Re: BSOD crap is getting old
on
Digital VCRs
·
· Score: 1
Ummm..."Explorer caused a general protection fault in module USER.EXE". Happened to me about three hours ago. At work, on my beyond-stinky IBM Aptiva, this is a thrice-weekly occurance.
Of course crashes are caused by bad programmers. Who ELSE would be responsible for ill-behaved software, the Easter Bunny? A not inconsiderable number of these bad programmers work for Microsoft. In fact, some might argue that it's an identical relationship, but I'll leave that as an exercise for the class.
Of course it's a rehash of the toolbox. The reason is, if you want legacy code to work, you have to have a toolbox for it to call. This implies that it's somehow bad to allow old software to work, which is what the previous poster was pointing out would be a Bad Thing. Can't have it both ways! Is it possible to make a better operating system if you start tabula rasa? Sure! But nobody will buy it. Old software can be easily migrated with Carbon (just like the 68k emulator smoothed the transition to PowerPC), and new code will be written in ObjC (how are they going to "kill" this? If people know it and want to use it to write Mac software, is Apple going to tell them no?) or Java (which is nowadays a popular programming language, why SHOULDN'T Apple use those brains).
Seems to me like you're objecting to the new OS because it's too flexible. : )
Two data points. My Mac (an aging 6100 with MacOS 8.6) constantly runs ICQ, Nutscrape, Eudora, IPNetRouter (a software router firewall), and my notoriously shoddy Road Runner Manager (to connect to the cable modem). The last time the computer was rebooted was a month ago, when I upgraded the operating system. My PC (with twice as much RAM and ten times the storage space) running Win98 has crashed four times today. Three of the crashes were GPF's caused by Explorer.
Does Apple have the resolve to switch to OSX? You're for damn skippy they do. Note that this is a company that implemented a switch from 68000 architecture to PowerPC, with close to ZERO deleterious effects on the user base. Were there teething problems? You betcha. NOTHING like going from, say, Win3.1 to 95/98 or installing NT on anything. Porting to Carbon (the new MacOSX API) is TRIVIAL. It's EASY EASY EASY to do, and it's a no brainer for anybody who wants to sell software in the very profitable Mac market.
Note that my comments are restricted to mass market consumer operating systems. No comparisons to truly reliable operating systems is expressed or implied. : )
If buying the tuner cost the same as a new, larger TV, why would you want to go that way? Modular engineering adds expense. In the computer realm, it's likely that there will be a substantial number of humans who will pay this expense. It's not right, however, for this minority of users (of which I am a part time member) to insist that our needs must be served to the exclusion of those who want to buy simple appliance computers. It's a big market, all, there's room for everybody. Relax. : )
Re:Fashion=Less Attractive
on
Cool PC Cases
·
· Score: 1
In an external expansion chassis, connected via FireWire. Works for me...
500mHz processor (let's save the X86 vs whoever holy war for somebody else, 'specially since PowerPC 0wnZ...; )
USB port FireWire port
Not listed, but CERTAINLY a no brainer, would be a 100bt Ethernet port. I'll go on record and say that I can find uses for such a box. If it has a sufficiently good video card, it could easily replace my current PC. I don't like serial ports. I don't like PS/2 ports. ISA slots are vile. PCI slots, while utilitarian, are mostly (in my box) for correcting shortcomings of the motherboard.
You say that it's cheaper to replace a net card or a modem or a video card than the whole computer. You're absolutely right. But, if you can buy a mobo whose video performance is, say, 90% of whatever state of the art video card is this week, for the same price as that video card, why is this bad?
In closing, YOU don't have to buy one. : ) PLENTY of companies out there are nipping at Intel's heels with open standards. For my money, it's the only Intel product I've EVER been really interested in. (I don't count the Celeron 300A, because that's only interesting if you overclock it to ludicrous speed, and Intel doesn't like that. : )
My discman's not upgradeable, and you know what? It doesn't need to be. It's a cheap, almost-disposeable, serviceable device. I've got a list of similar devices as long as my arm. Do you have any idea the bewildering array of SLR cameras that are available on the market? Do you really think that the personal computer market is going to be MORE streamlined than that? I think that's absurd. What Intel is talking about here is allowing a whole bunch of not-technically-savvy people access to the information resources that you and I enjoy today. The elitist notion that "they" (the unwashed masses who like appliance cars and appliance computers, two things I don't personally care for) don't deserve access to these resources (not a view that I think you're espousing here, but it's a short step away) is elitist and ridiculous. Nobody's going to take away your (and my) fun toys. We're just going to have to make the same considered buying decisions we do now. Instead of having 300 motherboards to choose between with feature set X, we'll only have 50. They'll probably be cheaper and easier to use, but that's OK with me.
