The keyword is "graceful degradation". Take away the elements that contribute to the "wow factor" for the power user but the low-power user won't really miss.
It's nice to see things like this "MinDesiredFrameRate= in game.ini files.
It looks like the developer is trying to balance 'wow' vs playability.
An absurd premise. You'd have to be colossally stupid to do it. Anyone smart enough to carry it out would understand that they'd be wiping themselves out too.
Be careful. We don't want to upset those really smart people who helped develop our huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons.
Intelligence and Wisdom are two very different things.
I think one thing that is interesting is how the movie industry already touched upon this. Quite often the movie industry because of their ability to think outside of the box is able to come up with scenarios that ordinarily wouldnt be thought of or addressed.
Once upon a time AltaVista was the "unbeatable" search engine of choice.
And, before that, Webcrawler was the unbeatable one...until a bad selling decision was made.
Re:The multi million dollar question...
on
In Google We Trust
·
· Score: 2, Informative
though I don't know of anyone that uses Yahoo (I hear different ones are popular in different regions of the world).
It's very often a question of bandwidth available that effects the choice.
I've noticed that in 'bandwidth challenged' areas, yahoo.com is much more used for email accounts rather than msn.com or netscape.com.
Yahoo pages usually load a lot faster than msn.com or netscape.com ones, so there's a good reason to use it. Users then often end up switching (or adding) yahoo instant messenger because they use the yahoo email accounts.
A google search for the phrase "google not a validation of data" returns Your search - "google not a validation of data" - did not match any documents.
Blasting invaders from space is one thing; a game that lets you steal a car and run over the owner or murder prostitutes is over the line. It increases the allure of immoral behavior and blurs the line between right and wrong to an unacceptable degree in a society that is already plagued with people who cannot accept responsibility for themselves.
Is blaming a game also not accepting personal responsibility?
And how exactly do they do that? Who knows what game or franchise could be suddenly re-released, remixed or redone to acclaim? It's far easier for companies to hold on to their property, than to let go of something that could be potential profit.
Not to mention, people playing those older re-released-for-free games would be buying less new games. So, not only is it potential profit loss, it would possibly cannibalize sales of their other new, more profitable products.
The obviousness of this question makes me suspect it is a dumb one to ask but maybe someone can clarify for me. Why is it so strongly believed that some kind of environmental change wiped out dinos and not some kind of disease/virus?
Not likely.
The disease would have to act slowly enough to allow for it to be spread over the entire planet without killing the carriers too soon. And, there would be areas where dinosaurs would have been isolated (except by air) due to changes in earth formations such as valleys & large rivers temporarily trapping dinosaurs in specific areas. Those dinosaurs should not have been infected.
The disease could have been carried by flying dinosaurs, but the chances of them covering every location on earth before dying isn't likely.
Not to mention, the virus would run into resistant dinosaurs due to species differences.
Just to make sure, everyone tell Bush that if China gets a man on Mars first, that proves that the president of China has a bigger penis than the president of the US.
That could get Bush out of the WMD fiasco.
He can cite intelligence sources about the impending doom and get us all concentrated on stopping the Chinese PMD's. "Intelligence Sources tell us that the Chinese PMD program is an immediate threat to our top national insecurity and the threat is growing larger every day!"
I had an occasion years ago where I needed an assistant with some programming duties. The interviewing manager wanted me to be present so I could ask some questions after him. After all, most of the business was not computer related.
At the beginning of each interview, the manager would ask a few questions and then I would ask the ones that were relevent to what I needed.
During the third interview I realized that I had the perfect candidate for the programming job. But, at the end of the interview, the manager took me to the side and said 'that person is unacceptable, I don't think she knows about what you need her to do.'. Wrap up the interview.
Her fatal mistake? One of the questions he had asked her was 'do you know how to copy and paste?'. She replied 'of course, who doesn't?'
The interviewing manager had previously had problems understanding the concept of 'copy and paste'. In fact, I had shown him 3 times how to do it in 1/2 of a year.
That candidate was by far the best out of any I interviewed. Instead of hiring one of the other candidates, I quit.
