
Framemaker is alive and well on several other Unix platforms, including Solaris. I believe that some of Adobe's other products are also available for Solaris or Irix.
A) The BSD is dying posts don't really discredit anything but the authors anyhow.
B) I've seen some of the posts that weren't anonymous
actually, DVD stands for nothing.
GRASS has been available for GNU/Linux for some time. In fact, at my work we use GRASS with SUSE Linux rather than the SUN Workstations that we have because of the superior speed.
I don't see how this is redundant. This was the first post on this topic. I suggest anybody who hasn't reads Killobyte, by Piers Anthony. It was a quite interesting insight into the gaming world, written well before the popularity of online games reached its current height.
It is astonishing how much meaning we attach to a test where you sit down for 1 or two hours. It might be a bad day, you may have just crammed the night before; either way, the score won't indicate what you know. And then to make decisions about a students career based on this exam is simply criminal. How the students actually perform in the classroom and on homework and projects should have told these adminstrators right away that something was wrong. No test should substitute for actually interacting with the teachers and students.
You'd think we already knew this, but unfortunately the trend is towards ever more standardized tests. Sadly, this is a trend the our "President" is encouraging, at the expense of real progress. Unfortunately, in my state so is the board of Regents and Commissioner of Education.
It sounds like this author just had his initial brain storming session, and then forgot to edit it afterwards. :)
Of course, Eco's profession is semiotics, so it is his job to find signs. Kubrick did have very deep films, but some of the connections this reviewer is drawing seem to be a bit of a reach.
OOP is also greatly aided by syntax, although it may be possible in some languages that don't directly support it. I'm just pointing out that a new way of looking at a problem is never a bad thing.
The point of most modern programming languages is to solve problems quickly, but in terms of the programmers time, not the time it takes the machine to execute the code. Compromises can be made where it is not too difficult to implement a more (computationally) efficient method, but in general the machine is worth much less than the person. Of course, a compiler should use as many tricks as possible for optimization, but a language should only make them when there is a significant speed advantange relative to a small programming efficiency loss.
Yes. The beauty of programming languages is that there is one for every purpose. As the uses for a computer increase in number and change in nature, it is natural that new languages get invented to better fit those uses. Of course, old languages die hard, but the language most used is the relevant one.
With that said, the curse of all programming is the so-called general purpose language, that tries to be all things and ends up nothing.
In the rest of your post, what you say seems true - but doesn't imply that we have too many programming languages. Rather, think of the long list of languages as a search for the many best solutions, each version getting a bit better. Having many languages to choose from is a blessing, not a curse.
Hah! Good luck trying to bring down a CMU server w/ the Slashdot effect. All OC3s...
Mod this redundant.
The Stirling engine is one of the oldest kinds of external combustion engines, invented way back in 1816. It is very simple, much less complex than the internal combustion engine that is more popular and was first used for steam power. I remember in HS our ecology class was researching it's use with hydrogen created by solar power and hydrolysis to use as a renewable energy source, but the wasted energy is incredible. It is still useful because of how many different types of fuel can be used with it, it is safe, and the pollution level is low. At any rate, it is certainly not the next "great thing"
More info here , though from a biased perspective.
Here is the relevant law:
Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976. Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified in that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.
In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include --
- the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
- the nature of the copyrighted work;
- the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
- the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.More information available here.
but on the other hand, we are very security minded. Anybody dumb enough not to use kerberos authentication may deserve what they get, since it is pretty simple to use.
Still, I would not be surprised if some clever folk on campus had already discovered the possibilities - several people transmit their passwords over unsecured Telnet already, and I know that some of those passwords are intercepted.
I am not positive this is a good thing.
Consumer advocate Ralph Nader had been protesting this bill all along. The negative publicity this would have created would have been horrendous. It is quite possible that political reasons motivated President Clinton rather than anything else. It seems like this bill would have been handy for the government's use, although suppressive of free speech.