It seems like you're interested in a computer version of GURPS.
In the role-playing version of GURPS, your skills and abilities were chosen from virtually anything you wanted to do. Want to be an axe-wielding, ambidextrous, spell-casting, gun-toting psycho who is afraid of caterpillars and can't wear any armor heavier than a thick blanket? Sure thing. Now just try to pigeonhole that character into a class stereotype. You really can't, and that's why GURPS was so generic.
You were allowed to create characters using a points-based system, where acquiring new skills or abilities (axes, spellcasting, guns, ambidextrous) cost you a certain number of points, and taking quirks or disadvantages (psycho, afraid of caterpillars, can't wear armor heavier than leather) allowed you to recoup some points for spending on other skills or abilities.
I may be wrong, but at the current time Steve Jackson is in the process of creating his own MMO based on GURPS. Maybe this will be the first, real archetype-free MMO we'll see on the market.
I'm perusing comments on this article, only to see people saying things such as, "Apparently just joined MS's crack security team last Thursday... needless to say, he's a real expert!" and, "Microsoft is never going to get it."
Hopefully, most people will look at these comments with a slightly more level-headed point of view, realizing that just because you work for Microsoft doesn't mean you don't know anything about security, or that Microsoft's recent approaches to improve the security on their browser doesn't mean they'll never "get it."
How about somebody from the OSS community try and think of ways to take one person's (slightly judgmental) observations with a grain of salt? How many times have we read/heard/stated opinions regarding Microsoft's ineptitude, chiding the company for it's lack of effort in the security arena? Now that Microsoft is actually trying to make a difference in their software security, why is it so hard to take some criticism regarding OSS security? Is it just easier to think that nobody else could be as correct as you?
Really, people, there's a much better way to handle this type of opinion: try and benefit from it. When everyone stops acting like the only opinion that counts is their own, then they'll see how they can better themselves (or their software).
HL2 is just one game in what appears to be a new form of DRM. If I feel the need to ask permission of the manufacturer to play their game that I've already paid for, then I'll go buy HL2.
My biggest concern with online activation for any software is that the companies who sell said software claim they change authentication practices to help prevent piracy. Yet, they also claim that increased software prices are due to piracy and decreases in profits.
So what's it going to be? Are we still going to get soaked for money while paying for software that is increasingly harder to simply activate? Why can't any software company sell a product that might be difficult to activate but costs less, or that might cost more but have no activation issues?
As long as people continue to pay such ghastly sums for software that won't even work "out of the box," then the customers are getting screwed by the vendors more than the vendors claim to get screwed by piracy.
Check your facts. From Dictionary.com's definition of documentary:
n : a film or TV program presenting the facts about a person or event
Just because there's more than one way to describe the facts doesn't mean you need to ignore the format. Documentaries are used to show one thing and one thing only: facts. When Moore uses footage of himself harassing Congressmen to sign their kids up for the military, it's not documentary fare, and it's certainly not recounting any facts. It's sensationalism, plain and simple.
I haven't seen Fahrenheit 9/11, nor do I plan on seeing it, as all of Moore's films I see show me that his attempt to shove his own propaganda down my throat is no worse than the "evils" he tries to fight. If Moore ever decides to create a film that actually doesn't reflect his personal opinion (and doesn't involve politics), then I might be intrigued enough to see it.
Quite a few years ago, I replaced a bad hard drive and reinstalled the OS (DOS and Windows 3.11, if I remember correctly) for my dentist. In return, he was kind enough to wrench a cavity-infested wisdom tooth from my skull - free of charge.
Inuit officials have declared that another word for 'snow' will be introduced into their vocabulary, this time referring to 'irradiated, green, and glowing.'
Its like microsoft, and linux. Microsoft will attempt to give you a good user experience. Linux will actually deliver.
Again, I see no difference between what you say and what the parent says. They're just opinions. They may seem like facts to you, but that's what an opinion really is: just a piece of information, wisdom, or knowledge that an individual strongly believes in.
One who is zealous; one who engages warmly in any cause, and pursues his object with earnestness and ardor; especially, one who is overzealous, or carried away by his zeal; one absorbed in devotion to anything; an enthusiast; a fanatical partisan.
I think what the whole article boils down to is being a well-opined editorial about the way somebody looks at the open-source movement. So what if their opinion doesn't match yours? Has it stopped you or anyone else in the open-source community from continuing to use these products or voicing your opinion on how much better open-source is for you and everyone else? I would assume it hasn't as your post clearly states your opinion of what you think of open-source and the writer's editorial.
I think the worst thing that zealotry can contribute to a personality is the fact that it teaches us to be close-minded regarding others' opinions. Once everybody can come to the realization that you're not going to have the same choice tastes in food, religion, sexual preference, or even software, then the sooner we'll all be able to accept other people as the most important thing they are: human beings.
