I do a lot of PowerPoint presentations in my line of work. I played around with OO for a bit especially the Presenter application. Two key points: 1) There seems to only be a single slide theme in there. OO needs to bundle more presentation templates in there. (Fortunately I have my own) 2) It's hard to browse between slides. With PowerPoint, all you have to do is hit page up or down to change slides in the editor. OO has these weird tab things you have to click on.
Ever notice how certain people always seem to have a cloud over them? Darl McBride of SCO infamy and Micheal Robertson of Lindows both have a record of storm clouds of litigenous conflicts surrounding them. Some might argue this is because they are hard chargers who buck the system and are victims of circumstance. However, one wonders if knowingly or unknowingly they keep putting themselves in these situations to generate the conflicts:)
In response to the HardOCP lawsuit (http://www.videogamestumpers.com/images/Infinium% 20Motion.pdf), IL claimed that they didn't have a corporate presence.
Check out the leases section of their 8K filing however: http://biz.yahoo.com/e/040322/iflb.ob8-k .html
"Infinium leases office space in Sarasota, Florida and Richardson, TEXAS under operating leases that expire in 2009 and 2007, respectively. Minimum future rental payments under these leases are as follows"
There are already a lot of cool games for Linux IMHO. For example, check out Savage from S2games.com. The problem I've encountered is with VIDEO DRIVERS. Specifically, I've got an ATI 9800 class card. If you check out the Linux forum over at http://www.rage3d.com you can see what I'm talking about. Assuming that the drivers will install okay on your distro of choice, one still has to content with decreased performance, screen artifiacts and other bugs. The 3D gaming video drivers need a lot of polish and they need to be included with the main distros. Then, joe user can install Linux, install a game CD and be off to the races. Today once you install Linux you have to track down the drivers and wrestle with them to get them installed!
Looking back at history I'm thinking about Rockefeller and Standard oil. How is that situation any different from Gates and Microsoft? Standard oil was broken up by the government why shouldn't we do the same now to Microsoft? Its irrefutable that Microsoft controls software for the personal computer from the operating system, office applications to now digital media/rights. Even before the SCO/Microsoft fiasco it was obvious that Microsoft devoured its competitors to preserve its stranglehold on the industry.
The Slashdot story seems to claim that Microsoft has many more lawsuits planned. Here is the paragraph that I think the author was referring to:
In a world where there are $500 million dollar patent infringement lawsuits imposed on OS companies (although this is not completely settled yet), how would somebody like Red Hat compete when 6 months ago they only had $80-$90 million in cash? At that point they could not even afford to settle a fraction of a single judgment without devastating their shareholders. I suspect Microsoft may have 50 or more of these lawsuits in the queue. All of them are not asking for hundreds of millions, but most would be large enough to ruin anything but the largest companies. Red Hat did recently raise several hundred million which certainly gives them more staying power. Ultimately, I do not think any company except a few of the largest companies can offer any reasonable insulation to their customers from these types of judgments. You would need a market cap of more than a couple billion to just survive in the OS space.
I read this to mean that Microsoft has a queue of 50 frivoulous lawsuits against itself not that Microsoft is planning 50 lawsuits against other people.
At any rate, Anderer's comments are devoid of any substance. Someone at Microsoft/SCO probably wrote the memo for him or he just copy and pasted talking points into his response.
Shortly after this fiasco began, IL took their forums offline. One guy wrote he was a millionaire investor and wanted to tour IL so he could vouch for their credibility. Others questioned the lawsuit and asked specifically what was wrong with the HardOCP article. I don't think anyone ever got a meaningful reply. The former forums can be found at http://forum.phantom.net. All that is there now is a message that reads "We will be re-launching the forums soon. Down for maintainance, we are upgrading to new software and adding more features. Admin."
Unfortunately I have a dedicated web server with Rackshack/EV1. I'm really frustrated. To migrate to a different host would be a huge hassle. Are there other decent hosting companies like EV1?
This was another garbage article by Berlind IMHO. Even if SCO did "own Unix" (which it does not!) The whole idea is irrelevant. None of "Unix" got put into "Linux". Even if a few lines out of millions got copied in the there, the concept of "de minimi" applies. Such as small amount is in there that it is irrelevant. Case closed.
You mentinoed that the AT&T $echo arcticle isn't binding. You are mistaken. The AT&T statements in the article are a equivalent to a verbal contract given ownership of derivative works to the licensees.