I hate jumpers. I hate the way the back of my computer looks. Why SHOULDN'T we able to make aesthetic choices as well as performance choices? If entity X (where X is any slashdot reader) likes their putty colored minitower, more power to them. If there are enough like minded entities, putty colored minitowers will be available forever. Me? I can't wait to kick this wastebasket lookin' thing to the curb. Am I willing to pay a functionality price to achieve this aim? No, but I don't think I'll really have to. Will I have to pay a FLEXIBILITY price in order to achieve my aesthetic aim? Possibly. I'm willing to make certain sacrifices. That's not to say that you have to, but shouldn't I be allowed to?
To totally sidetrack the issue, I've been beta-testing Time Warner Austin's new digital cable feed. It was kinda neat...this cable guy knocked on my door with three brand new cable boxes and a tiger team of cable TV jedis. They took my apartment by storm and upgraded everything. I'm kinda maso-menos on it. The program guide is great. You get picture in picture view of the channel you're watching, and a scrollable list of program choices. We now get a STACK of new channels (SPEEDVISION! WOO HOO!), and a passel of new premium stuff (we've got the full boat cable package). The box (a Scientific American piece of hardware with a nifty phaser-looking remote) has a USB port in the back...I haven't figured out why yet. It also has an Ethernet jack (not for cable modem...I've still got a separate box for that).
Drawbacks....artifacts artifacts artifacts. Dark movie scenes have box artifacts all over the place. Whatever CODEC they're using is rather stinky. Reception is OK, until it goes RealPlayer on me (breaks up into fairly random blocks of picture data, then freezes) which happens several times a month.
It's kind of a mixed bag, all told. The channel selection and the guide are great. The box is neat from a geek appeal factor, but I've yet to find out how to make it do anything supercool. The artifacts range from unnoticeable to downright annoying...YMMV.
now that I've totally clouded the issue, back to your regularly scheduled programming. : )
Look, if AOL walked up to MY door with a sack full of money, I wouldn't turn 'em away. In my opinion, grousing about somebody else "selling out" is restricted to people who haven't been given the opportunity to sell out. If it gives the ppl at Nullsoft the financial scratch to go do something else cool, bully for them! I like Winamp a lot. It's feature rich, nicely modular, and well-supported. However, there are only so many features you can throw at an audio app before it becomes bloaty, and I think that Winamp might be nearing that cusp. Bully for them if they sold it and want to go do something new. (Like, say, sailing to Barbados or whatever...that's what I'd do!)
If it was Microsoft's sack full of money, on the other hand, I'd find a big dog to feed 'em to. A guy's got to have his standards! : )
Re:Wearables are the future
on
PDA+MP3 Player
·
· Score: 1
The only problem I see is that magic free satellite Internet pipe you're talking about. Let me know when that exists for $50/month unlimited access. I'll buy two. : )
Those words work in a free market economy, which Microsoft has spent uncountable billions of dollars to destroy. They have repeatedly engaged in a pattern of destructive and illegal behavior, so therefore they'll be subject to punishment under the law. When we get to a free market OS economy, "supply" and "demand" will be back in force.
Before you start calling names, you might want to proofread more carefully. The energy required to create the food for humans will be MORE than the energy coming out of them. Humans do not spontaneously generate energy (unless our appendix is actually a matter/antimatter reactor). You're right, the energy is not going to increase, but your previous statement is backwards.
I don't understand how the amount of time that's gone in to getting this thing to work relates to how long it's going to take to finish the testing and prototyping. Keep in mind that this isn't GM or Boeing funding this thing...it's ONE DUDE scrounging for venture capital. Timescales will be long.
