There is another article on the NYTimes about this. With Sony coming out with their own format to MP3 called Atrac I'm not sure I'll be interested. I have way too many songs encoded already in MP3 to switch over to some other commercial format.
I've found that I get burned with cheapo non name but tasty cheap IO cards, cases and other infrastructure. I'd build an unstable crap box and spend five hours a week keeping it stable. Once I started buying even 2nd tier hardware many of my worries have vanished.
Drivers (win / linux) are designed to work with REAL devices and not third rate knockoffs w/o quality control.
I found the article useful since it provided ideas on HOW people gain access to your info. Made me think I have to do more.
One thing that was disappointing is that its not always a slip on an individual's part. A hospital could be sloppy with records and you've got a big target on your head. (...or wallet.)
Ron
PS: I do like those Citibank identity theft ads. They're funny. Too bad they didn't tell you more about how to protect yourself except to buy something.
he should think as hard about his editor choices
on
Linus on DRM
·
· Score: 1
Coffee? Void? Dark Matter? Does that question even make sense? I'm not up on this and would be most interested in getting a better understanding of this.
I found the story very interesting but skipping over the details to keep it lively. I would be interested in reading something of the level of Scientific American on this elsewhere on the web.
The article made it seem like this idea is far from proven. If it IS so wacky then why such attention paid to it?
Yes but my comment was circa '93-94. I don't think there was a port to Perl back then. So it was a very interesting library to have access to.
TCL vs TK / Ousterhout bailing/ maintaining code
on
Tcl Core Team Interview
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
At the 1998 Usenix convention in New Orleans Ousterhout asked how many people used TCL w/o TK. Few raised their hands. Then he asked how many used both. Most raised their hands! Finally he asked about just TK users. Far more raised their hands than the just TCL crowd. He was surprised. He seemed to feel that TK was an addon. For a number of developers that I know and myself TK was the glitz and feature that drew me in. Otherwise I would have stuck with Perl.
With Ousterhout looking for greener pastures does this weaken the product? I would think so. If he doesn't believe in it then why should I? How long as he been gone. I couldn't tell exactly from the interview. If I missed it sorry.
I don't know about anyone else but I get in a "TCL" frame of mind. If I go off and do some C++ or Perl coding I cannot seem to read TCL code for a bit. I have to "warm up" or something. I'm aware of flaws in other languages - Perl syntax for example - but you can get some nasty TCL bugs that will simply doom you. It IS tricky at times.
I feel that TCL's strength was it was an early tool that worked across platforms, and was great for X GUIs. Today that is much more common among tools.
-Ron PS: Ousterhout AND Welch used to reply to my questions years ago. They were terribly generous with their time answering emails. It kept me working with the tool.
The valley is too overpriced. It doesn't have that "thinking out of the box" culture anymore. Its more of a consumer-oid culture. My company has an office out there and its strange to walk around.
I think some lean, smart and hungry types will burst ahead - but it will not be in the Valley. Hopefully it will be in the USA but it could very well be in India or China next.
In the late 80s (?) Watcom products were really great. They were beating on everything for the Intel platform.
I received the email yesterday about Watcom's "release" to open source. In that email it says that Sybase felt there was no commercial value in the product anymore so they released it. My question is "Has Sybase been keeping this thing up? Is it useful today?" Or is this a scam to try to give life to a dying patient? I mean perhaps people working on this might be better off working on gcc or something.
Yes Go breaks down in ways that are a mess to evaluate currently. But think about it: thirty years ago a human beating chess computer would be only on an episode of Star Trek. And I mean beating ANY human.
Now computers can hold their own to the top Grandmasters of chess.
If in ten years computers started to gain against Go playing humans I'm sure someone would try to find another game that computers suck in and say "I think computer vs human GameX matches would be more interesting".
Just don't let the last man vs machine game be between John Conner vs machine!:)
Its nice that the writer went to all the trouble to work on this and share it.
His conclusions are not very revealing. Anyone doing Java programming will quickly discover how slow it is esp. in regards to floating point. You don't need a benchmark for that.
That C++ performed as well as Fortran on the author's examples is interesting to me. Is the C++ implementations getting better or is the Fortan complier gone soft?
His reasons for staying with Fortran made me chuckle. Those are the same answers programmers gave back in 1983 when I asked them why they didn't convert after learning the new fangled languages C and Lisp. (Well new for me anyway at the time.) When it is right it is right. I guess Fortran is still alright.
suitable only for sophisticated users ? developers tend to listen only to their smartest customers ?! What a load of ego bloat on this guy.
