Wether a software is commercial or not has nothing to do with wether a software is open source or not. The question is pointless. The question could be: Will and can open source software become so powerfull that the paradise of hermetric workstation software the 3D Application Vendors have is penetraded and they have to rethink their business model a bit? The answer is a clear "Yes". Blender - and this is what this discussion is all about - is forcing 3D app vendors to adjust their prices to sane numbers. This has allready taken direct effect with Softimage (softimage.com), Maya (alias.com) and Houdini (sidefx.com) (I'm to lazy to link, help yourself). Softimage has started a campaing called 3democracy and offers a substancial featureset of their XSI package for less than 500$, which is a pricedrop to 5% of what softimage used to cost. OSS and the competition is nibbeling at this market that is used to fanatic userbases paying insane prices. Everyone in the field will have to distinguish itself by price, performance, documentation and training. OSS or not. Blender is just speeding the process a little. This doesn't mean free (beer) and non-free (beer) can't coexist. I use blender (even bought a licence back then) since 1.8 and just bought a student licence of Lightwave because it has better docs and (better) features that blender doesn't and I need. I got it for 500. A licence for 1200 would've been to expensive for me and I would've stuck to blender. Now I got LW and am about to shell out 100$ aprox. for documentation and maybe the one or other training CD. I couldn't care less if LW where OSS or not. Do the math.
... can't be THAT difficult: GarageGames. Of course, it will take a few years and some buddies pithcing in at one time or the other, but in the end it isn't that much more difficult than building a good piece of software alltogether.
"You gotta be good at it, be patient and stick to it" - No, really?
If you wanna be a game designer, start now. Everything you need to build a game can be learned within a year by a skilled computer user and the tools nowadays cost a few hundred euros maximum. You won't build WoW of HalfLife3, because those need - most of all - huge man power. But you can build a good game. And have fun at it. You just have to do it.
Nice piece of humor. It would be nice if the rest of the Apache team gets the message and changes some things.
For the record: I've been professionally doing webstuff since 1999 and still haven't mastered Apache. It's noticeable at every end that it's concepts are 10 years old at least.
and so doesn't anyone here. A minimum of 2 and a max of about 4 portable USB Harddrives and daily overturnung backups, cronjobed. Take the current one with you and keep the remaining ones as spare, shrinkrapped and sealed. Anything else is ancient and/or pointless and/or a waste of time, money and resources. Unless you are backing up the bank of america this is the best solution I know. I recommend it to all my customers and it works with any OS and setup. I you look around you'll probably even find waterproof USB HDD cases. Add timer controlled power to them and they'll even be safe if they get in contact with water. Backing up over the web is time consuming and unsecure if it's any more than a few tables and spreadsheets. Even burining DVDs or CDs is silly compared to this, allthough those might even be more water proof.
The Truth being that this is nothing but the utter proof that US americans are - when it comes to anything remotely related to sex - exemplaric type A nutcases. Pardon my generalization, but you know what I mean. I'm not US bashing here. Every nation has it's loony slants. Such as germans with their 'no-speedlimit' policy not matter how many people die in traffic each year. But a game showing violence and promoting violent behaviour and being nothing but a ultra-gory hackfest such as Doom 3 hardly raises an eyebrow, while this hidded "sex mode" (that show a man fully dressed having sex) makes it into congress is nothing but silly. Bottom line: Pure and utter bizar US loonyness at work. Nothing special. Move along.
Since the screenshot is fake and the text describes getting gold by hopping in and out of a loadable area (the bugs description would mean a very basic, 1st grade programming error) this is nothing but someone trying to DDOS Blizzards gameservers by getting lots of people hopping back and forth over loading barriers. Move along and spread the word in the forums. When I'm playing tonight, I don't want the server brought down by a bunch of sheep hopping in and out of load-instances.
That's what this is all about. If Longhorn is a bloated mess and comes with utter sillyness such as "monitor DRM" that requires you to buy a new monitor (remember the MS keyboard? Keyboard manufacturers were crawling up MS' ass to be able to build and sell them) then the hardware vendors will hail Longhorn as the best OS ever. And be happy to sell you the great hardware you need to honor this OS. That's what this is all about. I hope they screw this one up.
How about fixing your crappy OS security model and the crappierst of Mailers on the Planet, Outlook?
I have a month-old business, personal-handout-only E-Mail address, and allready spam is rolling in. It's because my business partners all use Outlook, which is near by default riddled with Spambots, Contact-grabbers and whatnot because of this shitpile of software those f*ckers over at redmond farted onto their harddisks.
