You generally can't use preemptive threads or garbage collection (both of which Java relies on) in a realtime system--or for that matter, dynamically-sized data structures (put in too many elements and you'll miss a deadline) or virtual memory.
The Erlang real-time development platform uses all of these.
Those who attack Lisp are usually attacking Common Lisp.
In my experience, most people who "attack Lisp" direct their tirades against Lisp 1 - 1.5, or the all-caps Lisp which appears in, say, Tanimoto's Elements of Artificial Intelligence (1987). Analogous are those clever critics who blast Fortran. Only after you inquire deeper, it becomes clear they are talking about Fortran-77, Fortan-66, Fortran-IV, or even Fortran-II.
I don't care if LISP runs 500 times as fast as Java.
Well, then, you're a moron. I used to think nobody who spouts this sort of hyperbole was serious. But then, after using the Forte development environment for Java, I realized that yes, Java programmers really don't care if what they write is 500 times slower than it should be.
It has a massively restricted API. People don't base their language choice on speed
anymore.
Obviously you have never done any scientific computing.
FORTRAN is still twice as fast as C, but everyone still uses C,
No, Fortran is at least as popular as C in the scientific programming scene.
for two reasons: FORTRAN is harder to learn, and C has more libraries.
Heh. C doesn't even have an exponentiation operator. Considering this small fact could give you a bit of insight as to why much scientific programming is still done in Fortran. No amount of C libraries can give the numerical programmer the expressive power of Fortran's whole-array syntax. E.g., to find the average of values greater than 500 in an array of any dimensions:
avg = sum(a, mask = (a > 500))/ count(mask = (a > 500))
initialize the array b element-by-element to the
square root of corresponding elements of a:
What's wrong with selfish and uncaring? I should have the right to be selfish and uncaring if I so desire,
I'm not sure I follow you here. You already
have the necessary freedoms to comport yourself
with whatever sort of anti-social attitude you wish. People may object to your attitudes, though. What exactly do you mean by "right" in this
instance? Do you mean the "right" to be uncaring
and selfish, in the sense of an entrenched political or human right? What exactly would that
involve?
as long as I don't actively infringe on the rights of others.
You have a peculiar notion of "rights." Would
you say that people also have the "right" not to
tolerate the uncaring and selfish?
But don't require me to do anything. What's mine is mine.
Obviously, though, Art_XIV is requiring us
to do something. After all, he did present
his 8-point platform as "a solution to the world's problems".
You can't just say "use == abuse"; that's the same as "all sex is rape" and just as credible.
But we can say "rape == rape". There is no non-abusive way to recreationally use illegal
substances.
Furthermore, it's worth noting whether I *personally* am telling the truth or not,
If the veracity of your personal account is
irrelevent, then why did you use it as an
example?
the fact that there are people who are not juvenile idiots
who do find drugs fun was what I was trying to get at.
Quite frankly,
anybody who gets his kicks by repeatedly inducing
himself into a hallucinogenic stupor with the
help of illegal substances is about as idiotically juvenile as a kid who repeatedly whacks himself
in the head with a hammer because he likes to
look at all them funny stars.
So I'm not a juvenile idiot (as evidenced by the fact that despite having "experimented" pretty liberally with pot and LSD at certain times in
my life, I am not dead and not in jail), why should my toys be taken away?
I have no idea if you are a juvenile idiot or not.
Such matters can't rightly be decided simply by
declaring "I'm not a juvenile idiot" on
slashdot.
On the one hand, you say you abused drugs at some
points in the past -- which to me implies that you no longer lie about in a pallid stupor, "experimenting". On the other hand, you don't want
your toys taken away. Should we conclude that
you don't do drugs, but have a nice pile of
crack stashed away just for nostaligia?
All narcotics, mood-alterers, psychadelics, alchohol, cigarettes, etc. are recreational drugs. The import and export of them shall not be
regulated and persons who produce, possess, or use them shall not be subject to punishment.
If you do them and render yourself useless, then die.
If you screw up, I don't want to hear about how you started taking drugs because your life was all messed up, or you were sad, or you were poor.
Your sentiments are quite illustrative of the
typically selfish, uncaring, and infantile libertarian mentality so popular these days.
Libertarian policies toward opiates reflect the
fact that their entire world-view is but a
incoherent pipe dream.
Are *drugs* really the problem, or is the combination of drugs and the American eternally juvenile sensibility the problem?
It's both, of course. If you haven't noticed,
drugs are illegal. So, yes, their very presence
in your bong is a problem.
But you are quite correct to suggest that
an even greater problem is the exceedingly
juvenile mind-set and behavior of many
americans with regards to pretty much
everything -- vice, guns, drugs, &c.
Hence the reason for taking away their toys.