That one little social blunder she made shouldn't have ruined her chances for the job. After all, she was probably not used to being around a lot of non-computer experienced people.
Not to mention, I was there to find someone "I" needed and would only be dealing with me in any case.
I can see it now. A group of people in the parking lot arguing over who is sober enough to drive and then passing around the remote testing unit until the car starts.
Yep. I can see car chase scenes in movies becoming really boring very soon. Like the guy who robs a bank, runs to his getaway car, blows real hard in the breathalizer shouting COME ON! COME ON! then, 30 seconds later, puts the pedal to the metal.
It won't stop James Bond. They always come up with the nifty devices for him.
I can see it now 'Take this prototype breathalizer deactivator pen with you, James. You'll need it since no one else loves to drive around and kill people while under the influence of Martinis'.
There's NO WAY to blow air into a tube wihout it coming from a human lung. Billows do not exist. And these things are so inexpensive, they can put two or three in each car, to make sure the passengers are sober too!
Not to mention, there are easy ways to clear alcohol vapors out of lungs long enough to fool the machine.
And, for anyone who saw the Mythbusters where they 'proved' that alcohol testing machines can't be fooled, notice that they only tested ways to add something to breath to fool the machine and completely dodged the ways to temporarily remove the alcohol vapors themselves.
I agree. This makes perfect sense as part of a sentence for a DUI offence after your licence suspension is over.
For the rest of us, this would be just a big pain in the ass.
That's an understatement.
It will even be deadly.
I've seen numerous situations in my life where a person who was most likely over the local limit, and normally didn't drive under the influence had to use a vehicle for an emergency.
The DUI laws are supposed to be there to protect us from people who don't have the good judgement to have a designated driver when they drink. Punish them harshly. Don't pre-punish people who might have a very valid reason to temporarily need a vehicle to save a life.
Before anyone argues that there are NO situations where a person should drive impaired. Imagine your mother is having a heart attack and you've had a few beers at home. If you are unable to get assistance fast enough (for whatever reason, 'all circuits are busy', etc...) would you let her die because you just drank a few beers?
On top of that, how would you feel if she died because that interlock stopped you from saving her life?
Ignition interlocks are a tool for those who need them. They are monitored strictly under the guidelines of whatever court ordered it. Just throwing them onto cars without the monitoring is simply a waste of time.
ALL vehicles in the state should have them if the law passes, even Police Vehicles.
I always used to joke, after bartending for a couple of years, that when officers in the area pull someone over and require an alcohol test, the officer should take one too and if the citizen has a lower alcohol content, they don't get a ticket, they just have to park their vehicle.
It wasn't really a joke though. I served plenty of the local officers drinks and they'd then go on shift to bust people for traffic violations, including DUI's. (We had a police/fire scanner at the bar).
New Mexico has periodic (annual, IIRC) vehicle safety inspections. If your interlock were disabled, you wouldn't get your inspection sticker and couldn't legally drive your car.
You would still get inspection stickers.
California has strict exhaust emission control requirements.
But, plenty of people pass the emission tests because there are always shops in the area that are willing to validate just about any vehicle when slipped some extra cash.
Upgrading right now to get PCI-E is ridiculous, however buying a top of the line AGP card at this juncture is equally ridiculous...
I don't think purchasing a top quality AGP card is rediculous at all.
I generally get 2 years worth of use out of them. That comes to about $16 a month to have a card that can handle just about anything thrown at it at a high resolution.
I cut back on candy bars and Coca-Colas enough each month to pay for the card so the Bleeding-Edge AGP card is actually probably adding years onto my life!
Slashdot Mirror
The keyword is "graceful degradation". Take away the elements that contribute to the "wow factor" for the power user but the low-power user won't really miss.
.ini files.
It looks like the developer is trying to balance 'wow' vs playability.
It's nice to see things like this "MinDesiredFrameRate= in game
Can you back up your claim that we'd be driven to extinction by an asteroid hit?
Well, I can't prove that person's claim, OTOH, it's impossible to disprove it.
So, um, "there!" or something!
An absurd premise. You'd have to be colossally stupid to do it. Anyone smart enough to carry it out would understand that they'd be wiping themselves out too.
