Of course on slashdot, the vacuum of business reality, it can all be blamed on a microsoft conspiracy.
Consider this possibility: Desktop machines (not "workstations") are for home consumers. Mothers and grandmothers.. Dell provides user support for their desktops. All computer companies have a difficult time providing satisfying support to consumers.
Now throw linux on the desktop into the mix. You would have to train all of your support staff to be linux experts (or at least create all new scripts), etc. They would need to be able to walk non-computer users through tasks like setting up a printer, watching a DVD, etc. This would not be an easy, nor inexpensive task.
Instead, they are better off just offering linux as an option to the customers that buy workstations and servers: businesses. Businesses that can afford to pay higher support costs.
How can you NOT be modded as a troll when you make a blanket statement and don't provide examples? Just because Microsoft software has bugs, doesn't mean they develop things "quick and dirty". Yes, I'm sure some stuff is pushed out the door before it's 100% clean, just like every other commercial software vendor. But that doesn't mean that they don't have stringent development processes. You could put any commercial software company's name in the first line of your post. But because you chose to use "Microsoft", I'll call it a troll.
We're trying to make progress in the software development field. It hasn't all been worked out yet, but its good to see people taking stabs at it.
One benefit of OO development is the abstraction away from the data store. I want to think about Widgets, and Customers, and Orders, not VARCHAR fields, foreign keys, arbitrary identifier INTEGERs, etc.
So I would argue that the goal IS to build a database to store your objects, instead of building objects to manipulate your database. And I imagine that's what every OO developer would want. But it's hard.
You're suggestion doesn't solve the problem, it just avoids it.
You were mislead by the trolling story submission. This article has nothing to do with MS (despite them being oddly mentioned in the submission), nor Windows.
It's about commercial Unix vs. Linux. I bet not a single person understood that until they read the complete article. Seems to me the submission commentary itself should be moderated as OffTopic.
Are you suggesting, on Slashdot no less, that a single company collect your financial information and handle your access to various sites throughout the web?
Where were you when this place was freaking out about the (now slumbering) Microsoft My Services?
Are you sure about this? Thats what I thought when I first read the article, but I think the article may be just as misleading:
"In addition to playing DVD movies, the new player will be able to access content on PCs, such as photos, music and videos, via a wireless network connection."
That statement leads you to believe the DVD player has built-in wireless.
"Sonicblue's DVD player will be able to connect to networks via an Ethernet connection. Consumers will be able to purchase 802.11b PC cards to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking."
That statment leads you to believe the DVD player requires an add-on for the wireless capability.
But maybe not. Maybe this paragraph was trying to say was users will need to "...purchase 802.11b PC cards [for their PC] to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking."
So it really could go either way. We'd need another source to know for sure if the wireless is built in.
1) Removable battery - you can bring a spare along with you on long plane trips, and swap it out, just like a laptop. 2) Cradle can charge the PDA and a spare battery at the same time. 3) 1 Year next-day replacement standard (I believe Compaq charges an extra $75 for this) 4) Price!
I'm pretty sure it IS possible for an artist to distribute music to their fans, without dealing with such unfair deals that the RIAA companies seem to hand out.
The first thing that comes to mind is Dischord Records, who's most famous artist is Fugazi. They have always done it their own way, with many fan-friendly policies such as setting a $5 max admission for all shows, and $10 postage-paid for all of their CDs.
Recently, Aimee Mann made her entire new album available online before it was released (published under her own label I believe).
So, apparently, it CAN be done. Why isn't this route more attractive to more artists concerned with losing control of their work? I understand the big companies have much more resources for advertising, etc, but is it worth it? Do you think maybe the RIAA companies really ARE adding sufficient value to the product to merit the sort of control they have?
That runtime error you're seeing? Thats the.NET response to the slashdot effect. (Thats not a knock on.NET, what web server DOES stand up to the slashdot effect?)
Just thought a few people might be curious about the different looking error page.
It does give you a peak at the nice XML based configuration file they've implemented. It works like Apache, in that you can make all changes to the server configuration through a text file, only its all in XML, and it doesn't require a restart of the server. One of the really great features of ASP.NET, in my opinion.