It's the only way to deal with juvenile
idiots, as any parent knows.
The Matrix is an immortal film to so many because
it takes a large body of religious and spiritual
aphorisms and places them in a context where
they suddenly become extremely meaningful.
For example, we've all seen kung-fu flicks where
some guy is getting a lecture from his Master,
and it sounds like mostly mumbo-jumbo. However,
in the Matrix, this very same mumbo-jumbo suddenly
becomes perfectly clear, comprehensible, and
necessary. A good illustration is the stuff
Morpheus says about "walking the path".
We've heard this kind of stuff before. In other
films, it may have come off silly. But in the
Matrix, it makes sense. Some people out there
truly appreciate a movie which offers a positive
take on spirituality or other-worldliness, since
there are so few around. Most movies either
trivialize sprituality or positively ridicule it.
People are tired of that. The Matrix was a refreshing change.
With Scientology in the air, it even gets more interesting - old LRH's learning tech hinges on the idea that all misunderstandings are over misunderstood words.
When you don't get a new subject, it is solely because you didn't understand a word (not because the material is hard, or doesn't make sense, or the teacher is awful).
You are encouraged to look up all the words you didn't understand, and then you will understand.
Ayn Rand's Objectivism works the same way. Altruism? What's that? 'Altruism is what made
Hitler, Stalin, and Jeffrey Dahmer bad guys.' Selfishness? What's
that? 'Selfishness is what makes John Galt
a good guy.'
Putting an ideological spin on common words
is a fundamental brainwashing technique, most
notably exposed by George Orwell. You can always
spot a nut-cult by it's private redefinition of
non-technical words.
NET will allow you to use Linux, or any other.NET
compatible platform, to communicate with the vast majority of users who are Windows subscribers. Moving data, in the form of Office documents, closed-type formats, and other "feature-added" (pronounced proprietary) formats will be trival. Now, moving data between platforms/programs is a major task unless you don't mind your data being mangaled in the process.
I can already do this. It's called ftp.
A real specific example of why Word would be better with.NET capabilities would be this: you write user manuals for a software company, free
lance. You have a new-whiz bang computer/laptop, but not everyone at the mega-soft corp company has a new version of xyz app. Luckily, your
software company runs MS xyz server, and has decided to allow you to upload the documents to it weekly for progress review. Members of the
review staff have Office 95, but luckily, the MS xyz server tranlsates the document on the fly, delivers them a properly formatted version for Office
95, allows them to edit it, saves changes, and updates the original, still in the newest format. Sure, you COULD do this by hand, but when 10 editors
take the file automatically, edit it, and send it back to you in file versions ranging from Office 95, 97, 2000 and XP, things get messy.
So then, what you are saying is that.NET is
gonna be great because it's a solution to the problem deliberately created, perpetuated, and maintained
by Microsoft? I have an idea, why don't they
just screw.NET and go with open file formats
instead?
How many people really jump up and down at the
idea of not owning software. I don't see anything in this that will ever make me not want to own
my apps outright.
Do you remember when HP introduced the first
LaserJet? They initially thought to market
it as a print server. They figured nobody
would want to personally own one, that
everyone would just "rent" time on it by
sharing. However, it turned out to be the
opposite. Everyone wanted to own a laserprinter
personally.
There are some things that people prefer to
own rather than rent. Like cars. You hear
people say "Man, I'm saving up to buy that
Ferrari." You do not hear people say
"Man, I'm saving up to rent that Ferrari."
Books are like this too. Sure, libraries are
great. But notice they haven't put bookstores
out of business. That's because people like
owning their own books.
Same with software. There's a company I know
who used to have a number of Pro/E seats.
When Parametric Technologies instituted an
even more draconian licensing scheme involving
lots of regular payments (the new MS Office 2000
license reminds me of this), they just chucked
Pro/E off their systems.
Add that to the fact that the license is clearly
attempting to gain the rights to *ALL CONTENT
WHICH PASSES OVER ANY SERVICE THEY PROVIDE*. For
example... this article could be copied by someone
and sent to someone else who uses the hotmail
email service. According to the license Microsoft
would then own the rights to this article!
Unbelieveable you say? Go read it and see for
yourself.
The license may say this, or it may be interpreted
this way, but it doesn't mean that MS will own
the rights to the article. You can agree to an
absurd license, or to one which has consequences
that are illegal, e.g., that you waive your
right not to have your legs broken within 30
days of missing your loan payments, but such
clauses or interptetations are void and unenforceable. The courts could never interpret
the MS license this way, because if they do,
it would set a precedent rendering all previous
copyright or IP law irrelevant. So it won't
happen.
With these sort of convoluted licenses, the only time you can safely say that your rights
to something have been removed or transferred by a contractual agreement is when the courts rule so.