2 key points in rebuttal: 1) When Novell gave SCO in effect the exclusive license for Unix, there were clauses to protect Novell's existing licensees (for example, IBM) from SCO changing the licensing agreement. 2) Regarding the question about IBM and other licensees owning derivative works, the answer is no. AT&T sent out a docment specifically stating this.
Check out http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200402101 72505119. This article on Groklaw contains references and a much more detailed explanation that back up the above points.
For much of the document, SCO appeared to do little more than highlight IBM's contributions to Linux. They seemed to argue that IBM transferred ideas or programming concepts into Linux rather then cite any specific meaty line by line code examples. One key point that even SCO makes in this document is that these are features that have never been part of Unix. SCO lists a lot of Linux code however they don't seem to be able to list specifically what parts of their code were lifted. A good analogy would be 2 authors writing different books on the same subject. It seemed as if SCO was claiming ownership of the ideas as if they wished they owned the patents to them. When asked what portions of Linux they own, SCO refused stating the request was "overly broad and unduly burdensome". SCO also danced around the issue that they themselves contributed to Linux and distributed the code in question under the GPL by claiming ignorance. Once I heard a joke about someone who claimed ownership of the Brooklyn bridge and tried to sell it. How is SCO claiming ownership of Linux and trying to sell it any different from that situation?
I want to echo this. Savage is a really awesome game. I used to play Command and Conquer back in the day. This game is like C&C and Battlefield 1942 combined.
I live in southeastern Virginia in the Hampton Roads area. When the hurricane hit last fall, the rain was barely sprinkling and the cable TV went down for over a week. My phone service is also tied into the cable so was also down. However, cellular pretty much survived throughout the entire hurricane with only minimal downtime. I laugh everytime I see those cable TV commercials saying their landlines provide better signal quality, etc. After the main storm was over and all the power was out, my family and I sat in our living room and watched DirecTV powered by our generator.:)
I pasted a few abstracts below. The first is a neuroimaging study that shows anatomical differences between ADHD and normal patients. The second describes a genetic mechanism form ADHD. The third is another neuroimaging study. It shows that different areas of ADHD patients brains light up compared to normal patients when asked to perform a task that requires attention. You could do a lit search on Pub Med to find more:
Am J Psychiatry. 1994 Dec;151(12):1791-6. Quantitative morphology of the caudate nucleus in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
OBJECTIVE: Because the caudate nuclei receive inputs from cortical regions implicated in executive functioning and attentional tasks, caudate and total brain volumes were examined in boys with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and normal comparison subjects. To gain developmental perspective, a wide age range was sampled for both groups. METHOD: The brains of 50 male ADHD patients (aged 6-19) and 48 matched comparison subjects were scanned by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Volumetric measures of the head and body of the caudate nucleus were obtained from T1-weighted coronal images. Interrater reliabilities (intraclass correlations) were 0.89 or greater. RESULTS: The normal pattern of slight but significantly greater right caudate volume across all ages was not seen in ADHD. Mean right caudate volume was slightly but significantly smaller in the ADHD patients than in the comparison subjects, while there was no significant difference for the left. Together these facts accounted for the highly significant lack of normal asymmetry in caudate volume in the ADHD boys. Total brain volume was 5% smaller in the ADHD boys, and this was not accounted for by age, height, weight, or IQ. Smaller brain volume in ADHD did not account for the caudate volume or symmetry differences. For the normal boys, caudate volume decreased substantially (13%) and significantly with age, while in ADHD there was no age-related change. CONCLUSIONS: Along with previous MRI findings of low volumes in corpus callosum regions, these results support developmental abnormalities of frontal-striatal circuits in ADHD.
Biol Psychiatry. 1999 Nov 1;46(9):1234-42
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as a noradrenergic disorder.
Biederman J, Spencer T.
Pediatric Psychopharmacology Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston 02114, USA.
