"Some disciplines... need patented algorithms whose owners aren't willing to license them royalty-free;"
How about the owners just provide binary modules. Or whoever happens to implement the patented algorithm could agree to publish only binary modules. It's like some companies not wanting to provide drivers for Linux or X - because they don't want to publish the code under GPL to protect their trade secrets. Well they can just release a binary like they do for Windows.
The number of people who didn't read a thing about this project astounds me.
"Y addresses many of the problems associated with current systems, whilst keeping and improving on their best features."
He's not adding anything to X-servers. He's designing a new system, keeping and improving upon the best features in existing systems, and dumping all the cruft they've managed to accumulate over time.
"However, X has some useful features which any worthy replacement must also include:
-Network Transparency. (...) -Modularity and Extensibility. (...)"
This guy should call it YINX ("yincks"), because Y Is Not X. Go read the pdf, he addresses all the issues you've brought up. For example, your point number 7: "No smooth integration of the window managers." In the article you will find: "The beginnings of a set of widgets with appropriate input event processing that can be used to easily and quickly build consistent applications." Providing a standard widget set upon which all things can and should be based will allow smooth integration of everything.
Furthermore, the fact that this is an entirely new project with a new code base will make it easy to address all the problems with X. The design of Y itself is an improvement upon that of X's, so the system is better from the start, rather than having hacked on fixes.
"...Sorry, but this guy's just an undergraduate student, no offense but I find it highly unlikely he can come up with something superior to X, QT and GTK... in a year of work."
I think you may have missed the point of this project.. or did you even read the report?
"Clearly a full replacement of an entire graphical user interface system is far beyond the scope of a fourth year undergraduate individual project. The aim is instead to create a suitable foundation upon which a replacement can easily be built."
It'd be nice to see a group take this code and run with it. I'm pretty fed up with XFree86, and would more than welcome a replacement.
Once a community forms around this thing, I bet they could design a helluva system within a year.
When I was packin up at home gettin ready for school, I looked around my basement (ie: Command Central) at all the computer junk and crap I had lying around which I wanted to sell but never got around to doing.
I just thought to myself
"I wouldn't mind if this basement just caught on fire and burned everything."
Could someone explain to me why three of these comments were tagged as flamebait?
First of all, I think jared_hanson needs a whack with a clue stick. What would make him think the parent comment was intended to be funny? It's a good point. Having ones cheeck swabbed for a DNA sample to identify a possibly destroyed or dismembered corpse would be a painful thing to have to do and think about for someone who had just lost a family member in the WTC.
Second, the two replies to hanson's comments are also valid points. It's a tragedy for sure, but doesn't even come close to ranking with the greatest tragedies of all time. I can see why the second reply was tagged as flamebait; it was a little harsh. Regardless, I'm guessing that most/. moderators are from the States.
That second comment does raise a good point though. The US needs to get over itself. Although it's difficult to blame any US citizen for thinking it was the greatest tragedy of all time, given the propaganda they're exposed to.
Just for starters, compare "9/11" to the World Wars, the Holocaust, Hiroshima (and Pearl Harbour - which in itself wasn't as bad relative to the first 2, but tragic not only because of the loss of life but because it started off the manufacturing of weapons of rediculous destruction, be they nuke, chemical, or biological), Vietnam. And that's just recent history.
If anyone is going to marked as flamebait in this thread, it should be jared_hanson, because I doubt he speaks for all US citizens here.
By the way, I'm not posting as an AC - I've got a point to make, and I'll take the karma hit for it. If anything, mod me down for being off topic.
Using full sized cases seems like a rather inefficient use of space to me. But I guess those cases are all fairly full - the heatsinks in those things are enormous. Wish PCs had heatsinks like that, then maybe mine wouldn't be so noisy.
I was going to mention that, but I wasn't sure whether or not it'd be a good idea. Would charged ions then be sent into your case producing potential for electrostatic discharge?
This keyboard rocks. I got it from an old PB 486 system. It's small and compact, no Windows keys, and is just plain nice to type on. It fits very well on my desk too (due to the small compactness.) It's also easy to disassemble and reassemble for cleaning. I've taken it apart a few times to give it a good scrubbing in the sink.
Woo, just looked it up on google, looks like you can still buy these things for $8 or $9. Pretty sweet. It seems the newer versions of the 5130 have the Windows keys:/
Here's a picture on ebay. Doesn't mention the model number, but it sure looks the same.