Other than that it is speculation (even
out-of-court negotiations or settlements are based on speculation of how the court would rule on something.) In this case, it's inconceivable that the courts would ignore a long established tradition of IP/copyright laws to favour the literal text of MS's license.
Morphy died in his bathtub, shortly after
coming home from a walk, apparently from apoplexy
caused by the water being too cold.
IIRC, Steinitz spent some time in a looney-bin.
It is also rumoured that von Bardeleben ended
his days in the nut-house, but I don't think
anyone really knows what happened to him.
>Fischer (a half jew) wouldnt take the subway
>because it was full of jews and women. That was
>before he was world champion. He became steadily
>worse after that.
Fischer specialized in the paranoia department.
>Alekhine thought he was related
>to the Russian Czars. He would also get drunk
>and piss on stage during his matches.
I'll have to look into that one.
>Many chess players at the master level and above
>that I've had the opportunity to relate at some
>level with were, well, off somehow:-) I realize
>its not exactly pc to say so but fuck it, that's
>the impression that survived.
Players at the lower levels, below the rarified
stratosphere of the world-class, super-GM, and
GM, tend to be far stranger than any of the
"classic" cases mentioned above. But you don't
hear much about them and you won't realize this
until you start hanging around with them.
The most remarkable ones are those that sacrifice
their entire lives to chess, yet are not such
good players. I've known players in the 1600-2100
range who gave up their carreers and all other
facets of their lives in order to play chess
full time. Those types are rare, but you
will find them at your local chess club if you
hang around long enough. If you recall the
movie "Searching for Bobby Fischer", there was
one really good part that stood out over the
general mediocrity: a very minor character who
was an obsessed, babbling kook that gave up
his law career (iirc) for chess, and he wasn't
even any good. That was a really meaningful
moment, because I've met people exactly like
that guy. Other than that, the film mostly
sucked.
>I forgot anout Akiba Rubenstein. A talmudic
>scholar by training who was thought to be the
>most brillian player alive. Unfortunately, he
>had a rather short (coherent) life:-)
Rubenstein never played anything other than 1.d4
as white. As the story goes, some jokers nailed
the d4 pawn to the board on Akiba's table just
before he sat down to play white at some important
tournament. He completely freaked.
We might as well mention Efim Bogolyubov, the
Russian orthodox ex-monk who discovered beer
and chess, in that order. Alekhine, who was quite
an imbiber himself, never hesitated to construe
a situation which would result in the public
embarassment and abject ridicule of his dear
countryman, Bogolyubov. Prior to the opening
ceremonies of some tournament, Alekhine was
invited to get up on stage and say a few words.
Seeing that Bogo was in the crowd, he saw this as
one more fine opportunite to stick it to him. So
he recounted a joke that went something like
this: "my dear friends, I had a dream last
night. I dreamt that I died and went to heaven.
And I saw Saint Peter there, at the pearly
gates. But he told me that heaven wasn't for
chessmasters. That, as a fitting reward for
having spent my earthly days contemplating
chess, I should be cast in with the
devils of Hell to be tormented for all eternity.
Naturally I was quite upset by this. But
lo and behold! Guess who I saw walking around
up in heaven? Bogolyubov! So I asked Saint
Peter: how come he's there, huh? Saint
Peter said: Oh, him. He only thinks he's
a chessmaster."
Need I also mention that Alekhine, for
some weird, incomprehensible reason, really
enjoyed eating steak with his hands?
>Lasker and Capablanca were just normal folk with
>effortless natural talent. Neither studied the
>game particularly hard. They also had secondary
>occupations which is probably what saved them.
That's an interesting point. Botwinnik, who was
quite normal, had an extensive career outside
of chess.
>Lasker was a real medical doctor
Lasker's brother, Berthold, was the doctor.
Emmanuel Lasker was a mathematician.
>and I believe Capablanca was some kind of
>diplomat for Cuba.
He ended up in a diplomatic job, but he originally
trained as an engineer or something.
>No, the hostage thing happened before the match.
>The psychic was sitting front row for the match.
>Korchnoi complained and asked the organizers to
>move him out of psychic range.
What was that guy's name again? Dr. "Zarkov"
or something?
Do you remember the 2-way mirror? How about
the coded yogourt cups and sandwiches? Or
what about the time when Spassky, playing
against Korchnoi, would simply leave the stage
and do his thinking in a closet? Or the incident
with Spassky's ties?
>Chess players are,
>of course, world class lunatics. The incidence of
>madness and just plain wonky behaviour in world
>class players is astonishing.
Normally I'd take offence to such a
characterization, but as it turns out, there's
more than a grain of truth to it.
>Morphy, Steinitz, Alekhine,
Alekhine had this obsessive fascination
with fat chicks.