Be careful. We don't want to upset those really smart people who helped develop our huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons.
Intelligence and Wisdom are two very different things.
I think one thing that is interesting is how the movie industry already touched upon this. Quite often the movie industry because of their ability to think outside of the box is able to come up with scenarios that ordinarily wouldnt be thought of or addressed.
Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle.
It's a good read. Hollywood tends to regurgitate things that taste better when eaten fresh.
It's amazing what people do come up with to get an excuse for drinking beer.
This might knock you off of a barstool: STUDY FINDS WOMEN WHO DRINK WAY MORE FUN TO STUDY
Once upon a time AltaVista was the "unbeatable" search engine of choice.
And, before that, Webcrawler was the unbeatable one...until a bad selling decision was made.
though I don't know of anyone that uses Yahoo (I hear different ones are popular in different regions of the world).
It's very often a question of bandwidth available that effects the choice.
I've noticed that in 'bandwidth challenged' areas, yahoo.com is much more used for email accounts rather than msn.com or netscape.com.
Yahoo pages usually load a lot faster than msn.com or netscape.com ones, so there's a good reason to use it. Users then often end up switching (or adding) yahoo instant messenger because they use the yahoo email accounts.
Finding it on Google doesn't validate the data.
A google search for the phrase "google not a validation of data" returns Your search - "google not a validation of data" - did not match any documents.
Therefore:
a) It's never been said
which leads to:
b) This thread doesn'
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Just as scary as the article about Symbiot.
But, funny and stuff.
What's this, citizen? An encrypted message? Such signs of disloyalty and mistrust are not encouraging, citizen!
An encrypted message would not be rejected because it is not an encrypted attachment.
Blasting invaders from space is one thing; a game that lets you steal a car and run over the owner or murder prostitutes is over the line. It increases the allure of immoral behavior and blurs the line between right and wrong to an unacceptable degree in a society that is already plagued with people who cannot accept responsibility for themselves.
Is blaming a game also not accepting personal responsibility?
And how exactly do they do that? Who knows what game or franchise could be suddenly re-released, remixed or redone to acclaim? It's far easier for companies to hold on to their property, than to let go of something that could be potential profit.
Not to mention, people playing those older re-released-for-free games would be buying less new games. So, not only is it potential profit loss, it would possibly cannibalize sales of their other new, more profitable products.
The obviousness of this question makes me suspect it is a dumb one to ask but maybe someone can clarify for me. Why is it so strongly believed that some kind of environmental change wiped out dinos and not some kind of disease/virus?
Not likely.
The disease would have to act slowly enough to allow for it to be spread over the entire planet without killing the carriers too soon. And, there would be areas where dinosaurs would have been isolated (except by air) due to changes in earth formations such as valleys & large rivers temporarily trapping dinosaurs in specific areas. Those dinosaurs should not have been infected.
The disease could have been carried by flying dinosaurs, but the chances of them covering every location on earth before dying isn't likely.
Not to mention, the virus would run into resistant dinosaurs due to species differences.
Just to make sure, everyone tell Bush that if China gets a man on Mars first, that proves that the president of China has a bigger penis than the president of the US.
That could get Bush out of the WMD fiasco.
He can cite intelligence sources about the impending doom and get us all concentrated on stopping the Chinese PMD's. "Intelligence Sources tell us that the Chinese PMD program is an immediate threat to our top national insecurity and the threat is growing larger every day!"
"My toilet clogged up this morning...could that be terrorism?"
YES! Stopping courtesy flushes is one of the worst types of terrorism imaginable.
I had an occasion years ago where I needed an assistant with some programming duties. The interviewing manager wanted me to be present so I could ask some questions after him. After all, most of the business was not computer related.
At the beginning of each interview, the manager would ask a few questions and then I would ask the ones that were relevent to what I needed.
During the third interview I realized that I had the perfect candidate for the programming job. But, at the end of the interview, the manager took me to the side and said 'that person is unacceptable, I don't think she knows about what you need her to do.'. Wrap up the interview.
Her fatal mistake? One of the questions he had asked her was 'do you know how to copy and paste?'. She replied 'of course, who doesn't?'