The other big question I have about automated highways would be driver attention. If the driver isn't having to control the car, that driver's inattention to their surroundings will grow rapidly (even moreso than the people who are supposed to be controlling their cars now). How are you going to get a driver who's reading the newspaper to a) sense that there's an emergency b) get good situational awareness c) take control of the vehicle d) get safely out of trouble rapidly enough to be safe? Consider that the time between one driver stepping on the brakes and the driver behind him seeing the brake lights and stepping on the brakes is close to.5-.7 seconds.
The ONLY way an automated highway system would work, IMHO, if it was failsafe to the nines, and NEVER relied on driver intervention. There is no way to bring a driver's nervous system online to take control of the car quickly enough to be safe in an accident.
Ducted fans (like the Moller) are orders of magnitude quieter than jets (like the Harrier).
One thing that hasn't been touched on here (which is likely to spark some interesting thoughts) is that Mr. Moller's vision is for a completely automated, pilotless system. That means, you climb into your SkyCar (which likely will not be owned buy you, but be available to you on a subscription service from a vertiport), tell it where you want to go, and it will automagically whisk you away to your destination.
Hold on...my car has a range of about 300 miles (it's a Miata...teeny gas tank for a teeny car). I've seen few cars with much greater than 400 mph range...seems to me like you'd have to make the same number of gas stops in a given trip whether flying one of these things or driving...the trip is just compressed. How is this bad?
By definition, people who volunteer to do something are not slaves.
By definition, people who are paid to do something are not slaves.
If it develops free (speech) software, it is free software development. Whether it cost somebody money to generate that software, GPL==free software. If YOU don't want to do that, don't.
Digital (rather than analog) data is a boon IFF you're trying to transmit it. You have to be one hell of a lot smarter than me (which is, admittedly, a feat accomplished by many pieces of lawn furniture) to conceive of a way to transmit data in an analog format. It's absolutely a compromise, but it can be a terribly cost effective one. (EG DVD, which when done well, provides SUPERLATIVE quality.)
I never got the opinion that 3PO would be capable of obfuscation. Seems too scatter-brained. : ) R2, on the other hand, seems good at not telling 3PO everything. Cagey little droid, he is...
That's what I figured...since something like, what, 80% of the entire imagery is rendered, it makes sense to digitize the whole shooting match and edit electronically. I was alluding to an earlier Slashdot thread where many people expressed concern that movies captured digitally would have much lower picture quality than film. I just don't see how that would be the case. IFF a very high data-rate transmission method is found (a VERY thorny problem to begin with), digital recording, editing, and distribution seems like it would be orders of magnitude cheaper.
Wonder if he could do the transmission with lasers....
Your point about film students is an excellent one. I think we're on the cusp of a whole new bunch of imaginative, high-quality Indie movies. That'd be a Good Thing.
I can't cite the article, but I read somewhere that Lucas actually did use some digital photography for some parts of Episode 1, and he defies anybody to figure out which shots. The context implied that he is not talking about one of the many fully-rendered scenes, but some photography of meatspace actor types.
As far as the digital filmmaking question goes, I must be missing something. Obviously, several scenes in Episode 1 were rendered at sufficient resolution to be almost indistinguishable from film, so I'd argue there's no reason why the entire movie couldn't be captured digitally. I guess the question would be what resolution would be sufficient for high quality digital projection of the movie...that'd have to be a MONSTER datastream.
Lucas launching his own satellite and using that for delivery of the next films does not seem awfully far fetched.
Ah, grasshopper, but 3P0 wasn't with Chewie when Lando betrayed them! He was in the cell waiting to be reassembled. Vader may have seen an R2 unit leaving with Our Heroes, and he may have even seen some indiscriminate protocol droid in pieces on Chewie's back, but he'd have no way to identify them as HIS droids.
I'm going to be interested to find out what happens to R2's and 3PO's memory banks in the next two movies. At some point, 3PO's memory MUST be wiped, and likely R2's as well. That of course brings up the question whether the droids are in any meaningful sense the same droids as we saw in Ep1.
