No, my theory is that he's smart enough to read the industry pulse and then write something inflammatory about it. He then adds a veil of intelligence and learned speech that helps give his articles credence. Without these things, he'd be just another raving lunatic. And he's not pretending to be an idiot. He just doesn't care.
Consider for a moment, you don't listen to the Timecube idiot, do you? How about every psuedo-physicist who comes along with a free energy machine? What about the nuts who claim to have worked on alien technology for the government? Sure, many of these people get their day in the spotlight, but only for a brief period. Then everyone realizes that a) this person is nuts, and b) (most importantly!) they don't care. If they don't care, they stop listening. And thus people like Bob Lazar get ignored in the long run.
It's the same thing in the technology. When some moonbat claims that Microsoft is going to ditch Windows and buy out Apple, the industry ignores them. Why? Because the idea is simply perposterous. But with Dvorak, he's far more clever. He takes a kernel of truth (in this case, the fact that Vista has been delayed), adds in a few easily accepted misconceptions (more money will solve the problem, Microsoft spends billions on Internet Explorer, etc.), shakes in the latest focus (Will IE withstand the FireFox onslaught?), and then takes a giant leap of logic. His columns are so masterfully crafted that people actually believe what he's saying.
I mean, just look at some of the responses in this thread! There's one fellow who replied to me that he thinks that Dvorak is right on this one, even though he readily admits that Dvorak is generally full of shit!
There can only be two explanations why people keep accepting his nonsense:
1. Dvorak is really, really dumb, but his stupidity somehow consistently aligns with the stupidity of a large portion of the population. 2. Dvorak is not actually dumb, but crafts articles intended to elicit a reaction from 90% of the population.
Given the low odds of accidentally aligning his stupidity with the population for over 20 years (and "accidently" inflaming those who know better!), I have to go with the second option. He deliberately crafts stories intended to elicit a reaction. The fact that his articles are well written bolsters that supposition as he is obviously educated. He knows how to retain his readers' attention. If he's educated enough to do that, then he's educated enough to pull off his stunts.
Why do you think he keeps talking about the Macintosh? It's because the Mac fanatics are so easy to get a reaction out of! If he can't get a reaction out of anyone else, he always knows that he can use them as a trustworthy standby.
The part I fear is that he's been at this so long that he's starting to believe his own hogwash.
You think that stupidity is a bar to cultural hero status?
It is a bar when we're talking about timeframes of 20 years or so. Thousands of industry pundits have come and gone in the time that Dvorak has been writing. Some of them were smarter than he is, and some of them were a great deal stupider. (If that's even possible.) Yet Dvorak is still around. Why?
The answer is that he's actually quite smart. He knows that he doesn't have a f**king clue about the industry. So he makes stuff up that intentionally runs contrary to the most popular issues of the time. Yesterday it was BootCamp. Today it's Internet Explorer. Tomorrow it will be Vista. It doesn't matter what it is, as long as it sells columns. He doesn't care that he doesn't know the first thing about computers. He's just looking to make a buck.
He is that stupid. This isn't even the stupidest thing he's said. I first realized how stupid he was back in 1983, when he made some silly pronouncements about the secret plans of a company I was working for.
The problem is, that's not stupidity. It's revenue generating hogwash. Believe it or not, there is a difference.
If he was just stupid, people would have stopped listening to him and he would be out of work. The problem is that he's incredibly smart at adapting to the current market conditions to keep people raving about how "wrong" he is. All that raving and ranting keeps the sales of his columns up, and drives the price of his public appearances through the roof. Ergo, Dvorak makes more money.
Anything he can print that will get a public reaction will go into his articles. Heck, if Dvorak thought he could get away with it, he'd actually publish the Starbucks Automobiles story. After all, there's nothing quite like getting half the population telling you how wrong you are while the other half ponders over the actual possibility of what you've said. You've still got 100% of the attention on yourself.
DO NOT REPLY TO THIS STORY. Dvorak is not that stupid. He's just tweaking the tech community to see if he can get a response. To date, the tech community has been as predictable as Marty McFly.
If you really want to understand Dvorak, pick apart the post I made on his last big story. I think you'll understand him a lot better if you can take a clinical look at his sudden and inexplicable leaps of logic. It's what he does, and he's damn good at it.
I know its hard to resist the Dvorak trolling, but you need to consider one thing: He's not listening to you. He doesn't even care about your opinion. His crazy theories are keeping the money flowing, and that's good enough. Arguing with his drivel is simply wasting your time.
Duh, if I expected them to know more I wouldn't be calling for them to admit ignorance and go away.
Seriously, what's with the trolling? You've got a low UID and a +1 modifier, both of which suggest that you've said intelligent things in the past. Why troll?
You:I work at a Circuit City B&M store [...] Don't be so quick to rate an entire store based on one associate.
Who said anything about other stores? I was just ragging on Best Buy. Their teenage "associates" make more shit up than the worst episode of Star Trek Voyager. I'm sure there are better stores out there, but Best Buy isn't it.:-)
Notice the blue blazers and ties are gone? [...] Granted, some of the guys at CC did seem like used car salesmen but there were some that were very good at their job.