>Fischer
Volumes could be written about this guy's
peculiar quirks.
>were all world
>champions and all quite insane. And that's just
>off the top of my head; the list is considerably
>longer.
Let's add:
Von Bardeleben: bizarre growth on his head. Used
to marry and divorce women for money (they wanted
his noble surname), in return for some cash.
Von Bardeleben had the misfortune of being on the
shit end of Steinitz's most brilliant game, a
victim of one of the greatest combinations ever
played in the history of chess. Legend has it
that upon realizing what was about to happen
to him, von Bardeleben quietely picked up his
hat and left the building, vanishing into
obscurity. Legend also has it that he changed
his suit only once every six months.
Akiba Rubenstein: plagued by an imaginary
fly for much of his carreer.
David Janowski: somehow managed to con women into
financing his chess career, including putting
up stakes for his matches.
Emmanuel Lasker: Now, this guy wasn't at all
crazy, rather, he was an intellect of the
first rank, and an acquaintance of Einstein's.
However, he had the habit of chain-smoking
the most pungent, vile cigars he could lay his
hands on, during tournaments. After several
hours, his opponent, lost in a cloudy fog, either
had his mind numbed or was blinded, or both.
As tournaments gradually enforced non-smoking,
these regulations became known as "anti-Lasker
rules." Botvinnik once commented that Lasker's
technique relied almost entirely on the stupefying
power of his cigars.
And let us not forget Aaron Nimtsowitch,
unquestionably the nuttiest chess player of them
all. Among his many, many bizarre behavioral
aberrations was his habit of standing on his
head during important games.
But, as you say, this is only the tip of
the iceberg on a vast subject.
>After 15 years it is finally over. This is very
>depressing.
Why is it depressing? It is widely regarded
in some chess circles that the Kasparov-Karpov
matches where bogus and fixed from the outset.
If this is true (Boris Spassky and Victor
Korchnoi are convinced of it, and besides,
Russian players are well known for sandbagging
and pre-arranging their games when it suits them),
combined with all the political bullshit between
FIDE and Kasparov's GMA, yadda yadda... then, can
you really say it has been a great 15+ years for
the chess world?
Besides, it wasn't exactly a surprise
that Kramnik defeated Kasparov. People were
speculating on the inevitability of this
long, long ago.
Kramnik is a fantastic player in every
respect. And he's now the Champ.
Good for him. As Jamella says in D2, Hail
to you, Champion.
Another thing: a +2-0 win result in such a
high caliber match isn't just a marginal
victory for Kramnik. It's a decisive
performance.
>But I think he only lost because of
>his personal problems.
Kasparov lost because Kramnik is an awesome
player. For all we know, Kramnik may
have been facing some of his own personal
problems during the match.
>Linux has made improvements, but there is still a
>"hacker ethos"
Yeah. We all know about the "hacker ethos".
A bigger pile of bullshit you might never
find.
>in the Linux hierarchy that argues
>"if you don't know what you're doing, get out or
>RTFM".
Yeah, sure. There's also an "ethos" in the
community that equates hackers with crackers
and linux/BSD users and pr0nographers and mp3
pirates and warez dealers.
Who the fsuck cares anymore? If a subgroup
of the common populace of clueless idiots
wants to maintain such notions, then what
are you going to do about it? Nothing.
Just shake your head in incredulity and
walk away.
Same thing with "RTFM". As if that's a bad
thing. Ooh. Linux users are the guys who
keep telling me to RTFM. Baad, baad linux users.
Yeah, well, that's the best advice anyone ever
gave me. That, and grepping the HOW-TOs.
But somehow this paints them all as bad, uncaring,
unfeeling bastards who sell warez and
pirate mp3s and collaborate with terrorists, and,
worst of all, as the kind of guys who say "RTFM"
in respose to some Winluser's question.
>Huh? Assuming what this person wrote is the
>entire truth of the situation, explain to me
> where there is anything suspicious that he did?
>Is checking ports suspicious?
Another question you can add to your
list is: "how do you know this story is true?"
There are a number of elements to this
story which seem quite contrived. Can you
spot them?
>Then M$ would have to argue that it could not
>possibly have come from any other source but
>their code. All a developer has to do is keep
>a clear paper trail of what ideas come, as they
>come, and the very plausibility of the defense
>would dispell any allegation M$ might make.
There could be a different side-effect to
this code-stealing event, something other
than attacks on OSS etc. MS may be able
to use this situation to continue pushing
pre-installed OSs with aggressive campaigns.
They could argue, for example, that they
can no longer guarantee the integrity of any OS
obtained on distribution media. Any and all
such copies could have been tampered with, etc
etc. So the only way to get this guarantee
of integrity is to have your OS preinstalled
by the OEM, who must now have an even stronger,
tightly controlled software auditing bond to MS.
