...I worked withVMS... VMS was my friend... and, Windows NT, you're no VMS!
Very seriously, in the early years Microsoft kept saying that Windows NT was "similar" to VMS. So when we ran into various problems, I would look for Windows NT equivalents to familiar VMS utilities.
They weren't there.
And the five-foot-shelf of well-written, comprehensive, accurate documentation in China Red binders wasn't there.
And the source code on microfiche wasn't there.
I have no doubt that in some core internal details the two systems were similar, but at the level of the ordinary user AND the ordinary system manager, VMS was far more mature. I miss VMS, and I miss Digital.
(I knew Digital... Digital was my friend... and Compaq, I mean HP, you're no Digital.)
It sounds like interesting and worthwhile work, but some of the projected benefits are silly and the projected risks are not discussed at all.
For example: "If a user's computer becomes infected, she could use the Rollback feature to go back to an arbitrary point in time prior to the infection and resume work there, deleting the subsequent work -- and the virus."
There are several reasons why that statement is idiotic.
1) This exact capability has, of course, been available for several years now, first as the commercial product GoBack, then as a built-in feature in Windows XP. (And it has done nothing substantial to solve the virus problem).
2) The breeziness with which the reporter acknowledges that using this capability would "delete the subsequent work" is astonishing. Most of us would not like losing one, two, or several days' work.
3) If you always were aware of the exact moment at which you acquired a virus, viruses would be a relatively small problem. The fact is, you don't know.
4) There's even a nonzero probability that in going back to a time when you did not have the virus that you might also be undoing security patches preventing you from acquiring new viruses.
The U. S. has had a good long run as global superpower, over half a century. The British Empire wasn't at its peak for that long.
"Waiting for the cool (technological) stuff" is one of a number of signs that the U. S. may be at about the peak of its power and influence, and a slight decline may have already started.
Computer technology is not a secret, and all the manufacturing is now being done overseas. We should not be surprised that the U.S. is no longer the dominant innovator.
The U. S. is no longer the dominant winner of Nobel prices in the sciences, either.
I am starting to see signs of Japanese cultural influence in the U. S. "Hello Kitty" merchandise, anime, etc. After years in which the rest of the world bought Jordache blue jeans and watched "I Love Lucy" and "Miami Vice," I think the tide is starting to turn there, too.
One more media category that Best Buy, Circuit City, Staples, etc. will need to find room for on their shelves, in among the DVD+RW and the DVD-R and the Music CD-Rs and the Data CD-RW's and the Type 4 DVD-RAM and the Type 2 DVD-RAM and the Type 1 DVD-RAM and the "printable-but-not-by-inkjet" DVD's and the "inkjet-printable" DVD's.
I wonder what category of media they will kick out in order to make room for it? And what devices will start to become effectively orphaned as once-easily-obtained media become increasingly hard to find?
As others have pointed out, a truly black screen wouldn't reflect the projector's light. And, conversely, a screen that is able to reflect the red, green, and blue light from the projector will reflect some of the ambient light, which contains some light at the projector's R, G, and B wavelengths. It's too bad the article has to describe it as "Gee whiz! it's technological magic!"...
What we need to know is: a) what percentage of white, ambient room light does the screen reflect? It's not zero, and the screen probably looks like a dark grey. b) When the projector is projecting "white" light, what fraction of that light is reflected? Not only is it less than 100%, it's probably less than a white screen would reflect.
Other things one would like to know are whether the filters that do this magic cause any visible graininess, and over what angle the reflected light is reflected.
So much of this discussion seems to present this as an either-or. Why should we have to choose? Why was it necessary to break compatibility in order to provide basic security? And what, exactly, about these changes is making things break?
Why should things like "The Messenger service is now disabled by default" or "new RPC restrictions" break very many applications?
How many ordinary consumer applications (as opposed to specially-written corporate applications which should have a team of programmers to keep things up-to-date) are relying on RPC, or the Messenger service?