Looking back at it, I can't remember ever hearing misinformation from their staff, but I generally assumed that they didn't know what they were talking about. Why? Well, it was probably the suits. In the computer industry, suits have always been the anti-thesis of knowledgable individuals. The fact that they were wearing blazers rather than simply button-up shirts just screams, "Unknowledgable sales staff! Steer clear!"
Which is sad, considering that it sounds like they really knew what they were talking about. Everyone always assumes that a suit will automatically make you seem more professional. Unfortunately, it can swing the other way too. Thus it's important to dress the part, which isn't necessarily the same as "dressing for success.":(
The sales drone tried to convince him that he needed to buy one of the "gold" cables... and that going with a cheaper "silver" USB cable would result in blurry photograph prints.
Don't worry, they've fixed that problem. They now only carry the silver cables, but they're branded with the Geek Squad! logo and cost twice as much as the gold cables. See? Best Buy is simplifying things for their customers! You give them lots of money, they give you cheap crap in return. It's a Win-Lose situation!
I usually go into Best Buy because I don't want to be bothered by salesman. Alas, my last major experience with them was less than impressive. While I was browsing for a new home router, a salesperson decided to help out. While he did eventually point me toward a nice Netgear Wifi/Switch combo that was well-priced, his technical information left a lot to be desired. He informed me on no uncertain terms that the unit I had been looking at "wouldn't be full speed" because it was "a switch instead of a router." According to him, a switch was a network device that simply splits the signal, thereby allowing only one port to talk at a time. I shook my head and tried to explain that he was thinking of a hub, and that a switch gives full performance on each port. Unfortunately, I had a head cold at the time and probably wasn't very persuasive. He just sort of gave me a look like, "Whatever, dude".
All in all, Best Buy "geeks" (*cough* *sputter*) tend to have the computer knowledge of a third grader who's been throwing around factoids with his friends at lunch in a desparate attempt to arrive at a miniscule of real knowledge. It used to be amusing to ask the sales staff complex questions just to hear their wonderfully made-up answers, but these days I'm far too busy for that sort of nonsense. They would honestly be a lot more helpful if they just gave their recommendation (the same "here's the popular product" one they give everyone) and went away. For everything else they need to either profess ignorance or point the buyer to websites where they can do their own research. (Not that they're actually going to do that. They need to sell overpriced "Geek Squad" cables and useless warranties somehow.) *sigh*
That being said, I feel sorry for the well-intentioned geeks who spend some small portion of their lives with a Best Buy name tag affixed below their lapel. It must be horrifying to be expected to be so disinformative just to sell warranties and accessories.
I agree with you, but for the initial run of units, many (most?) DID sell far above the MSRP. JC Penny, for example, sold their stock at $799 a unit. Not to mention the eBay retailers who managed to sell units for upwards of $1000.
so in reality, a large number of units went for far more than the $400 price. i.e. The market self-adjusted the price. Microsoft may not have seen the profits, but that wasn't the point. Microsoft is selling the console as a loss-leader using the "razor blade" model. Advertising the system to be more costly would reduce demand, and thereby cut profits for Microsoft as fewer games got sold. With the lower MSRP, Microsoft was able to generate not only demand for games, but also buzz about the system. Buzz leads to more system sales (in the future), and more system sales can lead to more game sales. More game sales == more profit.
And that's without assuming that Microsoft isn't using its resources to undercut the competition in an attempt to monopolize the market.
That has to be the most reaching analysis I've heard yet. His basic argument is that gamers have grown up, therefore they're willing to spend gobs more money. I'm sorry, did he miss the $400 price tag? Many of the early units were sold for far more than that! If it was priced any higher, consumers would start to wonder why they shouldn't get a new gaming-rig computer instead! (Or at least a bigger HDTV and a load of HD-DVDs or BlueRays.)
If Dave of GamerDad wants to know why the 360 isn't taking the market by storm, he needs to look no farther than the games. As X-Play on G4* said, (and I'm paraphrasing here) "The XBox 360 needs to stop charging more money for less game." (In a review of Tiger Wood's Golf.) Microsoft and their affiliates need to realize that pretty graphics are not the only ingredient in making a good game. When you pay $60 for a game, you expect to get enough to entertain you until at least your next paycheck!
* No, I don't normally watch G4's game shows. I just happened to see their marathon of reviews this weekend. Which again convinced me why modern gaming sucks. Now, will someone please tell the hosts to stop nodding and making faces while the other person is talking? Also, get them into some adult-looking clothes without pockets. They look absolutely shriveled up with their arms so close to their sides. Last but not least, they need to eschew the ridiculous stream of bad jokes in favor of a few good jokes (read: not stupid!) and more off-the-cuff banter between the hosts. This practice of reading j0kes from a script really shows.
Caspian Prince has spent years perfecting his Game Design skills, and it has finally paid off with Titan Attacks. The control is excellent (though it may take a bit to realize that you're supposed to be slow before you buy upgrades), the graphics are top notch, and the game is just all around fun!