Slashdot Mirror
Ummm..."Explorer caused a general protection fault in module USER.EXE". Happened to me about three hours ago. At work, on my beyond-stinky IBM Aptiva, this is a thrice-weekly occurance.
Of course crashes are caused by bad programmers. Who ELSE would be responsible for ill-behaved software, the Easter Bunny? A not inconsiderable number of these bad programmers work for Microsoft. In fact, some might argue that it's an identical relationship, but I'll leave that as an exercise for the class.
Of course it's a rehash of the toolbox. The reason is, if you want legacy code to work, you have to have a toolbox for it to call. This implies that it's somehow bad to allow old software to work, which is what the previous poster was pointing out would be a Bad Thing. Can't have it both ways! Is it possible to make a better operating system if you start tabula rasa? Sure! But nobody will buy it. Old software can be easily migrated with Carbon (just like the 68k emulator smoothed the transition to PowerPC), and new code will be written in ObjC (how are they going to "kill" this? If people know it and want to use it to write Mac software, is Apple going to tell them no?) or Java (which is nowadays a popular programming language, why SHOULDN'T Apple use those brains).
Seems to me like you're objecting to the new OS because it's too flexible. : )
Two data points. My Mac (an aging 6100 with MacOS 8.6) constantly runs ICQ, Nutscrape, Eudora, IPNetRouter (a software router firewall), and my notoriously shoddy Road Runner Manager (to connect to the cable modem). The last time the computer was rebooted was a month ago, when I upgraded the operating system. My PC (with twice as much RAM and ten times the storage space) running Win98 has crashed four times today. Three of the crashes were GPF's caused by Explorer.
Does Apple have the resolve to switch to OSX? You're for damn skippy they do. Note that this is a company that implemented a switch from 68000 architecture to PowerPC, with close to ZERO deleterious effects on the user base. Were there teething problems? You betcha. NOTHING like going from, say, Win3.1 to 95/98 or installing NT on anything. Porting to Carbon (the new MacOSX API) is TRIVIAL. It's EASY EASY EASY to do, and it's a no brainer for anybody who wants to sell software in the very profitable Mac market.
Note that my comments are restricted to mass market consumer operating systems. No comparisons to truly reliable operating systems is expressed or implied. : )
If buying the tuner cost the same as a new, larger TV, why would you want to go that way? Modular engineering adds expense. In the computer realm, it's likely that there will be a substantial number of humans who will pay this expense. It's not right, however, for this minority of users (of which I am a part time member) to insist that our needs must be served to the exclusion of those who want to buy simple appliance computers. It's a big market, all, there's room for everybody. Relax. : )
In an external expansion chassis, connected via FireWire. Works for me...
Good. Right. Take a look at what's inside it.
500mHz processor (let's save the X86 vs whoever holy war for somebody else, 'specially since PowerPC 0wnZ...; )
USB port
FireWire port
Not listed, but CERTAINLY a no brainer, would be a 100bt Ethernet port. I'll go on record and say that I can find uses for such a box. If it has a sufficiently good video card, it could easily replace my current PC. I don't like serial ports. I don't like PS/2 ports. ISA slots are vile. PCI slots, while utilitarian, are mostly (in my box) for correcting shortcomings of the motherboard.
You say that it's cheaper to replace a net card or a modem or a video card than the whole computer. You're absolutely right. But, if you can buy a mobo whose video performance is, say, 90% of whatever state of the art video card is this week, for the same price as that video card, why is this bad?
In closing, YOU don't have to buy one. : ) PLENTY of companies out there are nipping at Intel's heels with open standards. For my money, it's the only Intel product I've EVER been really interested in. (I don't count the Celeron 300A, because that's only interesting if you overclock it to ludicrous speed, and Intel doesn't like that. : )
Upon rereading my post, I noticed how circular my statement beginning and ending with "elitist" was. Please excuse the rotten rhetoric.
