Hey. Marketing people love to trumpet all kinds of fantasy based figures when they talk about CPU spead.
The troth is that the only CPU mesure that matters is how long dose it take to rip and encode a DVD to DivX (One of the few tasks that still taks hours.) or whatever application YOU run which YOU feal is too slow on whatever system you have now.
And for comparison, Athlon 3200+ vs iNTEL 3.2 GHz is not what matters. What matters is iNTEL's $500 CPU vs AMD's $500 (or $100 CPU).
The same reason that I cary a clearly marked 10 KG weight when I work on POS (Point Of Sale) systems. Start with a known result to see how well the mesuring tool works.
I.e. You use GPLed software to test the reverse enginearing software itself. Especialy Decompilers.
Yeah. However in this case it's IBM and that makes all the difference. Why? Because IBM dose not need to make any money off selling this cra^M^M^MSoftware.
What dose this mean for the future of desktop software? Follow my logic below and see if you hit the same conclusion.
1. For individuals running Namebrand desktops and Portables MSOffice _looks_ free.
2. For those running none Windows OSs. OpenOffice/StarOffice and maybe kOffice are all that matter.
3. For those who currently have contracts with MS. The software itself is almost irrelevant. Hence the annual upgrade fee idea. I have never had a customer complain about a missing feature in any version of MSOffice 97. Just compatibility.
4. I have yet to see a Java app that's as fast as fast/stable etc.. as C/C++ apps written by similar priced programmers.
In short. It won't mean a lot there.
What it dose mean is that people building sites on IBM's infrastructure will have more tools to play with.
At my office "Systems Enginear", (part of a global consulting house that will remain nameless to protect the guilty). we have just Programers and Systems Enginears as technical people.
I.e. If you work with the technology and are not actualy a programer. You are a Systems Enginear.
Yes it's only January but this looks like such a wonderful invention and at such a great price that it most likely dose not exist. I.e. It's probebly Vaporware.
On the off chance that it is not I will personaly be buying some for "data archiving". (I.e. Pron Warehose.)
Actually. DOD has specific guidelines that define Overkill.
1. format drive 2. Triple overwrite security erase. (All 1s all 0s then all 1s again.) 3. Degauss with powerful magnet. 4. Crush with road roller. 5. Melt in furnace. 6. Bury in secure area under 15 feet of cement.
This whole "Design the Hardware for the software and design the software for the hardware" argument is a myth. People believe it because that's an excuse Microsoft uses whenever systems built entirely from the HCL break down.
Troth is that you just need to build good hardware and good software and make sure the drivers work properly.
I wonder if now you know why we weren't impressed by Caldera.
From the start they acted like the kinda bottom feeding company who would sell it's own mother for a buck but couldn't rub two creative neurons together if it's entire share equity depended on it.
Yes. For those who don't remember SCO == Caldera.
1. Let's see what these patent claims are.
2. Ask around. Just how much of a stake dose Microsoft have in this action?
3. In the worst case scenario. I.e. That the patent claims are valid and cover some core areas. Be prepared to code around it.
4. Let's just hope for the best. I.e. That this is all a big hoax and Caldera isn't the a venomus parasite after all.
This is a one of a kind prototype of what the manufacturers hope will become a popular mass production phenomenon. If you read the blurb on E-Bay you realise that the biding is realy for "The smithsonian" and anyone else with the cash to bid against them.
I.e. Major museums and insanely welthy individuals.
Treck knows this will eventualy end up in amuseum. They want it there as permanent advertising.
The only thing that could prevent that is some ID10T crashing into propane tank and smashing the flier to smitherines.
My unsientific guess, which the rest of you might call a profetic forcast.
When a significantly better telescope than the best curently in use is developed, it will find objects so far away that the Univers' age has to be recalculated at over 50 Billion years for the Big Bang theory to ramain a plausible explanation.
While, I am at it, I think they will actualy discuver that at least half of sul like stars (Yelow dewarf I think) have Earth like planets. Or planets positioned to posibly be Earth like.