Are so many ordinary applications doing spyware-like, product-activation-like, phone-home-like thingies over the Internet?
A single aspirin-sized pellet of U-235 could power your laptop for 20,000 years. No wimpy Centrinos, but a big honkin' full-strength 43.8-watt Pentium IV. The ability to burn DVD's directly, and I do mean burn. A simple 20-pound lead plate integral with the back of the case provides your lap with thermal and other protection, as well as looking cool. Waste disposal? No problem, nobody's going to throw one away when it still has 19,997 years of useful life in it.
It's just like that old joke. If Linux came from Minix, and if Minix came from Unix, then SCO might have some eggs. But since Linux didn't come from Minix and Minix didn't come from Unix, SCO has shit.
(shrug) I happened to find the FAQ at Gateway's website, but an identical FAQ can be found on Microsoft's own website here. The section entitled "Recorded TV File Format" says that Media Center can't be changed to use any other format, that the format can't be convert, can't be played with any other software, can't be edited even with WIndows Movie Maker "at this time." It doesn't say what the date of "at this time" is, and it doesn't give any URL for updates.
I suspect that Microsoft knows the capabilities of its own products.
Are these products that Google locates that are said to be compatible with DVR-MS products that Microsoft has approved, or are they reverse-engineered hacks? Are they actually available, tested, and working, or are they "futures?" And is Microsoft committed to interoperability of DVR-MS or could they keep mutating the file format, much as Apple is doing with iTunes DRM-protected AAC?
Consumers are not being told which devices do and which don't contain DRM and therefore there is no opportunity for marketplace discipline to occur. By the time consumers understand what is happening, every new device will have DRM and it will be too late to "vote with your dollars."
I recently saw a full-page ad in the Boston Globe for a Gateway (remember? the company that ran TV ads a year ago saying they support my fair-use rights to music) for something called a Media Center PC. My wife was interested and asked me to look into it. Go here and click on "What can I do with Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004" and it says:
"Watch your favorite shows, whenever you want. Record a single episode or capture an entire series. You can also watch a previously recorded show while recording a live TV program. With the new Media Center 2004, you're able to record a TV show directly to a DVD so you can start your own DVD collection or take it on the road and watch it late."
Only if you go here , click on ">FAQ" and scroll way down do you learn some relevant details:
"Media Center uses a new file format called DVR-MS... Q. Can the file format used by Media Center be changed? A. No... Q. Can [they] be converted to another video format? A. At this time, [no]. Q. Can I edit Recorded TV files? A. Currently, [no]. Q. Does Windows® Movie Maker support the Media Center file format? A. [Not at this time]."
"Q. What is content protection and how is it used by Media Center? A. Content owners and/or broadcasters can set copy protection flags to indicate that a program is subject to content protection. When Media Center detects that this flag is set, it will protect the content by limiting the ability to copy and distribute the program. Q. Can protected Recorded TV files be watched on another PC? A. No... Q. Can protected Recorded TV files be played back on the same Media Center PC using Media Player 9 or other DirectShow-enabled applications? A. No... Q. Can I record a TV show to my hard drive and then to a DVD using my DVD-R and play it on my home DVD player? A. No..."
Since few programs are currently using the broadcast flag, few consumers will discover these limitations either before they buy it or during the period when they could conceivably return it. DRM is currently in stealth mode. Like a virus that doesn't release its payload until it has infected many PCs, over the next five years millions of consumers will buy devices with DRM and not even know it. Then, suddenly, media companies will start turning on their protection flags and it will be too late to do anything about it.
When I asked direct questions to Gateway representatives about whether I could "use it like a VCR or DVD recorder to record my favorite shows on DVDs" they assured me that I could. Essentially the reps seemed to know about the "what you can do" paragraph I quoted above, but not about the "funny file format" and "content protection" issues I summarized below.