"But since the Rogers and Sympatico both have started bandwidth caps..."
When is the last time you checked on these caps? Both Rogers and Sympatico removed them. When I came back to school at the beginning of the month and was getting my apartment internet service, I called both of them and asked. Both said "No caps!" I went with rogers because I think anything over POTS is crap. Plus I hate Bell with a passion.
The best Canadian ISP, afaic, is Shaw Cable. I bet they'd be very reasonable in a situation like this. But they don't have caps either.
You can already buy cases with air filters. Most, if not all, Lian-Li cases come with filters over the intakes. The only thing they really do is reduce the airflow and cooling potential of your intake fans.
You have to periodically clean your filters anyway, so you might as well just dust your system with compressed air every now and then. Then you don't have to worry about reduced airflow.
The thing I've noticed about the filter on my case is that it picks up large particles, but the small stuff still gets through (it's like a soot, and builds up pretty good.) I've already replaced the stock filter material with something thicker. If I were to try and filter the soot, I don't think any air would get through. I'm not even sure why I still use a filter.
Personally I stopped with the whole p2p thing after Audio Galaxy died. I wasn't into it big even then. I liked getting a lot of tunes that were hard to find (ie: weren't played on the radio, tv, promoted or even sold in most stores.) I can't stand any p2p now because in all its forms it's a pain in the ass to use. Hence why I stopped after AG. AG was flawless. Great interface, and it took care of getting the song to you - never failed. Tiny, tiny client too.
When I used p2p, I had a reasonable purpose. I wanted to explore new music, and I found p2p great for that. And I'll have you know that most of my collection of CDs were legitimately purchased CDs and were the result of using p2p. (The others are copies from CDs borrowed from friends which is legal in Canada. That's a small fraction though.;) And anything I listen to in the future will be an indirect result of p2p because now I'm privvy to many artists and lables I never knew existed prior to p2p. Anyhow, it seems to me like a lot of people just download for the sake of downloading. I have a lot of friends who collect thousands of mp3s, and hundreds of movies and never listen to or watch them! They don't even know what they have on their hard drive.
It's like getting their money's worth on what they spend for a high speed connection and massive hard drive. They're not necessarily interested in what they're downloading, so long as there's a constant stream of data over the line and something changing the colour of the pie chart.
To me, this sort of behaviour seems to indicate a fad, and I think it'll pass; That is downloading for the sake of downloading which is what I think a lot of people are doing (no actual loss on sales there, hello RIAA and MPAA.) However, p2p will not go away, it'll simply maintain a (useful) niche, become used for more legitimate purposes, and people will treat it as a utility - which is what it is.
I'm now beginning to become annoyed by p2p since my roommates are hogging all the bandwidth on our internet connection, and the filtering software on the router doesn't seem to work.
I'll be happy when the music and movie fad is over and p2p is put to some real good use. How about free and open source software distribution. I'm sure it's being done and p2p seems like the perfect method of distribution - sharing resources with those who are sharing code.
"Uh, because the guy us a Francophone? It's still French whether it's in Canada or France."
Not really. From what I've heard, and to say the least, France does not like Quebec french. It is surprising that they're using a term coined by a guy in Montreal.
I tend to have a roll of duct tape handy where ever I am. I have a roll that I generally keep in my truck, and often in my backpack. If I go camping, I might as well bring a roll or bring no tape at all. If I'm anywhere else (ie: the city), I couldn't imagine being more than 5 minutes from a roll of tape - because I've got a roll at home, in my truck, or in my backpack (which comes everywhere with me.) Except maybe an airplane... I was going through security once, and they wouldn't let me take my roll on the plane - it can be used as a restraining device. I asked them if they wanted my shoe laces too.
"...a radiator leak on Highway 80 heading out to Moline..." He should have a roll of tape in his trunk to begin with.
"...presentations where I needed to put something on a wall." Briefcase or backpack. A roll of tape is just another piece of equipment you should be toting around with the rest of your presentation materials and hardware.
Really, for the price, it's a waste of money. If you really want to carry miniscule amounts of tape around then buy a roll and put a few strips on some wax paper.
You might as well just make a laptop with the screen facing out rather than in. You've got a full computer and monitor all in one package that's no more than a couple inches thick.