My discman's not upgradeable, and you know what? It doesn't need to be. It's a cheap, almost-disposeable, serviceable device. I've got a list of similar devices as long as my arm. Do you have any idea the bewildering array of SLR cameras that are available on the market? Do you really think that the personal computer market is going to be MORE streamlined than that? I think that's absurd. What Intel is talking about here is allowing a whole bunch of not-technically-savvy people access to the information resources that you and I enjoy today. The elitist notion that "they" (the unwashed masses who like appliance cars and appliance computers, two things I don't personally care for) don't deserve access to these resources (not a view that I think you're espousing here, but it's a short step away) is elitist and ridiculous. Nobody's going to take away your (and my) fun toys. We're just going to have to make the same considered buying decisions we do now. Instead of having 300 motherboards to choose between with feature set X, we'll only have 50. They'll probably be cheaper and easier to use, but that's OK with me.
I hate jumpers. I hate the way the back of my computer looks. Why SHOULDN'T we able to make aesthetic choices as well as performance choices? If entity X (where X is any slashdot reader) likes their putty colored minitower, more power to them. If there are enough like minded entities, putty colored minitowers will be available forever. Me? I can't wait to kick this wastebasket lookin' thing to the curb. Am I willing to pay a functionality price to achieve this aim? No, but I don't think I'll really have to. Will I have to pay a FLEXIBILITY price in order to achieve my aesthetic aim? Possibly. I'm willing to make certain sacrifices. That's not to say that you have to, but shouldn't I be allowed to?
/rant off
: )
To totally sidetrack the issue, I've been beta-testing Time Warner Austin's new digital cable feed. It was kinda neat...this cable guy knocked on my door with three brand new cable boxes and a tiger team of cable TV jedis. They took my apartment by storm and upgraded everything. I'm kinda maso-menos on it. The program guide is great. You get picture in picture view of the channel you're watching, and a scrollable list of program choices. We now get a STACK of new channels (SPEEDVISION! WOO HOO!), and a passel of new premium stuff (we've got the full boat cable package). The box (a Scientific American piece of hardware with a nifty phaser-looking remote) has a USB port in the back...I haven't figured out why yet. It also has an Ethernet jack (not for cable modem...I've still got a separate box for that).
Drawbacks....artifacts artifacts artifacts. Dark movie scenes have box artifacts all over the place. Whatever CODEC they're using is rather stinky. Reception is OK, until it goes RealPlayer on me (breaks up into fairly random blocks of picture data, then freezes) which happens several times a month.
It's kind of a mixed bag, all told. The channel selection and the guide are great. The box is neat from a geek appeal factor, but I've yet to find out how to make it do anything supercool. The artifacts range from unnoticeable to downright annoying...YMMV.
now that I've totally clouded the issue, back to your regularly scheduled programming. : )
Ask Camus and those other nutty existentialists. : )
Look, if AOL walked up to MY door with a sack full of money, I wouldn't turn 'em away. In my opinion, grousing about somebody else "selling out" is restricted to people who haven't been given the opportunity to sell out. If it gives the ppl at Nullsoft the financial scratch to go do something else cool, bully for them! I like Winamp a lot. It's feature rich, nicely modular, and well-supported. However, there are only so many features you can throw at an audio app before it becomes bloaty, and I think that Winamp might be nearing that cusp. Bully for them if they sold it and want to go do something new. (Like, say, sailing to Barbados or whatever...that's what I'd do!)
If it was Microsoft's sack full of money, on the other hand, I'd find a big dog to feed 'em to. A guy's got to have his standards! : )
The only problem I see is that magic free satellite Internet pipe you're talking about. Let me know when that exists for $50/month unlimited access. I'll buy two. : )
Those words work in a free market economy, which Microsoft has spent uncountable billions of dollars to destroy. They have repeatedly engaged in a pattern of destructive and illegal behavior, so therefore they'll be subject to punishment under the law. When we get to a free market OS economy, "supply" and "demand" will be back in force.
Before you start calling names, you might want to proofread more carefully. The energy required to create the food for humans will be MORE than the energy coming out of them. Humans do not spontaneously generate energy (unless our appendix is actually a matter/antimatter reactor). You're right, the energy is not going to increase, but your previous statement is backwards.
I don't understand how the amount of time that's gone in to getting this thing to work relates to how long it's going to take to finish the testing and prototyping. Keep in mind that this isn't GM or Boeing funding this thing...it's ONE DUDE scrounging for venture capital. Timescales will be long.