By radineg tihs txet, yr'oue viilatnog the DMCA. Palese go dreitlcy to yuor nraeset law erfceonnemt ctener and trun yesurolf in to the poprer arotiieuhts.
Currently, I don't use Linux for any purpose other than my NAT machine at home. Why? Because it's just too hard for the ordinary 'Joe' to figure out. I've seen plenty of books on how to administrate Linux, or how to master one aspect or another, but I really feel that if Linux is ever going to break into the limelight as a premiere OS, then it needs to be usable by everyone, not just the technically super-inclined. This book is a step in the right direction.
If this book can make even one person more technically savvy in the use of an alternate OS, then it's accomplished its goal. Let's just hope that it catches the eye of more than one person.
Things rushing away from us as space expands would leave light from distant objects moving more slowly relative to us if not for special relativistic effects. With the effects, the energy of the light is reduced. However, you're right... when an object is approaching you, light from it is blue-shifted, and that would be what we should expect when the universe starts collapsing.
Set in a closed universe and based on the concept of red-shift and blue-shift, wouldn't each object - when viewed from any vantage point - be visible to the viewer as a red-shift object in one direction and a blue-shift object in the opposite direction? Isn't the object - when viewed from one direction - moving away from you, but when viewed from the opposite direction, it's moving towards the viewer?
So how would we know if the universe is expanding, contracting, or stabilized?
To wit: the left lane on a road is for passing. Most states have laws that restrict the distance that a driver can drive in the left lane before moving over. If yu've ever driven long-distance, you know that there are those who insist on indefinately going limit plus 5 (or worse yet: limit) in the left lane. And no, I'm not breaking the law if I try to pass, I live in a prima facie state.
Highways are like socialism: they both work only in theory.
Parsec is a wonderful simulated space combat game that has been under development for about 6 years. Unfortunately, it is NOT an open-source project, but it is currently not even in its completed form. Who knows what the future holds?
A question to you, how the hell can any M$ person complain about taking the look and feel of another OS, they ripped so much off of apple its sick.
So, what you're telling me that - because it's Linux-oriented - two wrongs DO make a right? Or are you just being as narrow-minded and two-faced as any MS zealot would be?
They can contact a 30-year-old space probe that's more than 7 billion miles away (about 1/1000 of a light-year!), but they still have problems running a web server that can handle more than 3 hits a day.
Combined with all their recent Mars probes' failures, I guess this just goes to show that the folks at NASA haven't been able to show any real progress with the advance of technology.
One problem: have you ever been in Chicago and tried to use a cellular phone?
If there's one bad thing I can say about this city, Chicago is notorious for having awful wireless service. I've tried cellular service with 4 different providers and still have had major problems with connectivity. If the wireless communication problems could be fixed, then I could see a positive future for wireless data communication. But as it stands now, Chicago is a far cry away from having a reliable wireless network of any sort.
The Drake equation has one important factor missing from it: the "here-and-now" factor. The only part of the Drake equation with regards to time is the "lifetime" of communicating civilizations, or, specifically, "the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space" (space.com).
Wouldn't the simple idea be that if alien civilizations were technologically advanced enough and if they sent out detectable signals at all, then they would have to exist right now for us to detect them? The truth is that the vastness of our universe (throughout most of which we will never find "detectable signals" from within the next few million generations) makes the chances that other intelligent life exists fairly good. But the chances of us detecting them, them detecting us, or both detecting each other is fairly slim since we do not know if the time at which both civilizations are technologically able to do so coincides.
Consider this as well: signals take time to travel. Who's to say that if a civilization on the other side of our galaxy that existed 50,000 years ago but is extinct now ever had the opportunity to send out signals. What if there's intelligent life on an Earthlike planet orbiting Epison Eridani (only 10 light years away), but their civilization takes 500,000 years to become technologically adept enough to build detection or emitting devices? (Comparably, human life needed only 100,000 or so years to develop from animals that used simple tools to today's high-tech humanoids.)
Maybe we just need to quit debating and keep looking.
Slashdot Mirror
It seems like you're interested in a computer version of GURPS.
In the role-playing version of GURPS, your skills and abilities were chosen from virtually anything you wanted to do. Want to be an axe-wielding, ambidextrous, spell-casting, gun-toting psycho who is afraid of caterpillars and can't wear any armor heavier than a thick blanket? Sure thing. Now just try to pigeonhole that character into a class stereotype. You really can't, and that's why GURPS was so generic.
You were allowed to create characters using a points-based system, where acquiring new skills or abilities (axes, spellcasting, guns, ambidextrous) cost you a certain number of points, and taking quirks or disadvantages (psycho, afraid of caterpillars, can't wear armor heavier than leather) allowed you to recoup some points for spending on other skills or abilities.