I've seen some comments on how the various acronyms in the Linux filesystem make using Linux difficult for newbies, and how they can be confusing for people.
Can someone tell me what happened to LEARNING? If you're new to Linux then you've got to learn a few new things. The file system hierarchy (which isn't in need of improvement) being one of those things.
If you want to have some whacked out names for your directories, then do that in your home directory. The average user shouldn't even need to worry about root file system directories. When applications are installed, the binaries go to the right place (and are in $PATH, so you don't need to go find them), libraries go in the right and standard place, so programs know where to find them, (etc..).
There's a reason the file system is the way it is, and it doesn't need changing. It's just one of the things that goes along with learning a different operating system.
This is a very inexpensive, easy to implement overclocking deterrent.
Think about it. If it's a poor heat sink and fan that AMD requires you to use, then overclocking is out of the question because there's no way the HSF could regulate the temperature.
See, overclocking voids the warantee, but there's no way for AMD to tell if you were overclocking. This way they do know (or it's easier for them to tell) - assuming you used a different HSF while overclocking. I wonder what they'll do when hot cpus start failing in poorly ventilated cases, or in hot climates.
Personally I don't like it, because a crappy HSF... just sucks. I don't overclock, but I still want a half decent HSF. You could probably get away with using a different fan though. Watch, soon you'll see "heat sink extensions" that you lock on to AMD's required sink, and it extends the surface area of that heatsink.
Though given some of the crazy cooling solutions that have been posted on/., I can understand why they'd do this. There's no way for them to tell if you weren't using a HSF on their approved list.
Slashdot Mirror
"Some disciplines ... need patented algorithms whose owners aren't willing to license them royalty-free;"
How about the owners just provide binary modules. Or whoever happens to implement the patented algorithm could agree to publish only binary modules. It's like some companies not wanting to provide drivers for Linux or X - because they don't want to publish the code under GPL to protect their trade secrets. Well they can just release a binary like they do for Windows.
Problem solved.
The number of people who didn't read a thing about this project astounds me.
"Y addresses many of the problems associated with current systems, whilst keeping and improving on their best features."
He's not adding anything to X-servers. He's designing a new system, keeping and improving upon the best features in existing systems, and dumping all the cruft they've managed to accumulate over time.
"However, X has some useful features which any worthy replacement must also include:
-Network Transparency. (...)
-Modularity and Extensibility. (...)"
This guy should call it YINX ("yincks"), because Y Is Not X. Go read the pdf, he addresses all the issues you've brought up. For example, your point number 7:
"No smooth integration of the window managers."
In the article you will find:
"The beginnings of a set of widgets with appropriate input event processing that can be used to easily and quickly build consistent applications."
Providing a standard widget set upon which all things can and should be based will allow smooth integration of everything.
Furthermore, the fact that this is an entirely new project with a new code base will make it easy to address all the problems with X. The design of Y itself is an improvement upon that of X's, so the system is better from the start, rather than having hacked on fixes.
"...Sorry, but this guy's just an undergraduate student, no offense but I find it highly unlikely he can come up with something superior to X, QT and GTK ... in a year of work."
I think you may have missed the point of this project.. or did you even read the report?
"Clearly a full replacement of an entire graphical user interface system is far beyond the scope of a fourth year undergraduate individual project. The aim is instead to create a suitable foundation upon which a replacement can easily be built."
It'd be nice to see a group take this code and run with it. I'm pretty fed up with XFree86, and would more than welcome a replacement.
Once a community forms around this thing, I bet they could design a helluva system within a year.
When I was packin up at home gettin ready for school, I looked around my basement (ie: Command Central) at all the computer junk and crap I had lying around which I wanted to sell but never got around to doing.
I just thought to myself
"I wouldn't mind if this basement just caught on fire and burned everything."
Could someone explain to me why three of these comments were tagged as flamebait?
/. moderators are from the States.
First of all, I think jared_hanson needs a whack with a clue stick. What would make him think the parent comment was intended to be funny? It's a good point. Having ones cheeck swabbed for a DNA sample to identify a possibly destroyed or dismembered corpse would be a painful thing to have to do and think about for someone who had just lost a family member in the WTC.