Finaly, and this is the biggy. When SETI eventualy succeads we will discover that aliens have TV and there are whole sitcums about humans trying to adapt to civilisation.
1. Dark Energy. It's the stuff that makes all the recent World Heavyweight champions as powerful as they are.
2. Water on Mars. Yes, it's there but the stuff in France tastes better.
3. The Murky, Mediocre Middle of the Milky Way. Come on. We have second grade everything. Why not the same for Black hole?
4. The Origin of Life. One word. Creation.
5. Lunar Secrets. If we bring down earth rocks from the moon they might have dormant bacteria to which we no longer have a defense. Bad idea.
6. Are we alone? No. I'm an optimist and having failed to find intelligent life on Earth I am positive SETI will be successful eventually.
7. The Sun. It's bright, it's big, it's hot. What's to understand?
8. Age of the Universe. Anybody want to take this bet? When the best Telescope available is significantly (2x to 10x) better than the best currently available objects will be found so far a away that they set the minimum age of the universe at 30 billion years or more.
9. Missing planets. They drifted by and got caught in the gravity well.
10. Can we Survive 2003. Of course. Michael Clark Douglas and Bruce Willis can rescue us from anything.
Actualy that's the only reason to not think this is faked.
Otherwise it looks like Windows XP with a few obvius decorative splashes.
Notice the hardware section? S3 Trio 32/64?
What are the odds that The next Windowswill support such old video chips? I.e. If you dobt me on this remember that basic things like serial mice stoped working in Windows XP andwere flaky in 2000. ISA NICs don't work which probebly makes Windows the only OS on the planet which dosn't work with any of my NE2K clones.
Someone figured out that you can pack more bandwidth and less latency into fiberoptics than copper?
More importantly they are actualy using an optical router to prevent what has become a botleneck in resent years. I.e. Data comming off a fiber pipe is converted to electrical signals before being routed to it's next destination where it's converted back to little bity laser beams.
This should be faster than your typical loadsharing super computer (SETI@home) but slower than the miranet using hardcore. With enogh nodes however there is no telling howfast this baby can get.
New versions of Windows do not support ISA NICs (This problem has biten me in the behind) and old versions don't support most PCI NICs.
Hell that stupid little OS has unilateraly desided that nobody wants to use a serial mouse. Meanwhile the shop I buy parts at still has Serial mice in stock.
Linux dosn't suport every NIC. Niether dose any OS. However Linux dose prety well.
My idea is to produce a utility like this with all autoloadeble NIC drivers included. Of course it would practicaly be aLinux distribution andwouldneed a CD for those files but so what?
PS: Away to have it produce a floppy with just the right driver once it gets a working combination would be cool.
The cruise docked in Jamaica and everybody had a ball.
We were told that just a few of the speakers would be presenting in Jamaica so 3 of us drove down to the pier to colect them.
Ha.
we neaded all 3 cars plus 2 busses to haul them to "the Ruins". We sat ESR and Linux on a panel with 4 other senior geaks and asked them some lame questions for an hour or so.
All the baby Linuses were there and Tove is realy cool. everybody seams to think the Coffee here is great (exact words: "The best I have ever tasted") so we will try to have a few bags ready for the next deligation.
PS: No the Geak Cruise dosn't normaly hold talks on land for the locals. However JaLUG asked nicely:).
Kevin Forge. Jamaica Linux Users Group. JaLUG Founding member.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey. Marketing people love to trumpet all kinds of fantasy based figures when they talk about CPU spead.
The troth is that the only CPU mesure that matters is how long dose it take to rip and encode a DVD to DivX (One of the few tasks that still taks hours.) or whatever application YOU run which YOU feal is too slow on whatever system you have now.
And for comparison, Athlon 3200+ vs iNTEL 3.2 GHz is not what matters. What matters is iNTEL's $500 CPU vs AMD's $500 (or $100 CPU).
The same reason that I cary a clearly marked 10 KG weight when I work on POS (Point Of Sale) systems. Start with a known result to see how well the mesuring tool works.
I.e. You use GPLed software to test the reverse enginearing software itself. Especialy Decompilers.