FWIW, it's taken Cas about four major games to reach this point. First it was Alien Flux (a great little game, but complex controls!), then it was Super [Elvis|Dude] (Seems to be defunct these days.:( ), then he finally found his image with UltraTron. After UltraTron, he realized that he'd nailed the game style he wanted, but he really needed to reward the player more. So what did he do? Well, UltraTron was originally a small Applet intended to replace the PuppyInvaders Java game on his front page. So he thought, "Why not make a sequel to PuppyInvaders?" So he did.
You can still see the original PuppyInvaders, plus all his other games at: http://www.puppygames.net
Make sure you download at least Titan Attacks! I guarantee that you'll buy it.:)
Read The Fine Article more carefully. The businesses they're talking about didn't use Microsoft Windows. They went directly to Linux and have been running it for a long while. Coffey, for example, had standardized on Mandr[ake|iva] back in 1999. They came to the eventual conclusion that Linux wasn't meeting their needs, and so they went shopping. They (unsurprisingly, yet frustratingly) settled on Microsoft software.
Okay so I have an idea of an OS that is based of an extremely permissioned web-server
First and foremost, that is not an OS. You're talking about a type of graphical shell that uses RPC for communications. (Like most modern environments do.) If you're looking for a term for it, use "Web Desktop".
The users desktop would be a customized Firefox browser (basically in Kiosk mode so no tool bars) with the login option that tells the apache server what level access to allow this user.
Just so you're aware, this is a very easy thing to accomplish. Simply start XWindows without a Window Manager (running 'X' at the command line is sufficient), then run Mozilla or Firefox in kiosk mode, with the following command line parameters:
-geometry <WIDTH>x<HEIGHT>+0+0 http://localhost/
Replace "<WIDTH>" and "<HEIGHT>" with the screen width and height.
That should get you started on fully testing your idea. The key issue is that if the Mozilla engine opens any new browser windows, there will be no window interface. To do this "right", you'd need to find a simple Window Manager capable of keeping your "Desktop" window at the back of the screen. (Or in whatever configuration you prefer. You can do the "one window at a time" interface too.) Alternativelty, it's not that hard to build a new browser off the Gecko engine that will handle new windows in the way you specify.
1. WebOS is a misleading name. "Web Desktop" is a more appropriate term. I know that most users use the terms interchangably, but as techies we really shouldn't be encouraging them.
2. Most of these "WebOSes" are a mess. EyeOS just IFrames everything, Orca doesn't seem to work (at least not for me), YouOS is about at the XEdit and XTerm level, Fold is a fancy Portal environment, and XIN isn't available yet. These are nice starts to desktops, but they're a long way from fully featured desktop replacements. Right now, they're just fancy portals.
3. Google is not building a WebOS. Or at least, that's my opinion. There's no inherent advantage to building a windowing system in a browser other than the possibility of Web integration. Unfortunately, if the desktop isn't actually a real desktop (i.e. the only interface you see), then it isn't in any better position to provide Web integration than the web brower itself. Desktop development APIs are best saved for regular AJAX work until an actual need for a desktop arises.
If you replaced all those wheels in an 18-wheeler with powerful electric motors, it seems like you'd be able to get a LOT of net torque
Pfff. Motors like that currently exist in Diesel Engine trains. The problem is that there's no real reason to use a hybrid design in a Semi. Unlike cars, which are used for a lot of in-town driving, most of a truck's life is spent on the highway. Under those conditions, there's little regenerative braking to be had, and the Diesel Engine is already operating at its maximum efficiency thanks to a mechanical transmission rather than an electric transmission.
If you want a more efficient truck, look at hydrogen and ethanol blends for higher combustion temperatures, greater horsepower, and better torque. Hydrogen and ethanol are basically "safe" octane booster, but they do tend to wear parts down faster thanks to higher operating temperatures. The first rule of physics: You don't get something for nothing.
No, the push technology forward "kind of thinking" is exactly the type of thinking that gives us better lighting technologies like full-spectrum flourescents bulbs. The we must use less and less and less and less energy type of thinking is the type of thinking that forces less technological innovation by simply avoiding the technology in the first place.
The problem is, avoiding technology does nothing to move it forward. All you're doing is making sparing use of something like a lightbulb when what you really need is a good, old-fashioned problem for the market to deal with. That problem is that your energy costs are too high because your energy usage is high. Companies will then invest billions of dollars in trying to fix that problem in hopes of making money.
We may need to add more power generation capacity, but it would be nice to see some conservation happen first.
These two options cannot occur independently. Technology moves forward at an overall slow pace. (Even if individual innovations may appear to be breakneck.) If you simply start cutting off the usage of the current infrastructure, you're not going to get anywhere.
For example, the Motorola phone I use today can sit on standby for a good week or so before it needs to be recharged. Talk time is up in the area of hours. The old analog phones I used to have to deal with needed to be charged every other day. Yet my new phone does a lot more than my old phone. What changed?