This review revisits the thesis that a dysregulation of the central noradrenergic networks may underlie the pathophysiology of ADHD. We review the pertinent neurobiological and pharmacological literature on ADHD. The noradrenergic system has been intimately associated with the modulation of higher cortical functions including attention, alertness, vigilance and executive function. Noradrenergic activation is known to profoundly affect the performance of attention, especially the maintenance of arousal, a cognitive function known to be deficient in ADHD. Data from family, adoption, twin, and segregation analysis strongly support a genetic hypothesis for this disorder. Although molecular genetic studies of ADHD are relatively new and far from definitive, several replicated reports have found associations between ADHD with DAT and D4 receptor genes. Brain imaging studies fit well with the idea that dysfunction in fronto-subcortical pathways occurs in ADHD with its underlying dysregulation of noradrenergic function. A wealth of pharmacological data (within and without the stimulant literature) provides strong evidence for selective clinical activity in ADHD for drugs with noradrenergic and dopaminergic pharmacological profiles. Available research provides compelling theoretic, basic biologic and clinical support for the notion that ADHD is a brain disorder of likely genetic etiology with etiologic and pathophysiologic heterogeneity. Neurobio
Various talk show hosts minimize and make fun of ADHD. They claim it isn't a disorder and that people can just "get over it". What you have to keep in mind is that in order for attention problems to be a disorder, they have to result in severe occupational or interpersonal impairment. For example, failing out of school. The critics do have a good point about pharmaceutical companies wanting people to take drugs. The advent of neuroimaging has revolutionized the field of Psychiatry. For the first time, PET scans and other imaging modalities are able to view brains of afflicted persons and see structural differences compared to normal persons. There have been a few key studies involving neuroimaging of ADHD patients that give a lot of insight. One study showed that compared to normal subjects, ADHD patients had different structural and functional anatomy in the brain. The critics responded by charging that medications caused "brain damage". Another key study was done that refuted this. Subjects with ADHD taking medications versus subjects with ADHD not taking meds were compared. Their brains were had the same structural differences prooving that medications do not cause "brain damage".
I'd be happy to provide literature references if any one is interested.
The person (or corporation in this case) will come up with grander and grander delusions to support their psychotic thought process ("we own Linux"). This is of course because reality for SCO ("we don't own squat") is so difficult to face that it is much easier to come up with more and more psychotic thoughts to support the delusion.
Slashdot Mirror
Where is Pay Per View when you need them? I would gather all my friends, order lots of pizza and pay $50 for this event. We need a Geek Pay Per View!
I do a lot of PowerPoint presentations in my line of work. I played around with OO for a bit especially the Presenter application. Two key points:
1) There seems to only be a single slide theme in there. OO needs to bundle more presentation templates in there. (Fortunately I have my own)
2) It's hard to browse between slides. With PowerPoint, all you have to do is hit page up or down to change slides in the editor. OO has these weird tab things you have to click on.
/j #exceed
... Download #777 /ctcp FileBot xdcc list /ctcp FileBot send #1
FileBot: Offering
FileBot: You are in the queue...
Ever notice how certain people always seem to have a cloud over them? Darl McBride of SCO infamy and Micheal Robertson of Lindows both have a record of storm clouds of litigenous conflicts surrounding them. Some might argue this is because they are hard chargers who buck the system and are victims of circumstance. However, one wonders if knowingly or unknowingly they keep putting themselves in these situations to generate the conflicts:)
He has experience in this line of business:)
Wouldn't that be exciting:)
In response to the HardOCP lawsuit (http://www.videogamestumpers.com/images/Infinium% 20Motion.pdf), IL claimed that they didn't have a corporate presence.
k .html
Check out the leases section of their 8K filing however:
http://biz.yahoo.com/e/040322/iflb.ob8-
"Infinium leases office space in Sarasota, Florida and Richardson, TEXAS under operating leases that expire in 2009 and 2007, respectively. Minimum future rental payments under these leases are as follows"
There are already a lot of cool games for Linux IMHO. For example, check out Savage from S2games.com. The problem I've encountered is with VIDEO DRIVERS. Specifically, I've got an ATI 9800 class card. If you check out the Linux forum over at http://www.rage3d.com you can see what I'm talking about. Assuming that the drivers will install okay on your distro of choice, one still has to content with decreased performance, screen artifiacts and other bugs. The 3D gaming video drivers need a lot of polish and they need to be included with the main distros. Then, joe user can install Linux, install a game CD and be off to the races. Today once you install Linux you have to track down the drivers and wrestle with them to get them installed!
Looking back at history I'm thinking about Rockefeller and Standard oil. How is that situation any different from Gates and Microsoft? Standard oil was broken up by the government why shouldn't we do the same now to Microsoft? Its irrefutable that Microsoft controls software for the personal computer from the operating system, office applications to now digital media/rights. Even before the SCO/Microsoft fiasco it was obvious that Microsoft devoured its competitors to preserve its stranglehold on the industry.
Can you kill people in the game? Can you launch a violent coup, etc?