I may be wrong, but at the current time Steve Jackson is in the process of creating his own MMO based on GURPS. Maybe this will be the first, real archetype-free MMO we'll see on the market.
Guns don't kill people...it's usually the bullets
I was under the impression that the bullets aren't what kills people, it was the force of the bullets hitting a person that killed them.
So I guess guns don't kill people, nor do bullets kill people... physics kills people.
I'm perusing comments on this article, only to see people saying things such as, "Apparently just joined MS's crack security team last Thursday... needless to say, he's a real expert!" and, "Microsoft is never going to get it."
Hopefully, most people will look at these comments with a slightly more level-headed point of view, realizing that just because you work for Microsoft doesn't mean you don't know anything about security, or that Microsoft's recent approaches to improve the security on their browser doesn't mean they'll never "get it."
How about somebody from the OSS community try and think of ways to take one person's (slightly judgmental) observations with a grain of salt? How many times have we read/heard/stated opinions regarding Microsoft's ineptitude, chiding the company for it's lack of effort in the security arena? Now that Microsoft is actually trying to make a difference in their software security, why is it so hard to take some criticism regarding OSS security? Is it just easier to think that nobody else could be as correct as you?
Really, people, there's a much better way to handle this type of opinion: try and benefit from it. When everyone stops acting like the only opinion that counts is their own, then they'll see how they can better themselves (or their software).HL2 is just one game in what appears to be a new form of DRM. If I feel the need to ask permission of the manufacturer to play their game that I've already paid for, then I'll go buy HL2.
My biggest concern with online activation for any software is that the companies who sell said software claim they change authentication practices to help prevent piracy. Yet, they also claim that increased software prices are due to piracy and decreases in profits.
So what's it going to be? Are we still going to get soaked for money while paying for software that is increasingly harder to simply activate? Why can't any software company sell a product that might be difficult to activate but costs less, or that might cost more but have no activation issues?
As long as people continue to pay such ghastly sums for software that won't even work "out of the box," then the customers are getting screwed by the vendors more than the vendors claim to get screwed by piracy.
The NP4790-C seems to be a good deal, and just under the $2000 you wanted to spend.
Check your facts. From Dictionary.com's definition of documentary :
n : a film or TV program presenting the facts about a person or event
Just because there's more than one way to describe the facts doesn't mean you need to ignore the format. Documentaries are used to show one thing and one thing only: facts. When Moore uses footage of himself harassing Congressmen to sign their kids up for the military, it's not documentary fare, and it's certainly not recounting any facts. It's sensationalism, plain and simple.
I haven't seen Fahrenheit 9/11 , nor do I plan on seeing it, as all of Moore's films I see show me that his attempt to shove his own propaganda down my throat is no worse than the "evils" he tries to fight. If Moore ever decides to create a film that actually doesn't reflect his personal opinion (and doesn't involve politics), then I might be intrigued enough to see it.
Quite a few years ago, I replaced a bad hard drive and reinstalled the OS (DOS and Windows 3.11, if I remember correctly) for my dentist. In return, he was kind enough to wrench a cavity-infested wisdom tooth from my skull - free of charge.
I think he got good on both ends of that deal.
Did anybody else read this title and expect to hear about nanotechnology, a la Neal Stephenson's book of the same name?
Inuit officials have declared that another word for 'snow' will be introduced into their vocabulary, this time referring to 'irradiated, green, and glowing.'
Not really. It's just his opinion.
Its like microsoft, and linux.
Microsoft will attempt to give you a good user experience. Linux will actually deliver.
Again, I see no difference between what you say and what the parent says. They're just opinions. They may seem like facts to you, but that's what an opinion really is: just a piece of information, wisdom, or knowledge that an individual strongly believes in.
According to Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, a zealot is:
I think what the whole article boils down to is being a well-opined editorial about the way somebody looks at the open-source movement. So what if their opinion doesn't match yours? Has it stopped you or anyone else in the open-source community from continuing to use these products or voicing your opinion on how much better open-source is for you and everyone else? I would assume it hasn't as your post clearly states your opinion of what you think of open-source and the writer's editorial.
I think the worst thing that zealotry can contribute to a personality is the fact that it teaches us to be close-minded regarding others' opinions. Once everybody can come to the realization that you're not going to have the same choice tastes in food, religion, sexual preference, or even software, then the sooner we'll all be able to accept other people as the most important thing they are: human beings.
But, hey. That's just my opinion.
When asked why God had chosen to create the universe in such a specific shape, he simply replied:
"Go-go-go-GOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLLL!"
By radineg tihs txet, yr'oue viilatnog the DMCA. Palese go dreitlcy to yuor nraeset law erfceonnemt ctener and trun yesurolf in to the poprer arotiieuhts.
Unless you want to run Windows that is, in which case you have bigger problems. :)
Problems? As compared to the person who arbitrarily puts down another person because of a difference in choice and opinion?