Well, yes. For one the powerpack in my Motorola is better than the old one. It does store more energy. But nowhere near enough energy to make the difference seen. The real difference is that the technology got better. Instead of a powerful analog signal, my phone broadcasts a light digital communications channel. Thanks to the abilities of the built in microprocessor, that digital communications channel simply doesn't require the same amount of power to trasmit a clearer signal. The phone can even manage power to use only what is necessary to ensure a low rate of errors in the transmission. In comparison, the analog phones were spewing power, but often would still fail to keep a clear signal. Many of the lower powered phone were junk.
So the point is, keep technology moving. Certainly, we should be responsible with it. But stopping progress is far more irresponsible.
And here we have someone who failed to READ THE F***KING ARTICLE. This isn't about Wind. It's about everything from Nuclear to Bio-Fuels to Solar to Hydrogen. It's all about that people are looking at the perceived negatives of energy technologies while they blissfully ignore the fact that they NEED ENERGY TO SURVIVE.
The "actual benefits of wind power" are neither here nor there.
You're ignoring the only option which won't affect _something_: to use less energy
That is where you are incredibly wrong. All that wonderful food we eat, many of those beautiful landscapes, all those heated buildings we live in, and all those attractive clothes we wear all take energy to create. So much energy that any significant drop in power production would mean the death of a large portion of the human race today. Food production would drop, areas couldn't be cleared and replanted more effectively, buildings would fall behind on maintenence, and heat would become a premium. And that's ignoring the matter of overseas and land transportation used to move necessary goods around the world!
While it's a nice sentiment to suggest that mankind cut back on energy usage, the question is "to what end"? Will we forgo the use of all new power and revert to living in caves? Shall it be the survival of the fittest? Well, if it comes to that, the feel-good environmentalists will be the first to die. You know why? Because a guy who doesn't mind using modern technology will happily pull a.22 caliber pistol and put a bullet between his eyes so that he can survive instead of the environmentalist.
Technology creates more resources. That's the entire point of it. Right now our cups overflow because of it. But you can't go back unless you want the very halocaust you're trying to avoid. So pull your head out of yer ass and wake up to the fact that mankind NEEDS technology!
The problem plaguing new energy developments is no longer NIMBYism, the "Not-In-My-Back-Yard" movement. The problem now, as one wind-power executive puts it, is BANANAism: "Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything."
If it wasn't so true, it would be hilarious. Instead, we're currently faced with a no-win scenario. Don't want Power Plant technology X in your back yard? Fine, we'll move it to the middle of the desert. You don't like that because there's a fault there that *might* cause a teeny Earthquake 500 years from now? Fine, we'll move it to the swamp land. What's that? We'd be destroying the natural habitat of mosquitoes? Why do you want to keep mosquitoes around? FINE! Then we'll move it to the ocean where we can... what? You don't want it there, EITHER? Why the hell not? Because it might damage a coral reef? What if we build an artifical one? That will change the ocean currents?
NNNGNGGNNGGGG!! HUMANS #$!@@!# CHANGE #@$!#!@! THINGS !@#!#!!!! IT'S !@#!@# WHAT @!#@!# WE @#$!@#$ DO!
Call us when you don't have power and really, really want some. Good-bye!:-P
The better solution is to use vm for virtual memory and run all code in the same memory space, but only run code that cannot access memory illegally (ie no pointer arithmetic, only references). This code could be written in Java, or libmo, or D, or maybe other 'safe' languages and run at much faster speeds than they do now as traditional linux processes.
Ah, finally someone who understands! I've been promoting this sort of OS design for a long time. The advantages of such a scheme are just incredible, including the ability to align the paging system with actual chunks of memory (e.g. Objects, buffers, etc.) rather than 4K pages that may or may not contain information you actually want to be paged.
The only problem is that it's not going to happen anytime within the next decade. Far too much software is written in C/C++ to force the issue of "safe" memory handling.:(
What you're saying is that every time through the loop, there's going to be a page fault as the CoW pages are wiped away by the new copy into the same logical buffer. CoW is dependent on allocating new pages every time so that you don't ever write to the old CoW pages. Correct?
Of course, this is where I'd really like to hear from the *BSD developers. Surely they must be aware of this issue? Do they expect programmers to throw away their buffers, or do they have a plan?
...but it isn't going to happen. BootCamp is about advertising. Macs are generally known as Really Nice Hardware(TM). As a result, some people will buy Macs just to install Windows. They may even think, "Hey, I can even try out this Mac OS X thing so that I can *really* make fun of my Mac-lover friends!" Then the users purchase a Mac, try OS X, realize they don't actually NEED Windows, and never use BootCamp at all.
I *think* I understand what you're saying. Basically, the problem is caused by the fact that usermode code never (or rarely, depending on your platform) releases any of the memory it has allocated. Instead, it keeps reusing the same memory pools over and over again. This becomes a problem with CoW because the kernel doesn't learn about the deallocation of memory until the usermode reallocates it for another purpose. When that reallocation happens, the read-only exception is going to be triggered. Thus there's going to be a 100% occurance of exceptions on CoW pages.
However, given that the "free()" routine is part of the OS in FreeBSD, wouldn't it make sense to create a smarter "free()" routine that would attempt to recognize and explicitly deallocate CoW pages?