_I_ for one read do, goddamit, read privacy statements, and the dark-grey-on-light-grey fine print on the back of auto rental agreements, and so forth. I read whatever I sign. OK, sometimes I skim it pretty quickly if there is a long line behind me.
Is the court saying that what I do doesn't count, since most people don't read them? (Sorta like the FDA saying that it's OK for fish to have higher levels of mercury than other foods because most people don't eat that much fish...)
Does this mean that whenever I get one of these fine-print things I now need to ask someone at the airline, bank, etc. to initial a statement saying that they have seen me read it and understand that I am expecting them to live up to it?
...why, oh, why, oh WHY does everything that ought to be a simple, functional device end up as a bloated mass of featuritis with a clunky user interface, a 250-page manual... and the ability to accept and automatically execute executable content?
There is no rationale reason whatsoever why a cell phone needs to be susceptible to viruses.
What next? Digital cameras that are capable of updating their firmware by photographing the screen of the vendor's website... that will be infested by virus code which somebody smuggles onto the Jumbotron screen at a football game?
Well, mod me down if I'm wrong, but I'm assuming that in order to play traditional CD's and DVD's the units will need to have two different lasers in them.
Because the public will insist on backward compatibility initially, the units produced for the first ten years or so will all have them. Then, when blue-wavelength DVD's have become popular enough that virtually all new DVD and CD purchases are blue formats with DRM, they'll introduce single-wavelength machines.
Up to now, this would have been difficult to do. It would have taken true perversity on the part of a manufacturer to produce, say, a player that would ONLY play SACD or DVD-A disks. Since the actual cost of a unit that ALSO plays traditional CD's is virtually the same, any manufacturer that tried to do that would face competitors willing to sell a CD-capable unit that is similarly price. Same price, also plays CD's, which will consumers choose?
But once we have a new standard with a different laser wavelength, once a manufacturer dares to jumps in with a blue-only, DRM-only unit, competitors will NOT be able to make a legacy-capable unit at the same price, because they'll have the cost of a second laser to play the legacy media.
Wikipedia is another example of open-source-like methods being applied to a non-software area. Only time will tell exactly how successful it is, of course.
OK, it's not just Clippy. But everything about Windows just screams that it was done by the sort of people that think Clippy was a good idea.
Everything in Windows feels like it has a hidden agenda. Instead of being done some simple way for some straightforward purpose, everything there has some other purpose as well. Clippy isn't there to really help me, it's there for the purpose of producing an impressive demo that looks like lots of help is available.
Are the menus in Word different every release because of UI research that shows that each is an improvement on the last arrangement? Or are they they to reassure some manager that he or she is truly in charge now so and has the power to put the menu commands where they happen to like them.
Every new improvement feels as if its there 40% for the purpose of providing real convenience and functionality and 60% there for the purpose of promoting a technology in which Microsoft has a vested interest... or to undercut a rival... or to lock you in.
When I use Windows, I feel as if I'm being sold something all the time, every time, and I need to waste a lot of psychic energy keeping up my sales resistance.
And there's all the effort of trying to forget all the stuff that I was sold two years ago that has now been dumped and that Microsoft wishes I would forget. Active Desktop, Back Office, digital_nervous_system......and, indeed Clippy, which Microsoft now seems to believe they never invented.
And all the wonderful new solutions that we're supposed to admire, not noticing that they are solutions to problems Microsoft created..NET is the solution to DLL hell. And just where did that DLL hell come from in the first place? Did the devil make them do it?
There's just nothing there that seems to have the pure purpose of pleasing me or making my computing life genuinely easier.
Other will have different perceptions. These are mine, and these are why I use Windows only in situations where I have no real choice.
Copy should be control-alt-caps-lock-tilde. Paste should be escape-escape-shift-F6 and click the first and fourth mouse buttons. This pastes in two copies, which is what I usually want. If, for some reason, I only want one copy, then after I pasteI just press PgDn on the numeric keypad with NumLock on, then hit SysRq twice in rapid succession (usually, within half a second). This conveniently deletes the second copy.