Wow, talk about a skewed sense of reality......but this phrase should be on every Slashdot t-shirt:
"In Soviet Russia, all your base are belong to a Beowulf cluster. Profit!"
Remember the mars probe that bounced off the atomosphere into oblivian? Or the one that crashed and burried itself into the surface?
From the article:
1999
- Mars Climate Orbiter is lost during orbit insertion
- Mars Polar Lander stops communicating after landing on Mars
Not to mention losing 2 out of the 5 shuttles because engineers sorta just "guessed" a problem was okay.
From the article:
No, they didn't mention this year's shuttle disaster, but did you even bother reading the article?1986
- Space Shuttle Challenger explodes
...this is what Linux needs.
Currently, I don't use Linux for any purpose other than my NAT machine at home. Why? Because it's just too hard for the ordinary 'Joe' to figure out. I've seen plenty of books on how to administrate Linux, or how to master one aspect or another, but I really feel that if Linux is ever going to break into the limelight as a premiere OS, then it needs to be usable by everyone, not just the technically super-inclined. This book is a step in the right direction.
If this book can make even one person more technically savvy in the use of an alternate OS, then it's accomplished its goal. Let's just hope that it catches the eye of more than one person.
Things rushing away from us as space expands would leave light from distant objects moving more slowly relative to us if not for special relativistic effects. With the effects, the energy of the light is reduced. However, you're right... when an object is approaching you, light from it is blue-shifted, and that would be what we should expect when the universe starts collapsing.
Set in a closed universe and based on the concept of red-shift and blue-shift, wouldn't each object - when viewed from any vantage point - be visible to the viewer as a red-shift object in one direction and a blue-shift object in the opposite direction? Isn't the object - when viewed from one direction - moving away from you, but when viewed from the opposite direction, it's moving towards the viewer?
So how would we know if the universe is expanding, contracting, or stabilized?
To wit: the left lane on a road is for passing. Most states have laws that restrict the distance that a driver can drive in the left lane before moving over. If yu've ever driven long-distance, you know that there are those who insist on indefinately going limit plus 5 (or worse yet: limit) in the left lane. And no, I'm not breaking the law if I try to pass, I live in a prima facie state.
Highways are like socialism: they both work only in theory.
Parsec is a wonderful simulated space combat game that has been under development for about 6 years. Unfortunately, it is NOT an open-source project, but it is currently not even in its completed form. Who knows what the future holds?
A question to you, how the hell can any M$ person complain about taking the look and feel of another OS, they ripped so much off of apple its sick.
So, what you're telling me that - because it's Linux-oriented - two wrongs DO make a right? Or are you just being as narrow-minded and two-faced as any MS zealot would be?
They can contact a 30-year-old space probe that's more than 7 billion miles away (about 1/1000 of a light-year!), but they still have problems running a web server that can handle more than 3 hits a day.
Combined with all their recent Mars probes' failures, I guess this just goes to show that the folks at NASA haven't been able to show any real progress with the advance of technology.
One problem: have you ever been in Chicago and tried to use a cellular phone?
If there's one bad thing I can say about this city, Chicago is notorious for having awful wireless service. I've tried cellular service with 4 different providers and still have had major problems with connectivity. If the wireless communication problems could be fixed, then I could see a positive future for wireless data communication. But as it stands now, Chicago is a far cry away from having a reliable wireless network of any sort.
And, you still need to have or get SBC/ Ameritech home phone service to get anybody to even put in a DSL line
Not true. I have a friend who lives near Division and Damen who does not have a home phone, but has had DSL service for over a year.
I guess it's just a matter of getting on SBC/Ameritech's and your DSL ISP's collective asses to get you the service you should be able to get.
The Drake equation has one important factor missing from it: the "here-and-now" factor. The only part of the Drake equation with regards to time is the "lifetime" of communicating civilizations, or, specifically, "the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space" (space.com).
Wouldn't the simple idea be that if alien civilizations were technologically advanced enough and if they sent out detectable signals at all, then they would have to exist right now for us to detect them? The truth is that the vastness of our universe (throughout most of which we will never find "detectable signals" from within the next few million generations) makes the chances that other intelligent life exists fairly good. But the chances of us detecting them, them detecting us, or both detecting each other is fairly slim since we do not know if the time at which both civilizations are technologically able to do so coincides.
Consider this as well: signals take time to travel. Who's to say that if a civilization on the other side of our galaxy that existed 50,000 years ago but is extinct now ever had the opportunity to send out signals. What if there's intelligent life on an Earthlike planet orbiting Epison Eridani (only 10 light years away), but their civilization takes 500,000 years to become technologically adept enough to build detection or emitting devices? (Comparably, human life needed only 100,000 or so years to develop from animals that used simple tools to today's high-tech humanoids.)
Maybe we just need to quit debating and keep looking.