Yeah. However in this case it's IBM and that makes all the difference. Why? Because IBM dose not need to make any money off selling this cra^M^M^MSoftware.
What dose this mean for the future of desktop software? Follow my logic below and see if you hit the same conclusion.
1. For individuals running Namebrand desktops and Portables MSOffice _looks_ free.
2. For those running none Windows OSs. OpenOffice/StarOffice and maybe kOffice are all that matter.
3. For those who currently have contracts with MS. The software itself is almost irrelevant. Hence the annual upgrade fee idea. I have never had a customer complain about a missing feature in any version of MSOffice 97. Just compatibility.
4. I have yet to see a Java app that's as fast as fast/stable etc.. as C/C++ apps written by similar priced programmers.
In short. It won't mean a lot there.
What it dose mean is that people building sites on IBM's infrastructure will have more tools to play with.
That's ALL
At my office "Systems Enginear", (part of a global consulting house that will remain nameless to protect the guilty). we have just Programers and Systems Enginears as technical people.
I.e. If you work with the technology and are not actualy a programer. You are a Systems Enginear.
... For the 1st time this April.
I'll see to it that this bill gets the suport it deservs. I'll loby, I'll march, I'll recrute people to work the phones and go house to house.
Hmm... Maybe not.
Yes.
:)
After all. Toyota charges more than Lada.
That's just as fare.
"Don't bite the flamebait."
"Why not?"
"It might make you look dumb."
"It's OK. This one just needs a little clarity".
QTopia is a development environment for portable and embeded devices. It runs on embeded versions of Linux.
As soon as you accept that simple fact, the success of VHS and Wintel start to make sence. As dose the reason MS fears Linux so.
Hateful as it may sound the cost of an item is a part of the quality equation. If it wasn't then the Rols would be the only car that maters.
Let me be clear. Aple just designs beter stuff and make it work togather.
Linux on Aple hardware is more stable than OS9.
Where can I find such a device on this kind of scale? How much?
Yes it's only January but this looks like such a wonderful invention and at such a great price that it most likely dose not exist. I.e. It's probebly Vaporware.
On the off chance that it is not I will personaly be buying some for "data archiving". (I.e. Pron Warehose.)
Actually. DOD has specific guidelines that define Overkill.
1. format drive
2. Triple overwrite security erase. (All 1s all 0s then all 1s again.)
3. Degauss with powerful magnet.
4. Crush with road roller.
5. Melt in furnace.
6. Bury in secure area under 15 feet of cement.
By that logic, Windows should only crash on big name machines after you upgrade the hardware.
IBM, Dell etc... test thoroghly every configuration they sell. It still crashes long before any hardware device fails.
This is just an excuse because MS makes broken OSs and dosn't open enogh info for better drivers.
I don't know about him/her but I AM saying that.
This whole "Design the Hardware for the software and design the software for the hardware" argument is a myth. People believe it because that's an excuse Microsoft uses whenever systems built entirely from the HCL break down.
Troth is that you just need to build good hardware and good software and make sure the drivers work properly.
I wonder if now you know why we weren't impressed by Caldera.
From the start they acted like the kinda bottom feeding company who would sell it's own mother for a buck but couldn't rub two creative neurons together if it's entire share equity depended on it.
Yes. For those who don't remember SCO == Caldera.
1. Let's see what these patent claims are.
2. Ask around. Just how much of a stake dose Microsoft have in this action?
3. In the worst case scenario. I.e. That the patent claims are valid and cover some core areas. Be prepared to code around it.
4. Let's just hope for the best. I.e. That this is all a big hoax and Caldera isn't the a venomus parasite after all.
This is a one of a kind prototype of what the manufacturers hope will become a popular mass production phenomenon. If you read the blurb on E-Bay you realise that the biding is realy for "The smithsonian" and anyone else with the cash to bid against them.
I.e. Major museums and insanely welthy individuals.
Treck knows this will eventualy end up in amuseum. They want it there as permanent advertising.