If your mouse has less than four buttons, it's broken. Get one with four buttons.
Simple. Clean. Logical. Convenient.
I like it this way so this is the right way.. I know what I like, and that makes me a UI expert.
If anyone wants it any other way, well, let them set it as a non-default user preference. And if the preference isn't honored by every application, well, tough.
Followup volumes will deal with OGPU gems,
on
GPU Gems
·
· Score: 1
just as with the Internet, it was the efforts of educational institutions that pioneered and gave birth to radio as we know it in the late 1920s and early 1930s. The communications act of 1934 was essentially a giveaway to commercial interests, but it did, however, state that the airwaves belong to the public--a commons, if you will, and it did, as part of the compromise, carve out some of the spectrum for educational broadcasting and create special educational licensing.
The commercial interests basically got their way. It is a crying shame that they can't be content with what they have and that they, and the FCC, are now pushing around little educational stations and generally acting as if the airwaves were private property.
And where is it written that all drivers need to reside in kernel space? Isn't this determined by the OS design, and isn't it a legitimate target for critique?
Why should buggy code in a device driver bring down the OS as a whole? Why should it affect anything but the operation of that specific device?
What is there, exactly, about a SCSI device that requires the specific driver for that specific device to have full, unrestricted access to space? Is it logically impossible to think of any other architecture at all?
Or is this a deliberate tradeoff of performance and convenience against stability?
Slashdot Mirror
...in the Ridgefield Press.
...I worked withVMS... VMS was my friend... and, Windows NT, you're no VMS!
Very seriously, in the early years Microsoft kept saying that Windows NT was "similar" to VMS. So when we ran into various problems, I would look for Windows NT equivalents to familiar VMS utilities.
They weren't there.
And the five-foot-shelf of well-written, comprehensive, accurate documentation in China Red binders wasn't there.
And the source code on microfiche wasn't there.
I have no doubt that in some core internal details the two systems were similar, but at the level of the ordinary user AND the ordinary system manager, VMS was far more mature. I miss VMS, and I miss Digital.
(I knew Digital... Digital was my friend... and Compaq, I mean HP, you're no Digital.)
It sounds like interesting and worthwhile work, but some of the projected benefits are silly and the projected risks are not discussed at all.
For example: "If a user's computer becomes infected, she could use the Rollback feature to go back to an arbitrary point in time prior to the infection and resume work there, deleting the subsequent work -- and the virus."
There are several reasons why that statement is idiotic.
1) This exact capability has, of course, been available for several years now, first as the commercial product GoBack, then as a built-in feature in Windows XP. (And it has done nothing substantial to solve the virus problem).
2) The breeziness with which the reporter acknowledges that using this capability would "delete the subsequent work" is astonishing. Most of us would not like losing one, two, or several days' work.
3) If you always were aware of the exact moment at which you acquired a virus, viruses would be a relatively small problem. The fact is, you don't know.
4) There's even a nonzero probability that in going back to a time when you did not have the virus that you might also be undoing security patches preventing you from acquiring new viruses.
The U. S. has had a good long run as global superpower, over half a century. The British Empire wasn't at its peak for that long.
"Waiting for the cool (technological) stuff" is one of a number of signs that the U. S. may be at about the peak of its power and influence, and a slight decline may have already started.
Computer technology is not a secret, and all the manufacturing is now being done overseas. We should not be surprised that the U.S. is no longer the dominant innovator.
The U. S. is no longer the dominant winner of Nobel prices in the sciences, either.
I am starting to see signs of Japanese cultural influence in the U. S. "Hello Kitty" merchandise, anime, etc. After years in which the rest of the world bought Jordache blue jeans and watched "I Love Lucy" and "Miami Vice," I think the tide is starting to turn there, too.