Some people have been trained by Slashdot to be so privacy paranoid, they don't even think about what they are complaining about anymore.
Look at the sentence you quoted. Read it again, you quoted it. "...YOUR PC will keep track of..." Ok, read it again. "...YOUR PC will keep track of...".
Ok, now read an feature list for any PDA on the market. I bet it keeps track of YOUR contacts and YOUR appointments. EGADS!!! How did that ever get past the privacy police!
What about all those cell phones out there that can store the numbers YOU call!! The horror.
Wait...did you know they have VCRs that record the shows that YOU chose to??? Oh my, that means there is a record of what you watch! Is nothing sacred anymore?
It makes me think that the root of the problem is that there EXISTS personally identifiable information. How DARE your fingers grow a unique set of prints, now you can be distinguished from someone else! Its all a plot!
I can see the response now "but knowing Microsoft, they will PROBABLY send all this data from MY computer to a central server and THATS a bad thing", to which I say, "Well why didn't you quote the part in the article that said that?"
I totally agree. I wasn't complaining that it was a "bad" or "unfair" interview. I was just relating my experience of how I also have trouble coding to paper.
I was going to add that that I had this same problem at my Microsoft interview.
The recruiter wanted me to code some function in C, on paper, right there in front of him. It wasn't a very complicated function, but the environment made it very difficult. After I put together something that seemed reasonably correct, he proceeded to pick apart every little mistake, things that I easily would have corrected after the first compiler warning/error.
Thats exactly what I said to my companion after we watched the movie (having read no reviews): Pacino and Williams were great BECAUSE they didn't seem like they were doing their usual Pacino and Williams schticks. They weren't the over-the-top, explosive characters we would expect from those actors. They were both very good, and very believable.
The fact that people mention this movie in the same breath as "Heat" does it a great disservice.
This is a great movie, regardless of whether its a remake or not.
I've been wanting to see this movie ever since I heard about it a few months ago. Every time it has been mentioned, it has gotten very positive reviews. I was very surprised to see it reviewed on slashdot, which is usually confined to reviewing sci-fi flicks.
I'm a life-long skater that grew up on the Bones Brigade vidoes. They were the defining films of the skateboard culture of those days, at least in my clique. Now there is "Z-Boys", which is in effect a prequel to those earlier videos. Now, much older, I'll get a chance to see where all those characters came from. (was that subtle enough?)
My "nerdy techy" world doesn't usually intertwine with my skater world. Growing up, I always had my computer hacking set of friends, and then my skateboarder set of friends, and I was the only overlap. I was impressed that slashdot would cover this movie, and was hoping to see other skater/techy nerds add their appreciation.
Unfortunately, all I have see so far is a bunch of nitpicking on Jon Katz. Isn't anyone else excited about this movie? Isn't anyone else impressed that JonKatz/Slashdot would review such a movie?
Maybe I overestimate the share of artists the RIAA represents...
They claim that they are "forced" to pay the radio stations to play their music.
What happens if they don't pay?
Seems to me that the RIAA could handle this internally. All companies that they represent would agree on a course of action. None of them pay. I would think that MajorLabel1 pays out of fear that if they dont, then MajorLabel2 WILL pay, and therefore MajorLabel2 will get their song played. But if all of the MajorLabels controlled by the RIAA agreed not to pay, then what?
We'd be forced to listen to non-RIAA music? Really?
Or, are they afraid this could be seen as a monopolistic practice harmful to the independent promoters? (independent companies jointly deciding where to spend their money)
Slashdot Mirror
Of course on slashdot, the vacuum of business reality, it can all be blamed on a microsoft conspiracy.
Consider this possibility:
Desktop machines (not "workstations") are for home consumers. Mothers and grandmothers..
Dell provides user support for their desktops.
All computer companies have a difficult time providing satisfying support to consumers.
Now throw linux on the desktop into the mix.
You would have to train all of your support staff to be linux experts (or at least create all new scripts), etc. They would need to be able to walk non-computer users through tasks like setting up a printer, watching a DVD, etc. This would not be an easy, nor inexpensive task.
Instead, they are better off just offering linux as an option to the customers that buy workstations and servers: businesses. Businesses that can afford to pay higher support costs.