The Slashdot story seems to claim that Microsoft has many more lawsuits planned. Here is the paragraph that I think the author was referring to:
In a world where there are $500 million dollar patent infringement lawsuits imposed on OS companies (although this is not completely settled yet), how would somebody like Red Hat compete when 6 months ago they only had $80-$90 million in cash? At that point they could not even afford to settle a fraction of a single judgment without devastating their shareholders. I suspect Microsoft may have 50 or more of these lawsuits in the queue. All of them are not asking for hundreds of millions, but most would be large enough to ruin anything but the largest companies. Red Hat did recently raise several hundred million which certainly gives them more staying power. Ultimately, I do not think any company except a few of the largest companies can offer any reasonable insulation to their customers from these types of judgments. You would need a market cap of more than a couple billion to just survive in the OS space.
I read this to mean that Microsoft has a queue of 50 frivoulous lawsuits against itself not that Microsoft is planning 50 lawsuits against other people.
At any rate, Anderer's comments are devoid of any substance. Someone at Microsoft/SCO probably wrote the memo for him or he just copy and pasted talking points into his response.
Shortly after this fiasco began, IL took their forums offline. One guy wrote he was a millionaire investor and wanted to tour IL so he could vouch for their credibility. Others questioned the lawsuit and asked specifically what was wrong with the HardOCP article. I don't think anyone ever got a meaningful reply. The former forums can be found at http://forum.phantom.net. All that is there now is a message that reads "We will be re-launching the forums soon. Down for maintainance, we are upgrading to new software and adding more features. Admin."
[SCO] is hereby ordered to:
4. SCO is to provide and identify with specificity all lines of code in Linux that it claims rights to.
PDF: http://sco.tuxrocks.com/Docs/IBM/IBM-109.pdf
I can't wait to see the answer to this one...
If SCO sued an end user, that would make that person an instant celebrity. That person would be more famous than the American Idol...
Unfortunately I have a dedicated web server with Rackshack/EV1. I'm really frustrated. To migrate to a different host would be a huge hassle. Are there other decent hosting companies like EV1?
http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/mai n/What_did_SCO_buy.html
This was another garbage article by Berlind IMHO. Even if SCO did "own Unix" (which it does not!) The whole idea is irrelevant. None of "Unix" got put into "Linux". Even if a few lines out of millions got copied in the there, the concept of "de minimi" applies. Such as small amount is in there that it is irrelevant. Case closed.
You mentinoed that the AT&T $echo arcticle isn't binding. You are mistaken. The AT&T statements in the article are a equivalent to a verbal contract given ownership of derivative works to the licensees.
2 key points in rebuttal:
1 72505119. This article on Groklaw contains references and a much more detailed explanation that back up the above points.
1) When Novell gave SCO in effect the exclusive license for Unix, there were clauses to protect Novell's existing licensees (for example, IBM) from SCO changing the licensing agreement.
2) Regarding the question about IBM and other licensees owning derivative works, the answer is no. AT&T sent out a docment specifically stating this.
Check out http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20040210
For much of the document, SCO appeared to do little more than highlight IBM's contributions to Linux. They seemed to argue that IBM transferred ideas or programming concepts into Linux rather then cite any specific meaty line by line code examples. One key point that even SCO makes in this document is that these are features that have never been part of Unix. SCO lists a lot of Linux code however they don't seem to be able to list specifically what parts of their code were lifted. A good analogy would be 2 authors writing different books on the same subject. It seemed as if SCO was claiming ownership of the ideas as if they wished they owned the patents to them. When asked what portions of Linux they own, SCO refused stating the request was "overly broad and unduly burdensome". SCO also danced around the issue that they themselves contributed to Linux and distributed the code in question under the GPL by claiming ignorance. Once I heard a joke about someone who claimed ownership of the Brooklyn bridge and tried to sell it. How is SCO claiming ownership of Linux and trying to sell it any different from that situation?
I want to echo this. Savage is a really awesome game. I used to play Command and Conquer back in the day. This game is like C&C and Battlefield 1942 combined.
'nuff said.
I live in southeastern Virginia in the Hampton Roads area. When the hurricane hit last fall, the rain was barely sprinkling and the cable TV went down for over a week. My phone service is also tied into the cable so was also down. However, cellular pretty much survived throughout the entire hurricane with only minimal downtime. I laugh everytime I see those cable TV commercials saying their landlines provide better signal quality, etc. After the main storm was over and all the power was out, my family and I sat in our living room and watched DirecTV powered by our generator. :)
I pasted a few abstracts below. The first is a neuroimaging study that shows anatomical differences between ADHD and normal patients. The second describes a genetic mechanism form ADHD. The third is another neuroimaging study. It shows that different areas of ADHD patients brains light up compared to normal patients when asked to perform a task that requires attention. You could do a lit search on Pub Med to find more:
Am J Psychiatry. 1994 Dec;151(12):1791-6.