MS has already suggested that anyone who doesn't
want pre-installed Windows is probably planning
to pirate it. It's quite possible that they
can milk this code-stealing event for all its
worth in their "no naked PC" strategy.
Slashdot Mirror
Common Lisp.
Scientific Applications on Linx (SAL)
You generally can't use preemptive threads or garbage collection (both of which Java relies on) in a realtime system--or for that matter, dynamically-sized data structures (put in too many elements and you'll miss a deadline) or virtual memory.
The Erlang real-time development platform uses all of these.
Those who attack Lisp are usually attacking Common Lisp.
In my experience, most people who "attack Lisp" direct their tirades against Lisp 1 - 1.5, or the all-caps Lisp which appears in, say, Tanimoto's Elements of Artificial Intelligence (1987). Analogous are those clever critics who blast Fortran. Only after you inquire deeper, it becomes clear they are talking about Fortran-77, Fortan-66, Fortran-IV, or even Fortran-II.
I don't care if LISP runs 500 times as fast as Java.
Well, then, you're a moron. I used to think nobody who spouts this sort of hyperbole was serious. But then, after using the Forte development environment for Java, I realized that yes, Java programmers really don't care if what they write is 500 times slower than it should be.
It has a massively restricted API. People don't base their language choice on speed
anymore.
Obviously you have never done any scientific computing.
FORTRAN is still twice as fast as C, but everyone still uses C,
No, Fortran is at least as popular as C in the scientific programming scene.
for two reasons: FORTRAN is harder to learn, and C has more libraries.
Heh. C doesn't even have an exponentiation operator. Considering this small fact could give you a bit of insight as to why much scientific programming is still done in Fortran. No amount of C libraries can give the numerical programmer the expressive power of Fortran's whole-array syntax. E.g., to find the average of values greater than 500 in an array of any dimensions:
avg = sum(a, mask = (a > 500))/ count(mask = (a > 500))
initialize the array b element-by-element to the
square root of corresponding elements of a:
b = sqrt(a)
etc., etc.
So why are you promoting the ridiculous myth that Slackware users are console users?
What exactly is Ximian's problem with Slackware? Do you have something against Volkerding personally, or are all Slackware users on your shit list?
What's wrong with selfish and uncaring? I should have the right to be selfish and uncaring if I so desire,
I'm not sure I follow you here. You already have the necessary freedoms to comport yourself with whatever sort of anti-social attitude you wish. People may object to your attitudes, though. What exactly do you mean by "right" in this instance? Do you mean the "right" to be uncaring and selfish, in the sense of an entrenched political or human right? What exactly would that involve?
as long as I don't actively infringe on the rights of others.
You have a peculiar notion of "rights." Would you say that people also have the "right" not to tolerate the uncaring and selfish?
But don't require me to do anything. What's mine is mine.
Obviously, though, Art_XIV is requiring us to do something. After all, he did present his 8-point platform as "a solution to the world's problems".
Note how the libertarian mind equates "If you do them and render yourself useless, then die." with "a desire for peaceful co-existence".
Infantile? The desire to be taken care of is infantile.
Yes, possibly. But the instinct to care for others is not.
You can't just say "use == abuse"; that's the same as "all sex is rape" and just as credible.
But we can say "rape == rape". There is no non-abusive way to recreationally use illegal substances.
Furthermore, it's worth noting whether I *personally* am telling the truth or not,
If the veracity of your personal account is irrelevent, then why did you use it as an example?
the fact that there are people who are not juvenile idiots who do find drugs fun was what I was trying to get at.
Quite frankly, anybody who gets his kicks by repeatedly inducing himself into a hallucinogenic stupor with the help of illegal substances is about as idiotically juvenile as a kid who repeatedly whacks himself in the head with a hammer because he likes to look at all them funny stars.
So I'm not a juvenile idiot (as evidenced by the fact that despite having "experimented" pretty liberally with pot and LSD at certain times in my life, I am not dead and not in jail), why should my toys be taken away?
I have no idea if you are a juvenile idiot or not. Such matters can't rightly be decided simply by declaring "I'm not a juvenile idiot" on slashdot.
On the one hand, you say you abused drugs at some points in the past -- which to me implies that you no longer lie about in a pallid stupor, "experimenting". On the other hand, you don't want your toys taken away. Should we conclude that you don't do drugs, but have a nice pile of crack stashed away just for nostaligia?
If you do them and render yourself useless, then die.
If you screw up, I don't want to hear about how you started taking drugs because your life was all messed up, or you were sad, or you were poor.