The other big question I have about automated highways would be driver attention. If the driver isn't having to control the car, that driver's inattention to their surroundings will grow rapidly (even moreso than the people who are supposed to be controlling their cars now). How are you going to get a driver who's reading the newspaper to a) sense that there's an emergency b) get good situational awareness c) take control of the vehicle d) get safely out of trouble rapidly enough to be safe? Consider that the time between one driver stepping on the brakes and the driver behind him seeing the brake lights and stepping on the brakes is close to .5-.7 seconds.
The ONLY way an automated highway system would work, IMHO, if it was failsafe to the nines, and NEVER relied on driver intervention. There is no way to bring a driver's nervous system online to take control of the car quickly enough to be safe in an accident.
Well, if you can design a better aircraft than this fellow, I'll buy one from you not him.
Ducted fans (like the Moller) are orders of magnitude quieter than jets (like the Harrier).
One thing that hasn't been touched on here (which is likely to spark some interesting thoughts) is that Mr. Moller's vision is for a completely automated, pilotless system. That means, you climb into your SkyCar (which likely will not be owned buy you, but be available to you on a subscription service from a vertiport), tell it where you want to go, and it will automagically whisk you away to your destination.
How do you like THEM apples?
Hold on...my car has a range of about 300 miles (it's a Miata...teeny gas tank for a teeny car). I've seen few cars with much greater than 400 mph range...seems to me like you'd have to make the same number of gas stops in a given trip whether flying one of these things or driving...the trip is just compressed. How is this bad?
By definition, people who volunteer to do something are not slaves.
By definition, people who are paid to do something are not slaves.
If it develops free (speech) software, it is free software development. Whether it cost somebody money to generate that software, GPL==free software. If YOU don't want to do that, don't.
Digital (rather than analog) data is a boon IFF you're trying to transmit it. You have to be one hell of a lot smarter than me (which is, admittedly, a feat accomplished by many pieces of lawn furniture) to conceive of a way to transmit data in an analog format. It's absolutely a compromise, but it can be a terribly cost effective one. (EG DVD, which when done well, provides SUPERLATIVE quality.)
I never got the opinion that 3PO would be capable of obfuscation. Seems too scatter-brained. : ) R2, on the other hand, seems good at not telling 3PO everything. Cagey little droid, he is...
That's what I figured...since something like, what, 80% of the entire imagery is rendered, it makes sense to digitize the whole shooting match and edit electronically. I was alluding to an earlier Slashdot thread where many people expressed concern that movies captured digitally would have much lower picture quality than film. I just don't see how that would be the case. IFF a very high data-rate transmission method is found (a VERY thorny problem to begin with), digital recording, editing, and distribution seems like it would be orders of magnitude cheaper.
Wonder if he could do the transmission with lasers....
Your point about film students is an excellent one. I think we're on the cusp of a whole new bunch of imaginative, high-quality Indie movies. That'd be a Good Thing.
I can't cite the article, but I read somewhere that Lucas actually did use some digital photography for some parts of Episode 1, and he defies anybody to figure out which shots. The context implied that he is not talking about one of the many fully-rendered scenes, but some photography of meatspace actor types.
As far as the digital filmmaking question goes, I must be missing something. Obviously, several scenes in Episode 1 were rendered at sufficient resolution to be almost indistinguishable from film, so I'd argue there's no reason why the entire movie couldn't be captured digitally. I guess the question would be what resolution would be sufficient for high quality digital projection of the movie...that'd have to be a MONSTER datastream.
Lucas launching his own satellite and using that for delivery of the next films does not seem awfully far fetched.
Ah, grasshopper, but 3P0 wasn't with Chewie when Lando betrayed them! He was in the cell waiting to be reassembled. Vader may have seen an R2 unit leaving with Our Heroes, and he may have even seen some indiscriminate protocol droid in pieces on Chewie's back, but he'd have no way to identify them as HIS droids.
I'm going to be interested to find out what happens to R2's and 3PO's memory banks in the next two movies. At some point, 3PO's memory MUST be wiped, and likely R2's as well. That of course brings up the question whether the droids are in any meaningful sense the same droids as we saw in Ep1.