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No, my theory is that he's smart enough to read the industry pulse and then write something inflammatory about it. He then adds a veil of intelligence and learned speech that helps give his articles credence. Without these things, he'd be just another raving lunatic. And he's not pretending to be an idiot. He just doesn't care.
Consider for a moment, you don't listen to the Timecube idiot, do you? How about every psuedo-physicist who comes along with a free energy machine? What about the nuts who claim to have worked on alien technology for the government? Sure, many of these people get their day in the spotlight, but only for a brief period. Then everyone realizes that a) this person is nuts, and b) (most importantly!) they don't care. If they don't care, they stop listening. And thus people like Bob Lazar get ignored in the long run.
It's the same thing in the technology. When some moonbat claims that Microsoft is going to ditch Windows and buy out Apple, the industry ignores them. Why? Because the idea is simply perposterous. But with Dvorak, he's far more clever. He takes a kernel of truth (in this case, the fact that Vista has been delayed), adds in a few easily accepted misconceptions (more money will solve the problem, Microsoft spends billions on Internet Explorer, etc.), shakes in the latest focus (Will IE withstand the FireFox onslaught?), and then takes a giant leap of logic. His columns are so masterfully crafted that people actually believe what he's saying.
I mean, just look at some of the responses in this thread! There's one fellow who replied to me that he thinks that Dvorak is right on this one, even though he readily admits that Dvorak is generally full of shit!
There can only be two explanations why people keep accepting his nonsense:
1. Dvorak is really, really dumb, but his stupidity somehow consistently aligns with the stupidity of a large portion of the population.
2. Dvorak is not actually dumb, but crafts articles intended to elicit a reaction from 90% of the population.
Given the low odds of accidentally aligning his stupidity with the population for over 20 years (and "accidently" inflaming those who know better!), I have to go with the second option. He deliberately crafts stories intended to elicit a reaction. The fact that his articles are well written bolsters that supposition as he is obviously educated. He knows how to retain his readers' attention. If he's educated enough to do that, then he's educated enough to pull off his stunts.
Why do you think he keeps talking about the Macintosh? It's because the Mac fanatics are so easy to get a reaction out of! If he can't get a reaction out of anyone else, he always knows that he can use them as a trustworthy standby.
The part I fear is that he's been at this so long that he's starting to believe his own hogwash.
You think that stupidity is a bar to cultural hero status?
It is a bar when we're talking about timeframes of 20 years or so. Thousands of industry pundits have come and gone in the time that Dvorak has been writing. Some of them were smarter than he is, and some of them were a great deal stupider. (If that's even possible.) Yet Dvorak is still around. Why?
The answer is that he's actually quite smart. He knows that he doesn't have a f**king clue about the industry. So he makes stuff up that intentionally runs contrary to the most popular issues of the time. Yesterday it was BootCamp. Today it's Internet Explorer. Tomorrow it will be Vista. It doesn't matter what it is, as long as it sells columns. He doesn't care that he doesn't know the first thing about computers. He's just looking to make a buck.
He is that stupid. This isn't even the stupidest thing he's said. I first realized how stupid he was back in 1983, when he made some silly pronouncements about the secret plans of a company I was working for.
The problem is, that's not stupidity. It's revenue generating hogwash. Believe it or not, there is a difference.
If he was just stupid, people would have stopped listening to him and he would be out of work. The problem is that he's incredibly smart at adapting to the current market conditions to keep people raving about how "wrong" he is. All that raving and ranting keeps the sales of his columns up, and drives the price of his public appearances through the roof. Ergo, Dvorak makes more money.
Anything he can print that will get a public reaction will go into his articles. Heck, if Dvorak thought he could get away with it, he'd actually publish the Starbucks Automobiles story. After all, there's nothing quite like getting half the population telling you how wrong you are while the other half ponders over the actual possibility of what you've said. You've still got 100% of the attention on yourself.
DO NOT REPLY TO THIS STORY. Dvorak is not that stupid. He's just tweaking the tech community to see if he can get a response. To date, the tech community has been as predictable as Marty McFly.
If you really want to understand Dvorak, pick apart the post I made on his last big story. I think you'll understand him a lot better if you can take a clinical look at his sudden and inexplicable leaps of logic. It's what he does, and he's damn good at it.
I know its hard to resist the Dvorak trolling, but you need to consider one thing: He's not listening to you. He doesn't even care about your opinion. His crazy theories are keeping the money flowing, and that's good enough. Arguing with his drivel is simply wasting your time.
Well then, if you'd prefer to continue trolling (which is apparently "what you feel like typing"), I'll let you get right back to it. Toot-a-loo!
Duh, if I expected them to know more I wouldn't be calling for them to admit ignorance and go away.
Seriously, what's with the trolling? You've got a low UID and a +1 modifier, both of which suggest that you've said intelligent things in the past. Why troll?
Me: Best Buy Experience
:-)
You: I work at a Circuit City B&M store [...] Don't be so quick to rate an entire store based on one associate.
Who said anything about other stores? I was just ragging on Best Buy. Their teenage "associates" make more shit up than the worst episode of Star Trek Voyager. I'm sure there are better stores out there, but Best Buy isn't it.