Your sentiments are quite illustrative of the typically selfish, uncaring, and infantile libertarian mentality so popular these days. Libertarian policies toward opiates reflect the fact that their entire world-view is but a incoherent pipe dream.
Are *drugs* really the problem, or is the combination of drugs and the American eternally juvenile sensibility the problem?
It's both, of course. If you haven't noticed, drugs are illegal. So, yes, their very presence in your bong is a problem.
But you are quite correct to suggest that an even greater problem is the exceedingly juvenile mind-set and behavior of many americans with regards to pretty much everything -- vice, guns, drugs, &c. Hence the reason for taking away their toys. It's the only way to deal with juvenile idiots, as any parent knows.
The Matrix is an immortal film to so many because it takes a large body of religious and spiritual aphorisms and places them in a context where they suddenly become extremely meaningful. For example, we've all seen kung-fu flicks where some guy is getting a lecture from his Master, and it sounds like mostly mumbo-jumbo. However, in the Matrix, this very same mumbo-jumbo suddenly becomes perfectly clear, comprehensible, and necessary. A good illustration is the stuff Morpheus says about "walking the path". We've heard this kind of stuff before. In other films, it may have come off silly. But in the Matrix, it makes sense. Some people out there truly appreciate a movie which offers a positive take on spirituality or other-worldliness, since there are so few around. Most movies either trivialize sprituality or positively ridicule it. People are tired of that. The Matrix was a refreshing change.
Ayn Rand's Objectivism works the same way. Altruism? What's that? 'Altruism is what made Hitler, Stalin, and Jeffrey Dahmer bad guys.' Selfishness? What's that? 'Selfishness is what makes John Galt a good guy.'
Putting an ideological spin on common words is a fundamental brainwashing technique, most notably exposed by George Orwell. You can always spot a nut-cult by it's private redefinition of non-technical words.
I can already do this. It's called ftp.
A real specific example of why Word would be better with .NET capabilities would be this: you write user manuals for a software company, free
lance. You have a new-whiz bang computer/laptop, but not everyone at the mega-soft corp company has a new version of xyz app. Luckily, your
software company runs MS xyz server, and has decided to allow you to upload the documents to it weekly for progress review. Members of the
review staff have Office 95, but luckily, the MS xyz server tranlsates the document on the fly, delivers them a properly formatted version for Office
95, allows them to edit it, saves changes, and updates the original, still in the newest format. Sure, you COULD do this by hand, but when 10 editors
take the file automatically, edit it, and send it back to you in file versions ranging from Office 95, 97, 2000 and XP, things get messy.
So then, what you are saying is that .NET is
gonna be great because it's a solution to the problem deliberately created, perpetuated, and maintained
by Microsoft? I have an idea, why don't they
just screw .NET and go with open file formats
instead?
How many people really jump up and down at the idea of not owning software. I don't see anything in this that will ever make me not want to own my apps outright.
Do you remember when HP introduced the first LaserJet? They initially thought to market it as a print server. They figured nobody would want to personally own one, that everyone would just "rent" time on it by sharing. However, it turned out to be the opposite. Everyone wanted to own a laserprinter personally. There are some things that people prefer to own rather than rent. Like cars. You hear people say "Man, I'm saving up to buy that Ferrari." You do not hear people say "Man, I'm saving up to rent that Ferrari." Books are like this too. Sure, libraries are great. But notice they haven't put bookstores out of business. That's because people like owning their own books.
Same with software. There's a company I know who used to have a number of Pro/E seats. When Parametric Technologies instituted an even more draconian licensing scheme involving lots of regular payments (the new MS Office 2000 license reminds me of this), they just chucked Pro/E off their systems.
The license may say this, or it may be interpreted this way, but it doesn't mean that MS will own the rights to the article. You can agree to an absurd license, or to one which has consequences that are illegal, e.g., that you waive your right not to have your legs broken within 30 days of missing your loan payments, but such clauses or interptetations are void and unenforceable. The courts could never interpret the MS license this way, because if they do, it would set a precedent rendering all previous copyright or IP law irrelevant. So it won't happen.
With these sort of convoluted licenses, the only time you can safely say that your rights to something have been removed or transferred by a contractual agreement is when the courts rule so. Other than that it is speculation (even out-of-court negotiations or settlements are based on speculation of how the court would rule on something.) In this case, it's inconceivable that the courts would ignore a long established tradition of IP/copyright laws to favour the literal text of MS's license.
Well, almost inconceivable.
Computer scientists rarely understand real science, and I suppose that's the reason for this belief in particular.
I've heard mis-informed CS types explain that "numerical programming" and "computational physics" are just subsets of games programming.
>Morphy and Steinitz died in institutions.
:-) I realize
Morphy died in his bathtub, shortly after
coming home from a walk, apparently from apoplexy
caused by the water being too cold.