Some software requires a bit of technical abilities but not everyone would want to run it anyway. Developers, and I mean good ones, don't listen to anyone in the first place.
I think this predicting if something off sourceforge is going to be run by some grandma in Illinois is just navel gazing. I'm sure there are more useful thoughts to think.
Everyone is posting about XP but I would like to address the review.
It was rather thin. I didn't see much insight into the book's ideas or even the writing style. I didn't come away with any sort of idea if I should buy this book or if it would be of use to me.
I like book reviews. I think this was more like a very short book description and summary of the table of contents. Reviews talk about a view and not just a summary.
Do you play any musical instruments?
on
Ask Donald Becker
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
I read from Dijstra and Knuth that they both noted how many programmers also played musical instruments - more than the standard population.
This will will not further the clustering field but do you play any musical instruments?
Kernel or Applications?
on
Ask Donald Becker
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Where would a greater return be found for the development effort today? Better cluster software or better end user application tools for cluster software?
I really enjoyed the orginial rag. I have all the issues and they are fun to flip through even today.
I have a problem with my original subscription just vanishing in the middle like it did. Normally you would get some crap alternate magazine when your magazine hits the dirt. But instead I get the offer of yet another subscription that could fizz out.
I think I'll wait and buy the back issues. At least I know they'exist.
I felt that the article was not only about LINUX "growing up" but also that its founder has other things that are important. Nothing unusual but I think it makes nontechies feel more comfortable with Linus. Its nothing crazy or cultish. He even puts himself down a bit at the end.
The next time RMS rants about why he's not getting the attention that he should this link needs to be forwarded to him to show how it should be done.
Slashdot Mirror
There is another article on the NYTimes about this. With Sony coming out with their own format to MP3 called Atrac I'm not sure I'll be interested. I have way too many songs encoded already in MP3 to switch over to some other commercial format.
I've found that I get burned with cheapo non name but tasty cheap IO cards, cases and other infrastructure. I'd build an unstable crap box and spend five hours a week keeping it stable. Once I started buying even 2nd tier hardware many of my worries have vanished.
Drivers (win / linux) are designed to work with REAL devices and not third rate knockoffs w/o quality control.
Avoid those damn computer expos!
-Ron
I found the article useful since it provided ideas on HOW people gain access to your info. Made me think I have to do more.
One thing that was disappointing is that its not always a slip on an individual's part. A hospital could be sloppy with records and you've got a big target on your head. (...or wallet.)
Ron
PS: I do like those Citibank identity theft ads. They're funny. Too bad they didn't tell you more about how to protect yourself except to buy something.
...and go with vi. :)
Coffee? Void? Dark Matter? Does that question even make sense? I'm not up on this and would be most interested in getting a better understanding of this.
I found the story very interesting but skipping over the details to keep it lively. I would be interested in reading something of the level of Scientific American on this elsewhere on the web.
The article made it seem like this idea is far from proven. If it IS so wacky then why such attention paid to it?
Yes but my comment was circa '93-94. I don't think there was a port to Perl back then. So it was a very interesting library to have access to.
At the 1998 Usenix convention in New Orleans Ousterhout asked how many people used TCL w/o TK. Few raised their hands. Then he asked how many used both. Most raised their hands! Finally he asked about just TK users. Far more raised their hands than the just TCL crowd. He was surprised. He seemed to feel that TK was an addon. For a number of developers that I know and myself TK was the glitz and feature that drew me in. Otherwise I would have stuck with Perl.
With Ousterhout looking for greener pastures does this weaken the product? I would think so. If he doesn't believe in it then why should I? How long as he been gone. I couldn't tell exactly from the interview. If I missed it sorry.
I don't know about anyone else but I get in a "TCL" frame of mind. If I go off and do some C++ or Perl coding I cannot seem to read TCL code for a bit. I have to "warm up" or something. I'm aware of flaws in other languages - Perl syntax for example - but you can get some nasty TCL bugs that will simply doom you. It IS tricky at times.
I feel that TCL's strength was it was an early tool that worked across platforms, and was great for X GUIs. Today that is much more common among tools.
-Ron
PS: Ousterhout AND Welch used to reply to my questions years ago. They were terribly generous with their time answering emails. It kept me working with the tool.