Quantitative morphology of the caudate nucleus in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Castellanos FX, Giedd JN, Eckburg P, Marsh WL, Vaituzis AC, Kaysen D, Hamburger SD, Rapoport JL.
Child Psychiatry Branch, NIMH, Bethesda, MD 20892.
OBJECTIVE: Because the caudate nuclei receive inputs from cortical regions implicated in executive functioning and attentional tasks, caudate and total brain volumes were examined in boys with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and normal comparison subjects. To gain developmental perspective, a wide age range was sampled for both groups. METHOD: The brains of 50 male ADHD patients (aged 6-19) and 48 matched comparison subjects were scanned by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Volumetric measures of the head and body of the caudate nucleus were obtained from T1-weighted coronal images. Interrater reliabilities (intraclass correlations) were 0.89 or greater. RESULTS: The normal pattern of slight but significantly greater right caudate volume across all ages was not seen in ADHD. Mean right caudate volume was slightly but significantly smaller in the ADHD patients than in the comparison subjects, while there was no significant difference for the left. Together these facts accounted for the highly significant lack of normal asymmetry in caudate volume in the ADHD boys. Total brain volume was 5% smaller in the ADHD boys, and this was not accounted for by age, height, weight, or IQ. Smaller brain volume in ADHD did not account for the caudate volume or symmetry differences. For the normal boys, caudate volume decreased substantially (13%) and significantly with age, while in ADHD there was no age-related change. CONCLUSIONS: Along with previous MRI findings of low volumes in corpus callosum regions, these results support developmental abnormalities of frontal-striatal circuits in ADHD.
Biol Psychiatry. 1999 Nov 1;46(9):1234-42
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as a noradrenergic disorder.
Biederman J, Spencer T.
Pediatric Psychopharmacology Unit, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston 02114, USA.
This review revisits the thesis that a dysregulation of the central noradrenergic networks may underlie the pathophysiology of ADHD. We review the pertinent neurobiological and pharmacological literature on ADHD. The noradrenergic system has been intimately associated with the modulation of higher cortical functions including attention, alertness, vigilance and executive function. Noradrenergic activation is known to profoundly affect the performance of attention, especially the maintenance of arousal, a cognitive function known to be deficient in ADHD. Data from family, adoption, twin, and segregation analysis strongly support a genetic hypothesis for this disorder. Although molecular genetic studies of ADHD are relatively new and far from definitive, several replicated reports have found associations between ADHD with DAT and D4 receptor genes. Brain imaging studies fit well with the idea that dysfunction in fronto-subcortical pathways occurs in ADHD with its underlying dysregulation of noradrenergic function. A wealth of pharmacological data (within and without the stimulant literature) provides strong evidence for selective clinical activity in ADHD for drugs with noradrenergic and dopaminergic pharmacological profiles. Available research provides compelling theoretic, basic biologic and clinical support for the notion that ADHD is a brain disorder of likely genetic etiology with etiologic and pathophysiologic heterogeneity. Neurobio
Various talk show hosts minimize and make fun of ADHD. They claim it isn't a disorder and that people can just "get over it". What you have to keep in mind is that in order for attention problems to be a disorder, they have to result in severe occupational or interpersonal impairment. For example, failing out of school. The critics do have a good point about pharmaceutical companies wanting people to take drugs. The advent of neuroimaging has revolutionized the field of Psychiatry. For the first time, PET scans and other imaging modalities are able to view brains of afflicted persons and see structural differences compared to normal persons. There have been a few key studies involving neuroimaging of ADHD patients that give a lot of insight. One study showed that compared to normal subjects, ADHD patients had different structural and functional anatomy in the brain. The critics responded by charging that medications caused "brain damage". Another key study was done that refuted this. Subjects with ADHD taking medications versus subjects with ADHD not taking meds were compared. Their brains were had the same structural differences prooving that medications do not cause "brain damage".
I'd be happy to provide literature references if any one is interested.
The person (or corporation in this case) will come up with grander and grander delusions to support their psychotic thought process ("we own Linux"). This is of course because reality for SCO ("we don't own squat") is so difficult to face that it is much easier to come up with more and more psychotic thoughts to support the delusion.