...so can someone post a URL from which I can download the smell? (.wma format preferred)
Best quote in the article:
"You take away oversight - someone will steal. I guarantee it."
That makes sense to me. It seems to me that it ought to make sense to anyone, at any wavelength on the political spectrum.
One more media category that Best Buy, Circuit City, Staples, etc. will need to find room for on their shelves, in among the DVD+RW and the DVD-R and the Music CD-Rs and the Data CD-RW's and the Type 4 DVD-RAM and the Type 2 DVD-RAM and the Type 1 DVD-RAM and the "printable-but-not-by-inkjet" DVD's and the "inkjet-printable" DVD's.
I wonder what category of media they will kick out in order to make room for it? And what devices will start to become effectively orphaned as once-easily-obtained media become increasingly hard to find?
As others have pointed out, a truly black screen wouldn't reflect the projector's light. And, conversely, a screen that is able to reflect the red, green, and blue light from the projector will reflect some of the ambient light, which contains some light at the projector's R, G, and B wavelengths. It's too bad the article has to describe it as "Gee whiz! it's technological magic!"...
What we need to know is: a) what percentage of white, ambient room light does the screen reflect? It's not zero, and the screen probably looks like a dark grey. b) When the projector is projecting "white" light, what fraction of that light is reflected? Not only is it less than 100%, it's probably less than a white screen would reflect.
Other things one would like to know are whether the filters that do this magic cause any visible graininess, and over what angle the reflected light is reflected.
So much of this discussion seems to present this as an either-or. Why should we have to choose? Why was it necessary to break compatibility in order to provide basic security? And what, exactly, about these changes is making things break?
Why should things like "The Messenger service is now disabled by default" or "new RPC restrictions" break very many applications?
How many ordinary consumer applications (as opposed to specially-written corporate applications which should have a team of programmers to keep things up-to-date) are relying on RPC, or the Messenger service?
Are so many ordinary applications doing spyware-like, product-activation-like, phone-home-like thingies over the Internet?
A single aspirin-sized pellet of U-235 could power your laptop for 20,000 years. No wimpy Centrinos, but a big honkin' full-strength 43.8-watt Pentium IV. The ability to burn DVD's directly, and I do mean burn. A simple 20-pound lead plate integral with the back of the case provides your lap with thermal and other protection, as well as looking cool. Waste disposal? No problem, nobody's going to throw one away when it still has 19,997 years of useful life in it.
...if we had some eggs."
It's just like that old joke. If Linux came from Minix, and if Minix came from Unix, then SCO might have some eggs. But since Linux didn't come from Minix and Minix didn't come from Unix, SCO has shit.
(shrug) I happened to find the FAQ at Gateway's website, but an identical FAQ can be found on Microsoft's own website here. The section entitled "Recorded TV File Format" says that Media Center can't be changed to use any other format, that the format can't be convert, can't be played with any other software, can't be edited even with WIndows Movie Maker "at this time." It doesn't say what the date of "at this time" is, and it doesn't give any URL for updates.
I suspect that Microsoft knows the capabilities of its own products.
Are these products that Google locates that are said to be compatible with DVR-MS products that Microsoft has approved, or are they reverse-engineered hacks? Are they actually available, tested, and working, or are they "futures?" And is Microsoft committed to interoperability of DVR-MS or could they keep mutating the file format, much as Apple is doing with iTunes DRM-protected AAC?
Consumers are not being told which devices do and which don't contain DRM and therefore there is no opportunity for marketplace discipline to occur. By the time consumers understand what is happening, every new device will have DRM and it will be too late to "vote with your dollars."
I recently saw a full-page ad in the Boston Globe for a Gateway (remember? the company that ran TV ads a year ago saying they support my fair-use rights to music) for something called a Media Center PC. My wife was interested and asked me to look into it. Go here and click on "What can I do with Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004" and it says:
"Watch your favorite shows, whenever you want. Record a single episode or capture an entire series. You can also watch a previously recorded show while recording a live TV program. With the new Media Center 2004, you're able to record a TV show directly to a DVD so you can start your own DVD collection or take it on the road and watch it late."