The only thing that could prevent that is some ID10T crashing into propane tank and smashing the flier to smitherines.
My unsientific guess, which the rest of you might call a profetic forcast.
When a significantly better telescope than the best curently in use is developed, it will find objects so far away that the Univers' age has to be recalculated at over 50 Billion years for the Big Bang theory to ramain a plausible explanation.
While, I am at it, I think they will actualy discuver that at least half of sul like stars (Yelow dewarf I think) have Earth like planets. Or planets positioned to posibly be Earth like.
Finaly, and this is the biggy. When SETI eventualy succeads we will discover that aliens have TV and there are whole sitcums about humans trying to adapt to civilisation.
I can solve them all.
1. Dark Energy. It's the stuff that makes all the recent World Heavyweight champions as powerful as they are.
2. Water on Mars. Yes, it's there but the stuff in France tastes better.
3. The Murky, Mediocre Middle of the Milky Way. Come on. We have second grade everything. Why not the same for Black hole?
4. The Origin of Life. One word. Creation.
5. Lunar Secrets. If we bring down earth rocks from the moon they might have dormant bacteria to which we no longer have a defense. Bad idea.
6. Are we alone? No. I'm an optimist and having failed to find intelligent life on Earth I am positive SETI will be successful eventually.
7. The Sun. It's bright, it's big, it's hot. What's to understand?
8. Age of the Universe. Anybody want to take this bet? When the best Telescope available is significantly (2x to 10x) better than the best currently available objects will be found so far a away that they set the minimum age of the universe at 30 billion years or more.
9. Missing planets. They drifted by and got caught in the gravity well.
10. Can we Survive 2003. Of course. Michael Clark Douglas and Bruce Willis can rescue us from anything.
I stand corrected.
Actualy that's the only reason to not think this is faked.
Otherwise it looks like Windows XP with a few obvius decorative splashes.
Notice the hardware section? S3 Trio 32/64?
What are the odds that The next Windowswill support such old video chips? I.e. If you dobt me on this remember that basic things like serial mice stoped working in Windows XP andwere flaky in 2000. ISA NICs don't work which probebly makes Windows the only OS on the planet which dosn't work with any of my NE2K clones.
Actualy. Digital means just 1&0. :)
Not any old number
Someone figured out that you can pack more bandwidth and less latency into fiberoptics than copper?
More importantly they are actualy using an optical router to prevent what has become a botleneck in resent years. I.e. Data comming off a fiber pipe is converted to electrical signals before being routed to it's next destination where it's converted back to little bity laser beams.
This should be faster than your typical loadsharing super computer (SETI@home) but slower than the miranet using hardcore. With enogh nodes however there is no telling howfast this baby can get.
Not that you have a brain or anything but.
New versions of Windows do not support ISA NICs (This problem has biten me in the behind) and old versions don't support most PCI NICs.
Hell that stupid little OS has unilateraly desided that nobody wants to use a serial mouse. Meanwhile the shop I buy parts at still has Serial mice in stock.
PS: Why do you have such a foul mouth?
Linux dosn't suport every NIC. Niether dose any OS. However Linux dose prety well.
My idea is to produce a utility like this with all autoloadeble NIC drivers included. Of course it would practicaly be aLinux distribution andwouldneed a CD for those files but so what?
PS: Away to have it produce a floppy with just the right driver once it gets a working combination would be cool.
The cruise docked in Jamaica and everybody had a ball.
:).
We were told that just a few of the speakers would be presenting in Jamaica so 3 of us drove down to the pier to colect them.
Ha.
we neaded all 3 cars plus 2 busses to haul them to "the Ruins". We sat ESR and Linux on a panel with 4 other senior geaks and asked them some lame questions for an hour or so.
All the baby Linuses were there and Tove is realy cool. everybody seams to think the Coffee here is great (exact words: "The best I have ever tasted") so we will try to have a few bags ready for the next deligation.
PS: No the Geak Cruise dosn't normaly hold talks on land for the locals. However JaLUG asked nicely
Kevin Forge.
Jamaica Linux Users Group. JaLUG
Founding member.