Second, the two replies to hanson's comments are also valid points. It's a tragedy for sure, but doesn't even come close to ranking with the greatest tragedies of all time. I can see why the second reply was tagged as flamebait; it was a little harsh. Regardless, I'm guessing that most
That second comment does raise a good point though. The US needs to get over itself. Although it's difficult to blame any US citizen for thinking it was the greatest tragedy of all time, given the propaganda they're exposed to.
Just for starters, compare "9/11" to the World Wars, the Holocaust, Hiroshima (and Pearl Harbour - which in itself wasn't as bad relative to the first 2, but tragic not only because of the loss of life but because it started off the manufacturing of weapons of rediculous destruction, be they nuke, chemical, or biological), Vietnam. And that's just recent history.
If anyone is going to marked as flamebait in this thread, it should be jared_hanson, because I doubt he speaks for all US citizens here.
By the way, I'm not posting as an AC - I've got a point to make, and I'll take the karma hit for it. If anything, mod me down for being off topic.
But when the industry is dominated by products from Microsoft, it doesn't take much to be "Industry Strength"!
;)
Given that, one would think industry strength implies insecurity!
Don't let my alias throw you off, I'm not about bashing Microsoft, but this was just too easy
Using full sized cases seems like a rather inefficient use of space to me. But I guess those cases are all fairly full - the heatsinks in those things are enormous. Wish PCs had heatsinks like that, then maybe mine wouldn't be so noisy.
I was going to mention that, but I wasn't sure whether or not it'd be a good idea. Would charged ions then be sent into your case producing potential for electrostatic discharge?
It'd be a cool filtration system otherwise.
This keyboard rocks. I got it from an old PB 486 system. It's small and compact, no Windows keys, and is just plain nice to type on. It fits very well on my desk too (due to the small compactness.)
:/
It's also easy to disassemble and reassemble for cleaning. I've taken it apart a few times to give it a good scrubbing in the sink.
Woo, just looked it up on google, looks like you can still buy these things for $8 or $9. Pretty sweet. It seems the newer versions of the 5130 have the Windows keys
Here's a picture on ebay. Doesn't mention the model number, but it sure looks the same.
"But since the Rogers and Sympatico both have started bandwidth caps..."
When is the last time you checked on these caps? Both Rogers and Sympatico removed them. When I came back to school at the beginning of the month and was getting my apartment internet service, I called both of them and asked. Both said "No caps!" I went with rogers because I think anything over POTS is crap. Plus I hate Bell with a passion.
The best Canadian ISP, afaic, is Shaw Cable. I bet they'd be very reasonable in a situation like this. But they don't have caps either.
You can already buy cases with air filters. Most, if not all, Lian-Li cases come with filters over the intakes. The only thing they really do is reduce the airflow and cooling potential of your intake fans.
You have to periodically clean your filters anyway, so you might as well just dust your system with compressed air every now and then. Then you don't have to worry about reduced airflow.
The thing I've noticed about the filter on my case is that it picks up large particles, but the small stuff still gets through (it's like a soot, and builds up pretty good.) I've already replaced the stock filter material with something thicker. If I were to try and filter the soot, I don't think any air would get through. I'm not even sure why I still use a filter.
"almost anything is possible with the a patch... it just takes the will to do it."
It also takes the will to install it. If people don't like what it does, then it won't get installed.
Personally I stopped with the whole p2p thing after Audio Galaxy died. I wasn't into it big even then. I liked getting a lot of tunes that were hard to find (ie: weren't played on the radio, tv, promoted or even sold in most stores.) I can't stand any p2p now because in all its forms it's a pain in the ass to use. Hence why I stopped after AG. AG was flawless. Great interface, and it took care of getting the song to you - never failed. Tiny, tiny client too.
;) And anything I listen to in the future will be an indirect result of p2p because now I'm privvy to many artists and lables I never knew existed prior to p2p. Anyhow, it seems to me like a lot of people just download for the sake of downloading. I have a lot of friends who collect thousands of mp3s, and hundreds of movies and never listen to or watch them! They don't even know what they have on their hard drive.
When I used p2p, I had a reasonable purpose. I wanted to explore new music, and I found p2p great for that. And I'll have you know that most of my collection of CDs were legitimately purchased CDs and were the result of using p2p. (The others are copies from CDs borrowed from friends which is legal in Canada. That's a small fraction though.