IIRC, Steinitz spent some time in a looney-bin.
It is also rumoured that von Bardeleben ended
his days in the nut-house, but I don't think
anyone really knows what happened to him.
>Fischer (a half jew) wouldnt take the subway
>because it was full of jews and women. That was
>before he was world champion. He became steadily
>worse after that.
Fischer specialized in the paranoia department.
>Alekhine thought he was related
>to the Russian Czars. He would also get drunk
>and piss on stage during his matches.
I'll have to look into that one.
>Many chess players at the master level and above
>that I've had the opportunity to relate at some
>level with were, well, off somehow
>its not exactly pc to say so but fuck it, that's
>the impression that survived.
Players at the lower levels, below the rarified
stratosphere of the world-class, super-GM, and
GM, tend to be far stranger than any of the
"classic" cases mentioned above. But you don't
hear much about them and you won't realize this
until you start hanging around with them.
The most remarkable ones are those that sacrifice
their entire lives to chess, yet are not such
good players. I've known players in the 1600-2100
range who gave up their carreers and all other
facets of their lives in order to play chess
full time. Those types are rare, but you
will find them at your local chess club if you
hang around long enough. If you recall the
movie "Searching for Bobby Fischer", there was
one really good part that stood out over the
general mediocrity: a very minor character who
was an obsessed, babbling kook that gave up
his law career (iirc) for chess, and he wasn't
even any good. That was a really meaningful
moment, because I've met people exactly like
that guy. Other than that, the film mostly
sucked.
>I forgot anout Akiba Rubenstein. A talmudic
>scholar by training who was thought to be the
>most brillian player alive. Unfortunately, he
>had a rather short (coherent) life
Rubenstein never played anything other than 1.d4
as white. As the story goes, some jokers nailed
the d4 pawn to the board on Akiba's table just
before he sat down to play white at some important
tournament. He completely freaked.
We might as well mention Efim Bogolyubov, the
Russian orthodox ex-monk who discovered beer
and chess, in that order. Alekhine, who was quite
an imbiber himself, never hesitated to construe
a situation which would result in the public
embarassment and abject ridicule of his dear
countryman, Bogolyubov. Prior to the opening
ceremonies of some tournament, Alekhine was
invited to get up on stage and say a few words.
Seeing that Bogo was in the crowd, he saw this as
one more fine opportunite to stick it to him. So
he recounted a joke that went something like
this: "my dear friends, I had a dream last
night. I dreamt that I died and went to heaven.
And I saw Saint Peter there, at the pearly
gates. But he told me that heaven wasn't for
chessmasters. That, as a fitting reward for
having spent my earthly days contemplating
chess, I should be cast in with the
devils of Hell to be tormented for all eternity.
Naturally I was quite upset by this. But
lo and behold! Guess who I saw walking around
up in heaven? Bogolyubov! So I asked Saint
Peter: how come he's there, huh? Saint
Peter said: Oh, him. He only thinks he's
a chessmaster."
Need I also mention that Alekhine, for
some weird, incomprehensible reason, really
enjoyed eating steak with his hands?
>Lasker and Capablanca were just normal folk with
>effortless natural talent. Neither studied the
>game particularly hard. They also had secondary
>occupations which is probably what saved them.
That's an interesting point. Botwinnik, who was
quite normal, had an extensive career outside
of chess.
>Lasker was a real medical doctor
Lasker's brother, Berthold, was the doctor.
Emmanuel Lasker was a mathematician.
>and I believe Capablanca was some kind of
>diplomat for Cuba.
He ended up in a diplomatic job, but he originally
trained as an engineer or something.
>No, the hostage thing happened before the match.
>The psychic was sitting front row for the match.
>Korchnoi complained and asked the organizers to
>move him out of psychic range.
What was that guy's name again? Dr. "Zarkov"
or something?
Do you remember the 2-way mirror? How about
the coded yogourt cups and sandwiches? Or
what about the time when Spassky, playing
against Korchnoi, would simply leave the stage
and do his thinking in a closet? Or the incident
with Spassky's ties?
>Chess players are,
>of course, world class lunatics. The incidence of
>madness and just plain wonky behaviour in world
>class players is astonishing.
Normally I'd take offence to such a
characterization, but as it turns out, there's
more than a grain of truth to it.
>Morphy, Steinitz, Alekhine,
Alekhine had this obsessive fascination
with fat chicks.
>Fischer
Volumes could be written about this guy's
peculiar quirks.
>were all world
>champions and all quite insane. And that's just
>off the top of my head; the list is considerably
>longer.
Let's add:
Von Bardeleben: bizarre growth on his head. Used
to marry and divorce women for money (they wanted
his noble surname), in return for some cash.