The valley is too overpriced. It doesn't have that "thinking out of the box" culture anymore. Its more of a consumer-oid culture. My company has an office out there and its strange to walk around.
I think some lean, smart and hungry types will burst ahead - but it will not be in the Valley. Hopefully it will be in the USA but it could very well be in India or China next.
So its the primary toolset for DOS work these days? If so I guess that is far and away from Sybase's meat and potatoes.
In the late 80s (?) Watcom products were really great. They were beating on everything for the Intel platform.
I received the email yesterday about Watcom's "release" to open source. In that email it says that Sybase felt there was no commercial value in the product anymore so they released it. My question is "Has Sybase been keeping this thing up? Is it useful today?" Or is this a scam to try to give life to a dying patient? I mean perhaps people working on this might be better off working on gcc or something.
Thanks!
Yes Go breaks down in ways that are a mess to evaluate currently. But think about it: thirty years ago a human beating chess computer would be only on an episode of Star Trek. And I mean beating ANY human.
:)
Now computers can hold their own to the top Grandmasters of chess.
If in ten years computers started to gain against Go playing humans I'm sure someone would try to find another game that computers suck in and say "I think computer vs human GameX matches would be more interesting".
Just don't let the last man vs machine game be between John Conner vs machine!
Its nice that the writer went to all the trouble to work on this and share it.
His conclusions are not very revealing. Anyone doing Java programming will quickly discover how slow it is esp. in regards to floating point. You don't need a benchmark for that.
That C++ performed as well as Fortran on the author's examples is interesting to me. Is the C++ implementations getting better or is the Fortan complier gone soft?
His reasons for staying with Fortran made me chuckle. Those are the same answers programmers gave back in 1983 when I asked them why they didn't convert after learning the new fangled languages C and Lisp. (Well new for me anyway at the time.) When it is right it is right. I guess Fortran is still alright.
suitable only for sophisticated users
?
developers tend to listen only to their smartest customers
?!
What a load of ego bloat on this guy.
Some software requires a bit of technical abilities but not everyone would want to run it anyway. Developers, and I mean good ones, don't listen to anyone in the first place.
I think this predicting if something off sourceforge is going to be run by some grandma in Illinois is just navel gazing. I'm sure there are more useful thoughts to think.
I had read several of his books in the 80s and my friends thought he must have gone bonkers after being a great astronomer.
Too bad he passed on before he could be shown to be correct... if this virus from space stuff is proven correct.
-Ron
Does your family quip TJ Hooker or Star Trek jokes to you? Or do they love you for who you are?
Who was fun to work with, both Star Trek related and on the variety of other projects you've been a part of?
Most of us simply see the performances. It would be interesting to know more about the people and the interactions.
Everyone is posting about XP but I would like to address the review.
It was rather thin. I didn't see much insight into the book's ideas or even the writing style. I didn't come away with any sort of idea if I should buy this book or if it would be of use to me.
I like book reviews. I think this was more like a very short book description and summary of the table of contents. Reviews talk about a view and not just a summary.
I read from Dijstra and Knuth that they both noted how many programmers also played musical instruments - more than the standard population.
This will will not further the clustering field but do you play any musical instruments?
Where would a greater return be found for the development effort today? Better cluster software or better end user application tools for cluster software?
The article states that the inddustry expects computer sales to lukewarm since people are happy with what they have.
HP should be looking for exciting NEW concepts to exploit. Bring a little excitement to the industry.
PC. PC/TV. PC/TV/Stereo. PC/TV/Stereo/Phone. Nothing new....
Blah! Consolidation and not innovation.
I agree!
I really enjoyed the orginial rag. I have all the issues and they are fun to flip through even today.
I have a problem with my original subscription just vanishing in the middle like it did. Normally you would get some crap alternate magazine when your magazine hits the dirt. But instead I get the offer of yet another subscription that could fizz out.
I think I'll wait and buy the back issues. At least I know they'exist.
I felt that the article was not only about LINUX "growing up" but also that its founder has other things that are important. Nothing unusual but I think it makes nontechies feel more comfortable with Linus. Its nothing crazy or cultish. He even puts himself down a bit at the end.
The next time RMS rants about why he's not getting the attention that he should this link needs to be forwarded to him to show how it should be done.
I saw these while on a business trip to Irvine for sale in the Spectrum.
This is not big, new or interesting news. Blah!