It's like getting their money's worth on what they spend for a high speed connection and massive hard drive. They're not necessarily interested in what they're downloading, so long as there's a constant stream of data over the line and something changing the colour of the pie chart.
To me, this sort of behaviour seems to indicate a fad, and I think it'll pass; That is downloading for the sake of downloading which is what I think a lot of people are doing (no actual loss on sales there, hello RIAA and MPAA.) However, p2p will not go away, it'll simply maintain a (useful) niche, become used for more legitimate purposes, and people will treat it as a utility - which is what it is.
I'm now beginning to become annoyed by p2p since my roommates are hogging all the bandwidth on our internet connection, and the filtering software on the router doesn't seem to work.
I'll be happy when the music and movie fad is over and p2p is put to some real good use. How about free and open source software distribution. I'm sure it's being done and p2p seems like the perfect method of distribution - sharing resources with those who are sharing code.
The Apple G5 has 8 sockets for ram.
Hook it up.
"It's to complain about Microsoft's business products."
I'm sure by this you mean Microsoft's business practices.
Someone has to buy food and clothing for that kid. More money to the US economy.
And you can invoke the DMCA on those RIAA bastards when they try and decrypt your hard drive!!
bahahaha!
Probably not.. but it'd be fun.
"Uh, because the guy us a Francophone? It's still French whether it's in Canada or France."
Not really. From what I've heard, and to say the least, France does not like Quebec french. It is surprising that they're using a term coined by a guy in Montreal.
I tend to have a roll of duct tape handy where ever I am. I have a roll that I generally keep in my truck, and often in my backpack. If I go camping, I might as well bring a roll or bring no tape at all. If I'm anywhere else (ie: the city), I couldn't imagine being more than 5 minutes from a roll of tape - because I've got a roll at home, in my truck, or in my backpack (which comes everywhere with me.) Except maybe an airplane... I was going through security once, and they wouldn't let me take my roll on the plane - it can be used as a restraining device. I asked them if they wanted my shoe laces too.
"...a radiator leak on Highway 80 heading out to Moline..."
He should have a roll of tape in his trunk to begin with.
"...presentations where I needed to put something on a wall."
Briefcase or backpack. A roll of tape is just another piece of equipment you should be toting around with the rest of your presentation materials and hardware.
Really, for the price, it's a waste of money. If you really want to carry miniscule amounts of tape around then buy a roll and put a few strips on some wax paper.
You might as well just make a laptop with the screen facing out rather than in. You've got a full computer and monitor all in one package that's no more than a couple inches thick.
Heh, I didn't even notice that.. :P
Looks like the moderators didn't either
I can see my house from here!
What do you think happens to the recycled materials once they're processed? Are they just thrown in the garbage?
I imagine the materials are sold for a profit, helping cover the costs of a community recycling program.
I've seen some comments on how the various acronyms in the Linux filesystem make using Linux difficult for newbies, and how they can be confusing for people.
Can someone tell me what happened to LEARNING? If you're new to Linux then you've got to learn a few new things. The file system hierarchy (which isn't in need of improvement) being one of those things.
If you want to have some whacked out names for your directories, then do that in your home directory. The average user shouldn't even need to worry about root file system directories. When applications are installed, the binaries go to the right place (and are in $PATH, so you don't need to go find them), libraries go in the right and standard place, so programs know where to find them, (etc..).
There's a reason the file system is the way it is, and it doesn't need changing. It's just one of the things that goes along with learning a different operating system.
This is a very inexpensive, easy to implement overclocking deterrent.
/., I can understand why they'd do this. There's no way for them to tell if you weren't using a HSF on their approved list.
Think about it. If it's a poor heat sink and fan that AMD requires you to use, then overclocking is out of the question because there's no way the HSF could regulate the temperature.
See, overclocking voids the warantee, but there's no way for AMD to tell if you were overclocking. This way they do know (or it's easier for them to tell) - assuming you used a different HSF while overclocking. I wonder what they'll do when hot cpus start failing in poorly ventilated cases, or in hot climates.
Personally I don't like it, because a crappy HSF... just sucks. I don't overclock, but I still want a half decent HSF. You could probably get away with using a different fan though. Watch, soon you'll see "heat sink extensions" that you lock on to AMD's required sink, and it extends the surface area of that heatsink.
Though given some of the crazy cooling solutions that have been posted on