Notice the blue blazers and ties are gone? [...] Granted, some of the guys at CC did seem like used car salesmen but there were some that were very good at their job.
:(
Looking back at it, I can't remember ever hearing misinformation from their staff, but I generally assumed that they didn't know what they were talking about. Why? Well, it was probably the suits. In the computer industry, suits have always been the anti-thesis of knowledgable individuals. The fact that they were wearing blazers rather than simply button-up shirts just screams, "Unknowledgable sales staff! Steer clear!"
Which is sad, considering that it sounds like they really knew what they were talking about. Everyone always assumes that a suit will automatically make you seem more professional. Unfortunately, it can swing the other way too. Thus it's important to dress the part, which isn't necessarily the same as "dressing for success."
The sales drone tried to convince him that he needed to buy one of the "gold" cables... and that going with a cheaper "silver" USB cable would result in blurry photograph prints.
Don't worry, they've fixed that problem. They now only carry the silver cables, but they're branded with the Geek Squad! logo and cost twice as much as the gold cables. See? Best Buy is simplifying things for their customers! You give them lots of money, they give you cheap crap in return. It's a Win-Lose situation!
I usually go into Best Buy because I don't want to be bothered by salesman. Alas, my last major experience with them was less than impressive. While I was browsing for a new home router, a salesperson decided to help out. While he did eventually point me toward a nice Netgear Wifi/Switch combo that was well-priced, his technical information left a lot to be desired. He informed me on no uncertain terms that the unit I had been looking at "wouldn't be full speed" because it was "a switch instead of a router." According to him, a switch was a network device that simply splits the signal, thereby allowing only one port to talk at a time. I shook my head and tried to explain that he was thinking of a hub, and that a switch gives full performance on each port. Unfortunately, I had a head cold at the time and probably wasn't very persuasive. He just sort of gave me a look like, "Whatever, dude".
All in all, Best Buy "geeks" (*cough* *sputter*) tend to have the computer knowledge of a third grader who's been throwing around factoids with his friends at lunch in a desparate attempt to arrive at a miniscule of real knowledge. It used to be amusing to ask the sales staff complex questions just to hear their wonderfully made-up answers, but these days I'm far too busy for that sort of nonsense. They would honestly be a lot more helpful if they just gave their recommendation (the same "here's the popular product" one they give everyone) and went away. For everything else they need to either profess ignorance or point the buyer to websites where they can do their own research. (Not that they're actually going to do that. They need to sell overpriced "Geek Squad" cables and useless warranties somehow.) *sigh*
That being said, I feel sorry for the well-intentioned geeks who spend some small portion of their lives with a Best Buy name tag affixed below their lapel. It must be horrifying to be expected to be so disinformative just to sell warranties and accessories.
I agree with you, but for the initial run of units, many (most?) DID sell far above the MSRP. JC Penny, for example, sold their stock at $799 a unit. Not to mention the eBay retailers who managed to sell units for upwards of $1000.
so in reality, a large number of units went for far more than the $400 price. i.e. The market self-adjusted the price. Microsoft may not have seen the profits, but that wasn't the point. Microsoft is selling the console as a loss-leader using the "razor blade" model. Advertising the system to be more costly would reduce demand, and thereby cut profits for Microsoft as fewer games got sold. With the lower MSRP, Microsoft was able to generate not only demand for games, but also buzz about the system. Buzz leads to more system sales (in the future), and more system sales can lead to more game sales. More game sales == more profit.
And that's without assuming that Microsoft isn't using its resources to undercut the competition in an attempt to monopolize the market.
That has to be the most reaching analysis I've heard yet. His basic argument is that gamers have grown up, therefore they're willing to spend gobs more money. I'm sorry, did he miss the $400 price tag? Many of the early units were sold for far more than that! If it was priced any higher, consumers would start to wonder why they shouldn't get a new gaming-rig computer instead! (Or at least a bigger HDTV and a load of HD-DVDs or BlueRays.)
If Dave of GamerDad wants to know why the 360 isn't taking the market by storm, he needs to look no farther than the games. As X-Play on G4* said, (and I'm paraphrasing here) "The XBox 360 needs to stop charging more money for less game." (In a review of Tiger Wood's Golf.) Microsoft and their affiliates need to realize that pretty graphics are not the only ingredient in making a good game. When you pay $60 for a game, you expect to get enough to entertain you until at least your next paycheck!
* No, I don't normally watch G4's game shows. I just happened to see their marathon of reviews this weekend. Which again convinced me why modern gaming sucks. Now, will someone please tell the hosts to stop nodding and making faces while the other person is talking? Also, get them into some adult-looking clothes without pockets. They look absolutely shriveled up with their arms so close to their sides. Last but not least, they need to eschew the ridiculous stream of bad jokes in favor of a few good jokes (read: not stupid!) and more off-the-cuff banter between the hosts. This practice of reading j0kes from a script really shows.
If I may be so bold...
:( ), then he finally found his image with UltraTron. After UltraTron, he realized that he'd nailed the game style he wanted, but he really needed to reward the player more. So what did he do? Well, UltraTron was originally a small Applet intended to replace the PuppyInvaders Java game on his front page. So he thought, "Why not make a sequel to PuppyInvaders?" So he did.