That's my conspiracy theory.
How can you NOT be modded as a troll when you make a blanket statement and don't provide examples?
Just because Microsoft software has bugs, doesn't mean they develop things "quick and dirty". Yes, I'm sure some stuff is pushed out the door before it's 100% clean, just like every other commercial software vendor. But that doesn't mean that they don't have stringent development processes.
You could put any commercial software company's name in the first line of your post. But because you chose to use "Microsoft", I'll call it a troll.
You just need the right service packs.
All the other wires are connected to a base station.
Its for wall mounting, not portability.
All-Star Baseball (multi-platform) is my favorite baseball series for PS2. It has a good balance of fun play and semi-realistic simulation.
Supposedly the 2004 edition will include historical players, as well as historical stadiums and uniforms.
Check out the official site for the details.
You can place orders online today:d el_inspn _inspn_8500.htm
http://www.dell.com/us/en/dhs/products/mo
But they show the "build time" at 25 days (compared with 5 days for an 8200).
So yes, you can buy this today. But you probably won't have it in your hands tomorrow.
We're trying to make progress in the software development field. It hasn't all been worked out yet, but its good to see people taking stabs at it.
One benefit of OO development is the abstraction away from the data store. I want to think about Widgets, and Customers, and Orders, not VARCHAR fields, foreign keys, arbitrary identifier INTEGERs, etc.
So I would argue that the goal IS to build a database to store your objects, instead of building objects to manipulate your database. And I imagine that's what every OO developer would want. But it's hard.
You're suggestion doesn't solve the problem, it just avoids it.
You were mislead by the trolling story submission. This article has nothing to do with MS (despite them being oddly mentioned in the submission), nor Windows.
It's about commercial Unix vs. Linux. I bet not a single person understood that until they read the complete article. Seems to me the submission commentary itself should be moderated as OffTopic.
Have you NOTICED the market lately? Have you heard of the squeeze on I/T spending?
And you're going to tell me that a 40% markup is no big deal?
Wasn't that decided with the whole MPEG4/Windows Media licensing uproar?
You've been able to create trusted scripts on Windows for a while now.
Since Windows Scripting Host 5.6 at least.Are you suggesting, on Slashdot no less, that a single company collect your financial information and handle your access to various sites throughout the web?
Where were you when this place was freaking out about the (now slumbering) Microsoft My Services?
At least thats my guess. It's a common acronym used at other companies. It's a sales department, not a law department.
Are you sure about this? Thats what I thought when I first read the article, but I think the article may be just as misleading:
"In addition to playing DVD movies, the new player will be able to access content on PCs, such as photos, music and videos, via a wireless network connection."
That statement leads you to believe the DVD player has built-in wireless.
"Sonicblue's DVD player will be able to connect to networks via an Ethernet connection. Consumers will be able to purchase 802.11b PC cards to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking."
That statment leads you to believe the DVD player requires an add-on for the wireless capability.
But maybe not. Maybe this paragraph was trying to say was users will need to "...purchase 802.11b PC cards [for their PC] to connect the player to a PC using wireless networking."
So it really could go either way. We'd need another source to know for sure if the wireless is built in.
A few differentiating features of the Dell:
1) Removable battery - you can bring a spare along with you on long plane trips, and swap it out, just like a laptop.
2) Cradle can charge the PDA and a spare battery at the same time.
3) 1 Year next-day replacement standard (I believe Compaq charges an extra $75 for this)
4) Price!
I'm pretty sure it IS possible for an artist to distribute music to their fans, without dealing with such unfair deals that the RIAA companies seem to hand out.
The first thing that comes to mind is Dischord Records, who's most famous artist is Fugazi. They have always done it their own way, with many fan-friendly policies such as setting a $5 max admission for all shows, and $10 postage-paid for all of their CDs.
Recently, Aimee Mann made her entire new album available online before it was released (published under her own label I believe).
So, apparently, it CAN be done. Why isn't this route more attractive to more artists concerned with losing control of their work? I understand the big companies have much more resources for advertising, etc, but is it worth it? Do you think maybe the RIAA companies really ARE adding sufficient value to the product to merit the sort of control they have?