Von Bardeleben had the misfortune of being on the
shit end of Steinitz's most brilliant game, a
victim of one of the greatest combinations ever
played in the history of chess. Legend has it
that upon realizing what was about to happen
to him, von Bardeleben quietely picked up his
hat and left the building, vanishing into
obscurity. Legend also has it that he changed
his suit only once every six months.
Akiba Rubenstein: plagued by an imaginary
fly for much of his carreer.
David Janowski: somehow managed to con women into
financing his chess career, including putting
up stakes for his matches.
Emmanuel Lasker: Now, this guy wasn't at all
crazy, rather, he was an intellect of the
first rank, and an acquaintance of Einstein's.
However, he had the habit of chain-smoking
the most pungent, vile cigars he could lay his
hands on, during tournaments. After several
hours, his opponent, lost in a cloudy fog, either
had his mind numbed or was blinded, or both.
As tournaments gradually enforced non-smoking,
these regulations became known as "anti-Lasker
rules." Botvinnik once commented that Lasker's
technique relied almost entirely on the stupefying
power of his cigars.
And let us not forget Aaron Nimtsowitch,
unquestionably the nuttiest chess player of them
all. Among his many, many bizarre behavioral
aberrations was his habit of standing on his
head during important games.
But, as you say, this is only the tip of
the iceberg on a vast subject.
>After 15 years it is finally over. This is very
>depressing.
Why is it depressing? It is widely regarded
in some chess circles that the Kasparov-Karpov
matches where bogus and fixed from the outset.
If this is true (Boris Spassky and Victor
Korchnoi are convinced of it, and besides,
Russian players are well known for sandbagging
and pre-arranging their games when it suits them),
combined with all the political bullshit between
FIDE and Kasparov's GMA, yadda yadda... then, can
you really say it has been a great 15+ years for
the chess world?
Besides, it wasn't exactly a surprise
that Kramnik defeated Kasparov. People were
speculating on the inevitability of this
long, long ago.
Kramnik is a fantastic player in every
respect. And he's now the Champ.
Good for him. As Jamella says in D2, Hail
to you, Champion.
Another thing: a +2-0 win result in such a
high caliber match isn't just a marginal
victory for Kramnik. It's a decisive
performance.
>But I think he only lost because of
>his personal problems.
Kasparov lost because Kramnik is an awesome
player. For all we know, Kramnik may
have been facing some of his own personal
problems during the match.
>Linux has made improvements, but there is still a
>"hacker ethos"
Yeah. We all know about the "hacker ethos".
A bigger pile of bullshit you might never
find.
>in the Linux hierarchy that argues
>"if you don't know what you're doing, get out or
>RTFM".
Yeah, sure. There's also an "ethos" in the
community that equates hackers with crackers
and linux/BSD users and pr0nographers and mp3
pirates and warez dealers.
Who the fsuck cares anymore? If a subgroup
of the common populace of clueless idiots
wants to maintain such notions, then what
are you going to do about it? Nothing.
Just shake your head in incredulity and
walk away.
Same thing with "RTFM". As if that's a bad
thing. Ooh. Linux users are the guys who
keep telling me to RTFM. Baad, baad linux users.
Yeah, well, that's the best advice anyone ever
gave me. That, and grepping the HOW-TOs.
But somehow this paints them all as bad, uncaring,
unfeeling bastards who sell warez and
pirate mp3s and collaborate with terrorists, and,
worst of all, as the kind of guys who say "RTFM"
in respose to some Winluser's question.
The "hacker ethos", as you say.
etc, etc.
>Huh? Assuming what this person wrote is the
>entire truth of the situation, explain to me
> where there is anything suspicious that he did?
>Is checking ports suspicious?
Another question you can add to your
list is: "how do you know this story is true?"
There are a number of elements to this
story which seem quite contrived. Can you
spot them?
>Then M$ would have to argue that it could not
>possibly have come from any other source but
>their code. All a developer has to do is keep
>a clear paper trail of what ideas come, as they
>come, and the very plausibility of the defense
>would dispell any allegation M$ might make.
There could be a different side-effect to
this code-stealing event, something other
than attacks on OSS etc. MS may be able
to use this situation to continue pushing
pre-installed OSs with aggressive campaigns.
They could argue, for example, that they
can no longer guarantee the integrity of any OS
obtained on distribution media. Any and all
such copies could have been tampered with, etc
etc. So the only way to get this guarantee
of integrity is to have your OS preinstalled
by the OEM, who must now have an even stronger,
tightly controlled software auditing bond to MS.
MS has already suggested that anyone who doesn't
want pre-installed Windows is probably planning
to pirate it. It's quite possible that they
can milk this code-stealing event for all its
worth in their "no naked PC" strategy.