:)
Titan Attacks ROCKS!
Caspian Prince has spent years perfecting his Game Design skills, and it has finally paid off with Titan Attacks. The control is excellent (though it may take a bit to realize that you're supposed to be slow before you buy upgrades), the graphics are top notch, and the game is just all around fun!
FWIW, it's taken Cas about four major games to reach this point. First it was Alien Flux (a great little game, but complex controls!), then it was Super [Elvis|Dude] (Seems to be defunct these days.
You can still see the original PuppyInvaders, plus all his other games at: http://www.puppygames.net
Make sure you download at least Titan Attacks! I guarantee that you'll buy it.
Read The Fine Article more carefully. The businesses they're talking about didn't use Microsoft Windows. They went directly to Linux and have been running it for a long while. Coffey, for example, had standardized on Mandr[ake|iva] back in 1999. They came to the eventual conclusion that Linux wasn't meeting their needs, and so they went shopping. They (unsurprisingly, yet frustratingly) settled on Microsoft software.
First and foremost, that is not an OS. You're talking about a type of graphical shell that uses RPC for communications. (Like most modern environments do.) If you're looking for a term for it, use "Web Desktop".
The users desktop would be a customized Firefox browser (basically in Kiosk mode so no tool bars) with the login option that tells the apache server what level access to allow this user.
Just so you're aware, this is a very easy thing to accomplish. Simply start XWindows without a Window Manager (running 'X' at the command line is sufficient), then run Mozilla or Firefox in kiosk mode, with the following command line parameters:Replace "<WIDTH>" and "<HEIGHT>" with the screen width and height.
That should get you started on fully testing your idea. The key issue is that if the Mozilla engine opens any new browser windows, there will be no window interface. To do this "right", you'd need to find a simple Window Manager capable of keeping your "Desktop" window at the back of the screen. (Or in whatever configuration you prefer. You can do the "one window at a time" interface too.) Alternativelty, it's not that hard to build a new browser off the Gecko engine that will handle new windows in the way you specify.
Good luck!
1. WebOS is a misleading name. "Web Desktop" is a more appropriate term. I know that most users use the terms interchangably, but as techies we really shouldn't be encouraging them.
2. Most of these "WebOSes" are a mess. EyeOS just IFrames everything, Orca doesn't seem to work (at least not for me), YouOS is about at the XEdit and XTerm level, Fold is a fancy Portal environment, and XIN isn't available yet. These are nice starts to desktops, but they're a long way from fully featured desktop replacements. Right now, they're just fancy portals.
3. Google is not building a WebOS. Or at least, that's my opinion. There's no inherent advantage to building a windowing system in a browser other than the possibility of Web integration. Unfortunately, if the desktop isn't actually a real desktop (i.e. the only interface you see), then it isn't in any better position to provide Web integration than the web brower itself. Desktop development APIs are best saved for regular AJAX work until an actual need for a desktop arises.
If you replaced all those wheels in an 18-wheeler with powerful electric motors, it seems like you'd be able to get a LOT of net torque
Pfff. Motors like that currently exist in Diesel Engine trains. The problem is that there's no real reason to use a hybrid design in a Semi. Unlike cars, which are used for a lot of in-town driving, most of a truck's life is spent on the highway. Under those conditions, there's little regenerative braking to be had, and the Diesel Engine is already operating at its maximum efficiency thanks to a mechanical transmission rather than an electric transmission.
If you want a more efficient truck, look at hydrogen and ethanol blends for higher combustion temperatures, greater horsepower, and better torque. Hydrogen and ethanol are basically "safe" octane booster, but they do tend to wear parts down faster thanks to higher operating temperatures. The first rule of physics: You don't get something for nothing.
No, the push technology forward "kind of thinking" is exactly the type of thinking that gives us better lighting technologies like full-spectrum flourescents bulbs. The we must use less and less and less and less energy type of thinking is the type of thinking that forces less technological innovation by simply avoiding the technology in the first place.
The problem is, avoiding technology does nothing to move it forward. All you're doing is making sparing use of something like a lightbulb when what you really need is a good, old-fashioned problem for the market to deal with. That problem is that your energy costs are too high because your energy usage is high. Companies will then invest billions of dollars in trying to fix that problem in hopes of making money.
We may need to add more power generation capacity, but it would be nice to see some conservation happen first.
These two options cannot occur independently. Technology moves forward at an overall slow pace. (Even if individual innovations may appear to be breakneck.) If you simply start cutting off the usage of the current infrastructure, you're not going to get anywhere.
For example, the Motorola phone I use today can sit on standby for a good week or so before it needs to be recharged. Talk time is up in the area of hours. The old analog phones I used to have to deal with needed to be charged every other day. Yet my new phone does a lot more than my old phone. What changed?
Well, yes. For one the powerpack in my Motorola is better than the old one. It does store more energy. But nowhere near enough energy to make the difference seen. The real difference is that the technology got better. Instead of a powerful analog signal, my phone broadcasts a light digital communications channel. Thanks to the abilities of the built in microprocessor, that digital communications channel simply doesn't require the same amount of power to trasmit a clearer signal. The phone can even manage power to use only what is necessary to ensure a low rate of errors in the transmission. In comparison, the analog phones were spewing power, but often would still fail to keep a clear signal. Many of the lower powered phone were junk.