That runtime error you're seeing? Thats the .NET response to the slashdot effect. .NET, what web server DOES stand up to the slashdot effect?)
(Thats not a knock on
Just thought a few people might be curious about the different looking error page.
It does give you a peak at the nice XML based configuration file they've implemented. It works like Apache, in that you can make all changes to the server configuration through a text file, only its all in XML, and it doesn't require a restart of the server. One of the really great features of ASP.NET, in my opinion.
Yeah, its a terrible thing when your devices are customized with your information and your tates.
It all went downhill when AM radios came out with those push-button preset channels...
Some people have been trained by Slashdot to be so privacy paranoid, they don't even think about what they are complaining about anymore.
Look at the sentence you quoted. Read it again, you quoted it. "...YOUR PC will keep track of..."
Ok, read it again. "...YOUR PC will keep track of...".
Ok, now read an feature list for any PDA on the market. I bet it keeps track of YOUR contacts and YOUR appointments. EGADS!!! How did that ever get past the privacy police!
What about all those cell phones out there that can store the numbers YOU call!! The horror.
Wait...did you know they have VCRs that record the shows that YOU chose to??? Oh my, that means there is a record of what you watch! Is nothing sacred anymore?
It makes me think that the root of the problem is that there EXISTS personally identifiable information. How DARE your fingers grow a unique set of prints, now you can be distinguished from someone else! Its all a plot!
I can see the response now "but knowing Microsoft, they will PROBABLY send all this data from MY computer to a central server and THATS a bad thing", to which I say, "Well why didn't you quote the part in the article that said that?"
Mcafee's spam stopper???
That's an oxymoron if I've ever seen one.
I totally agree. I wasn't complaining that it was a "bad" or "unfair" interview. I was just relating my experience of how I also have trouble coding to paper.
I was going to add that that I had this same problem at my Microsoft interview.
The recruiter wanted me to code some function in C, on paper, right there in front of him. It wasn't a very complicated function, but the environment made it very difficult. After I put together something that seemed reasonably correct, he proceeded to pick apart every little mistake, things that I easily would have corrected after the first compiler warning/error.
Thats exactly what I said to my companion after we watched the movie (having read no reviews): Pacino and Williams were great BECAUSE they didn't seem like they were doing their usual Pacino and Williams schticks. They weren't the over-the-top, explosive characters we would expect from those actors. They were both very good, and very believable.
The fact that people mention this movie in the same breath as "Heat" does it a great disservice.
This is a great movie, regardless of whether its a remake or not.
I've been wanting to see this movie ever since I heard about it a few months ago. Every time it has been mentioned, it has gotten very positive reviews. I was very surprised to see it reviewed on slashdot, which is usually confined to reviewing sci-fi flicks.
I'm a life-long skater that grew up on the Bones Brigade vidoes. They were the defining films of the skateboard culture of those days, at least in my clique. Now there is "Z-Boys", which is in effect a prequel to those earlier videos. Now, much older, I'll get a chance to see where all those characters came from. (was that subtle enough?)
My "nerdy techy" world doesn't usually intertwine with my skater world. Growing up, I always had my computer hacking set of friends, and then my skateboarder set of friends, and I was the only overlap. I was impressed that slashdot would cover this movie, and was hoping to see other skater/techy nerds add their appreciation.
Unfortunately, all I have see so far is a bunch of nitpicking on Jon Katz. Isn't anyone else excited about this movie? Isn't anyone else impressed that JonKatz/Slashdot would review such a movie?
Maybe I overestimate the share of artists the RIAA represents...
They claim that they are "forced" to pay the radio stations to play their music.
What happens if they don't pay?
Seems to me that the RIAA could handle this internally. All companies that they represent would agree on a course of action. None of them pay. I would think that MajorLabel1 pays out of fear that if they dont, then MajorLabel2 WILL pay, and therefore MajorLabel2 will get their song played. But if all of the MajorLabels controlled by the RIAA agreed not to pay, then what?
We'd be forced to listen to non-RIAA music? Really?
Or, are they afraid this could be seen as a monopolistic practice harmful to the independent promoters? (independent companies jointly deciding where to spend their money)