Only if you go here , click on ">FAQ" and scroll way down do you learn some relevant details:
"Media Center uses a new file format called DVR-MS... Q. Can the file format used by Media Center be changed? A. No... Q. Can [they] be converted to another video format? A. At this time, [no]. Q. Can I edit Recorded TV files? A. Currently, [no].
Q. Does Windows® Movie Maker support the Media Center file format? A. [Not at this time]."
"Q. What is content protection and how is it used by Media Center? A. Content owners and/or broadcasters can set copy protection flags to indicate that a program is subject to content protection. When Media Center detects that this flag is set, it will protect the content by limiting the ability to copy and distribute the program. Q. Can protected Recorded TV files be watched on another PC? A. No... Q. Can protected Recorded TV files be played back on the same Media Center PC using Media Player 9 or other DirectShow-enabled applications? A. No... Q.
Can I record a TV show to my hard drive and then to a DVD using my DVD-R and play it on my home DVD player? A. No..."
Since few programs are currently using the broadcast flag, few consumers will discover these limitations either before they buy it or during the period when they could conceivably return it. DRM is currently in stealth mode. Like a virus that doesn't release its payload until it has infected many PCs, over the next five years millions of consumers will buy devices with DRM and not even know it. Then, suddenly, media companies will start turning on their protection flags and it will be too late to do anything about it.
When I asked direct questions to Gateway representatives about whether I could "use it like a VCR or DVD recorder to record my favorite shows on DVDs" they assured me that I could. Essentially the reps seemed to know about the "what you can do" paragraph I quoted above, but not about the "funny file format" and "content protection" issues I summarized below.
_I_ for one read do, goddamit, read privacy statements, and the dark-grey-on-light-grey fine print on the back of auto rental agreements, and so forth. I read whatever I sign. OK, sometimes I skim it pretty quickly if there is a long line behind me.
Is the court saying that what I do doesn't count, since most people don't read them? (Sorta like the FDA saying that it's OK for fish to have higher levels of mercury than other foods because most people don't eat that much fish...)
Does this mean that whenever I get one of these fine-print things I now need to ask someone at the airline, bank, etc. to initial a statement saying that they have seen me read it and understand that I am expecting them to live up to it?
...why, oh, why, oh WHY does everything that ought to be a simple, functional device end up as a bloated mass of featuritis with a clunky user interface, a 250-page manual... and the ability to accept and automatically execute executable content?
There is no rationale reason whatsoever why a cell phone needs to be susceptible to viruses.
What next? Digital cameras that are capable of updating their firmware by photographing the screen of the vendor's website... that will be infested by virus code which somebody smuggles onto the Jumbotron screen at a football game?
Well, mod me down if I'm wrong, but I'm assuming that in order to play traditional CD's and DVD's the units will need to have two different lasers in them.
Because the public will insist on backward compatibility initially, the units produced for the first ten years or so will all have them. Then, when blue-wavelength DVD's have become popular enough that virtually all new DVD and CD purchases are blue formats with DRM, they'll introduce single-wavelength machines.
Up to now, this would have been difficult to do. It would have taken true perversity on the part of a manufacturer to produce, say, a player that would ONLY play SACD or DVD-A disks. Since the actual cost of a unit that ALSO plays traditional CD's is virtually the same, any manufacturer that tried to do that would face competitors willing to sell a CD-capable unit that is similarly price. Same price, also plays CD's, which will consumers choose?
But once we have a new standard with a different laser wavelength, once a manufacturer dares to jumps in with a blue-only, DRM-only unit, competitors will NOT be able to make a legacy-capable unit at the same price, because they'll have the cost of a second laser to play the legacy media.