So the point is, keep technology moving. Certainly, we should be responsible with it. But stopping progress is far more irresponsible.
And here we have someone who failed to READ THE F***KING ARTICLE. This isn't about Wind. It's about everything from Nuclear to Bio-Fuels to Solar to Hydrogen. It's all about that people are looking at the perceived negatives of energy technologies while they blissfully ignore the fact that they NEED ENERGY TO SURVIVE.
The "actual benefits of wind power" are neither here nor there.
You're ignoring the only option which won't affect _something_: to use less energy
.22 caliber pistol and put a bullet between his eyes so that he can survive instead of the environmentalist.
That is where you are incredibly wrong. All that wonderful food we eat, many of those beautiful landscapes, all those heated buildings we live in, and all those attractive clothes we wear all take energy to create. So much energy that any significant drop in power production would mean the death of a large portion of the human race today. Food production would drop, areas couldn't be cleared and replanted more effectively, buildings would fall behind on maintenence, and heat would become a premium. And that's ignoring the matter of overseas and land transportation used to move necessary goods around the world!
While it's a nice sentiment to suggest that mankind cut back on energy usage, the question is "to what end"? Will we forgo the use of all new power and revert to living in caves? Shall it be the survival of the fittest? Well, if it comes to that, the feel-good environmentalists will be the first to die. You know why? Because a guy who doesn't mind using modern technology will happily pull a
Technology creates more resources. That's the entire point of it. Right now our cups overflow because of it. But you can't go back unless you want the very halocaust you're trying to avoid. So pull your head out of yer ass and wake up to the fact that mankind NEEDS technology!
Thank you.
The problem plaguing new energy developments is no longer NIMBYism, the "Not-In-My-Back-Yard" movement. The problem now, as one wind-power executive puts it, is BANANAism: "Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything."
:-P
If it wasn't so true, it would be hilarious. Instead, we're currently faced with a no-win scenario. Don't want Power Plant technology X in your back yard? Fine, we'll move it to the middle of the desert. You don't like that because there's a fault there that *might* cause a teeny Earthquake 500 years from now? Fine, we'll move it to the swamp land. What's that? We'd be destroying the natural habitat of mosquitoes? Why do you want to keep mosquitoes around? FINE! Then we'll move it to the ocean where we can... what? You don't want it there, EITHER? Why the hell not? Because it might damage a coral reef? What if we build an artifical one? That will change the ocean currents?
NNNGNGGNNGGGG!! HUMANS #$!@@!# CHANGE #@$!#!@! THINGS !@#!#!!!! IT'S !@#!@# WHAT @!#@!# WE @#$!@#$ DO!
Call us when you don't have power and really, really want some. Good-bye!
The better solution is to use vm for virtual memory and run all code in the same memory space, but only run code that cannot access memory illegally (ie no pointer arithmetic, only references). This code could be written in Java, or libmo, or D, or maybe other 'safe' languages and run at much faster speeds than they do now as traditional linux processes.
:(
Ah, finally someone who understands! I've been promoting this sort of OS design for a long time. The advantages of such a scheme are just incredible, including the ability to align the paging system with actual chunks of memory (e.g. Objects, buffers, etc.) rather than 4K pages that may or may not contain information you actually want to be paged.
The only problem is that it's not going to happen anytime within the next decade. Far too much software is written in C/C++ to force the issue of "safe" memory handling.
* Lightbulb goes on
Oohhhh, I see! So something like this is the problem:What you're saying is that every time through the loop, there's going to be a page fault as the CoW pages are wiped away by the new copy into the same logical buffer. CoW is dependent on allocating new pages every time so that you don't ever write to the old CoW pages. Correct?
Of course, this is where I'd really like to hear from the *BSD developers. Surely they must be aware of this issue? Do they expect programmers to throw away their buffers, or do they have a plan?
...but it isn't going to happen. BootCamp is about advertising. Macs are generally known as Really Nice Hardware(TM). As a result, some people will buy Macs just to install Windows. They may even think, "Hey, I can even try out this Mac OS X thing so that I can *really* make fun of my Mac-lover friends!" Then the users purchase a Mac, try OS X, realize they don't actually NEED Windows, and never use BootCamp at all.
It's a stroke of genius, actually.
I *think* I understand what you're saying. Basically, the problem is caused by the fact that usermode code never (or rarely, depending on your platform) releases any of the memory it has allocated. Instead, it keeps reusing the same memory pools over and over again. This becomes a problem with CoW because the kernel doesn't learn about the deallocation of memory until the usermode reallocates it for another purpose. When that reallocation happens, the read-only exception is going to be triggered. Thus there's going to be a 100% occurance of exceptions on CoW pages.
However, given that the "free()" routine is part of the OS in FreeBSD, wouldn't it make sense to create a smarter "free()" routine that would attempt to recognize and explicitly deallocate CoW pages?