The interviewing manager had previously had problems understanding the concept of 'copy and paste'. In fact, I had shown him 3 times how to do it in 1/2 of a year.
That candidate was by far the best out of any I interviewed. Instead of hiring one of the other candidates, I quit.
That one little social blunder she made shouldn't have ruined her chances for the job. After all, she was probably not used to being around a lot of non-computer experienced people.
Not to mention, I was there to find someone "I" needed and would only be dealing with me in any case.
Will remote breathalyzers be an option?
I guess it could be a feature.
I can see it now. A group of people in the parking lot arguing over who is sober enough to drive and then passing around the remote testing unit until the car starts.
Yep. I can see car chase scenes in movies becoming really boring very soon. Like the guy who robs a bank, runs to his getaway car, blows real hard in the breathalizer shouting COME ON! COME ON! then, 30 seconds later, puts the pedal to the metal.
It won't stop James Bond. They always come up with the nifty devices for him.
I can see it now 'Take this prototype breathalizer deactivator pen with you, James. You'll need it since no one else loves to drive around and kill people while under the influence of Martinis'.
There's NO WAY to blow air into a tube wihout it coming from a human lung. Billows do not exist. And these things are so inexpensive, they can put two or three in each car, to make sure the passengers are sober too!
Not to mention, there are easy ways to clear alcohol vapors out of lungs long enough to fool the machine.
And, for anyone who saw the Mythbusters where they 'proved' that alcohol testing machines can't be fooled, notice that they only tested ways to add something to breath to fool the machine and completely dodged the ways to temporarily remove the alcohol vapors themselves.
I agree. This makes perfect sense as part of a sentence for a DUI offence after your licence suspension is over.
For the rest of us, this would be just a big pain in the ass.
That's an understatement.
It will even be deadly.
I've seen numerous situations in my life where a person who was most likely over the local limit, and normally didn't drive under the influence had to use a vehicle for an emergency.
The DUI laws are supposed to be there to protect us from people who don't have the good judgement to have a designated driver when they drink. Punish them harshly. Don't pre-punish people who might have a very valid reason to temporarily need a vehicle to save a life.
Before anyone argues that there are NO situations where a person should drive impaired. Imagine your mother is having a heart attack and you've had a few beers at home. If you are unable to get assistance fast enough (for whatever reason, 'all circuits are busy', etc...) would you let her die because you just drank a few beers?
On top of that, how would you feel if she died because that interlock stopped you from saving her life?
Ignition interlocks are a tool for those who need them. They are monitored strictly under the guidelines of whatever court ordered it. Just throwing them onto cars without the monitoring is simply a waste of time.
ALL vehicles in the state should have them if the law passes, even Police Vehicles.
I always used to joke, after bartending for a couple of years, that when officers in the area pull someone over and require an alcohol test, the officer should take one too and if the citizen has a lower alcohol content, they don't get a ticket, they just have to park their vehicle.
It wasn't really a joke though. I served plenty of the local officers drinks and they'd then go on shift to bust people for traffic violations, including DUI's. (We had a police/fire scanner at the bar).
New Mexico has periodic (annual, IIRC) vehicle safety inspections. If your interlock were disabled, you wouldn't get your inspection sticker and couldn't legally drive your car.
You would still get inspection stickers.
California has strict exhaust emission control requirements.
But, plenty of people pass the emission tests because there are always shops in the area that are willing to validate just about any vehicle when slipped some extra cash.
Upgrading right now to get PCI-E is ridiculous, however buying a top of the line AGP card at this juncture is equally ridiculous... I don't think purchasing a top quality AGP card is rediculous at all.
I generally get 2 years worth of use out of them. That comes to about $16 a month to have a card that can handle just about anything thrown at it at a high resolution.
I cut back on candy bars and Coca-Colas enough each month to pay for the card so the Bleeding-Edge AGP card is actually probably adding years onto my life!
I know that that doesn't work for NeverWinter Nights. You have to be logged in as Admin for that to work.
Install the application into your non-admin user "/documents and settings/whoever" area instead of "/program files".
I also factor in the number of used books for sale.
If there are a lot, it might (combined with many negative reviews) IMHO indicate a really suck-ass book.