And that is how the all-DRM era will begin.
Wikipedia is another example of open-source-like methods being applied to a non-software area. Only time will tell exactly how successful it is, of course.
OK, it's not just Clippy. But everything about Windows just screams that it was done by the sort of people that think Clippy was a good idea.
...and, indeed Clippy, which Microsoft now seems to believe they never invented.
.NET is the solution to DLL hell. And just where did that DLL hell come from in the first place? Did the devil make them do it?
Everything in Windows feels like it has a hidden agenda. Instead of being done some simple way for some straightforward purpose, everything there has some other purpose as well. Clippy isn't there to really help me, it's there for the purpose of producing an impressive demo that looks like lots of help is available.
Are the menus in Word different every release because of UI research that shows that each is an improvement on the last arrangement? Or are they they to reassure some manager that he or she is truly in charge now so and has the power to put the menu commands where they happen to like them.
Every new improvement feels as if its there 40% for the purpose of providing real convenience and functionality and 60% there for the purpose of promoting a technology in which Microsoft has a vested interest... or to undercut a rival... or to lock you in.
When I use Windows, I feel as if I'm being sold something all the time, every time, and I need to waste a lot of psychic energy keeping up my sales resistance.
And there's all the effort of trying to forget all the stuff that I was sold two years ago that has now been dumped and that Microsoft wishes I would forget. Active Desktop, Back Office, digital_nervous_system...
And all the wonderful new solutions that we're supposed to admire, not noticing that they are solutions to problems Microsoft created.
There's just nothing there that seems to have the pure purpose of pleasing me or making my computing life
genuinely easier.
Other will have different perceptions. These are mine, and these are why I use Windows only in situations where I have no real choice.
...programmable either, because it could only store about twenty program steps.
Those twenty program steps sure seemed handy at the time, though.
1) Find 1939 article on "Leica photography composition tips"
2) Change "Leica" to "Digital"
3) ?????
4) Profit!
P. S. For best results, use Digital Kodak Verichrome Film and process in Digital-76 developer.
...you can clearly see Noah's Ark perched about three-quarters of the way up.
And the skeleton of a dove.
Copy should be control-alt-caps-lock-tilde. Paste should be escape-escape-shift-F6 and click the first and fourth mouse buttons. This pastes in two copies, which is what I usually want. If, for some reason, I only want one copy, then after I pasteI just press PgDn on the numeric keypad with NumLock on, then hit SysRq twice in rapid succession (usually, within half a second). This conveniently deletes the second copy.
If your mouse has less than four buttons, it's broken. Get one with four buttons.
Simple. Clean. Logical. Convenient.
I like it this way so this is the right way.. I know what I like, and that makes me a UI expert.
If anyone wants it any other way, well, let them set it as a non-default user preference. And if the preference isn't honored by every application, well, tough.
Cheka gems, NKVD gems, MVD gems and KGB gems.
Cue "in Soviet Russia" jokes...
just as with the Internet, it was the efforts of educational institutions that pioneered and gave birth to radio as we know it in the late 1920s and early 1930s. The communications act of 1934 was essentially a giveaway to commercial interests, but it did, however, state that the airwaves belong to the public--a commons, if you will, and it did, as part of the compromise, carve out some of the spectrum for educational broadcasting and create special educational licensing.
The commercial interests basically got their way. It is a crying shame that they can't be content with what they have and that they, and the FCC, are now pushing around little educational stations and generally acting as if the airwaves were private property.
And where is it written that all drivers need to reside in kernel space? Isn't this determined by the OS design, and isn't it a legitimate target for critique?
Why should buggy code in a device driver bring down the OS as a whole? Why should it affect anything but the operation of that specific device?
What is there, exactly, about a SCSI device that requires the specific driver for that specific device to have full, unrestricted access to space? Is it logically impossible to think of any other architecture at all?
Or is this a deliberate tradeoff of performance and convenience against stability?