MSses bullshitting policy couldn't care me less as long as they don't bug me with their crap. But spam popping up left, right and center once Jon Doe has your mailaddress on his box is NOTHING BUT MICROSOFTS FAULT!
Heavens, this issue gets me so pumped I want to go to Redmond and chop of heads ALL the time. That would be sweet.
There are these kind of youths around. It wasn't just the c64 days were kids could grasp computers. I bumped into one on the tram 2 years back. He was about to dive into Visual Basic. I talked him into Python and Linux. 4 weeks later he was up and running SuSE and soon after that Debian. He's allready done an internship with my business, is better than I at handling Linux and recently programmed an application that is about to become a cornerstone of our business. It was his first Java programm. The point is, that whenever you bump into these kids and teens, we have to get them aware of the light side of the force. I'm shure this girl would rock doint OSS stuff aswell. But now it could be that won't come across it any time soon.
No big deal. Why? This is, of course, the only real next evolutionary step in keyboards. This is so obvious that it only was a matter of time until it went gold. I have an entire collection of PC input devices - from macro keyboards over special joysticks that cost an insane amount of money to the very first Wacom ArtPad, optical trackball and optical mouse. It has been clear to me for a very long time that this is what I'm waiting for. Glad it's there now. In ten years all keyboards will be like this one. That's the simple truth. If I had had the money, I would've come up with this piece of hardware myself. This one looks like a real good implementation of the concept. One that the concept deserves. I hope for them they make a fortune.
--> crappiest default mailer ever concieved by living entities (Outlook) with potential to spoil email for ever by allowing spambots to grap 3rd party mailadresses and introducing extremely bad mailing habbits by default (thread breaking and fullquoting)
--> insecure by design, crappy intsable OS, still needs a lot of basic work before its ready for the desktop
--> letting everyday users to this windows is a security threat to the entire internet; not only is windows not ready for the desktop, it should be prohibited by law to use it with internet connection unless you've got a special licence in windows-patching
--> held and developed by a single company only, large potential for vendor lock-in, supplier has a proven track record of hating cooperation, disliking open source and pulling ilegal tricks Ergo: Absolutely no go for business scenarios.
--> proven, extremly bad and instable server performance; not viable as a server system either.
--> windows remote operation and remote system integration is two decades behind... it's really no server system
--> Kernel and GUI are to closely tied to make up for a usable desktop enviroment. Factually zero end user choice limit it's desktop capabilies further.
Bottom Line: Windows is usable only for the most non-critical tasks. It has a reputation as a gaming operating system (where stability and security aren't that critical) and may be a choice in stand-alone scenarious were certain windows-only applications are needed for data migration. But for real production or mission critical enviroments Windows is not qualified.
One educational system to beat them all ...
on
Improving Education?
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I've moved more than once a year in the first 20 years of my life and visited 5 different school systems alltogether. I've seen many education systems as a first hand experience. Top-Level ultra expensive private schools, reformistic primary school, integrated high school (with school uniform, corporal punishment and the whole sheebang), etc. The last school I attended was a waldorf school (wikipedia info not very detailed but feasable). I was there for the last few years of my school time. In my first hand experience the anthroposophical waldorf education system beats any other hands down. It had concepts one hundred years ago that are considered "brand new stuff" (such as early second language education) by others today. The Epochal system makes learning fun and the results just stick. I rember our classes with tremendous detail. And, rumors to the contrary, their scientific education is top notch, often due to the pratical and experimental orientation of classes. Art is a core component (not just a nice extra) training social skills from the first day. Teachers usually are hard working idealists doing their best to aknowledge each individual pupil and supporting their talents. I mentioned their math classes in another comment the other day, which gives a clear picture of the general compentence of the waldorf system. My daugther attends waldorf school and the extra money it costs is more than worth it. And I live in germany where the education system is... errrm... was considered one of the better ones.
The truth is: Every improvement regular western school education has gone through within the last century allways was a step towards the waldorf way of doing things. It is my first hand experience that they are the bar for everything else.
Shrinkwrap Software only business is over. 50 Billion$ on the bank or not. That's the simple truth. Be it that MS will roll on with XBox 360, 720 or whatever. But their core milkcow is withering.
The CEO of MS having a sweet-little-nothings chinwag with one of his minions and hideously bullshitting 90% of the time won't change that.
You talk about lack of inovation and give openoffice as only example- an ex-commercial sad-and-sorry MS Office rippoff.
I'll give you some innovation in OSS:
Enlightenment Konqueror (and it's extensions) ogg flac Rox zshell Zope (you can hardly get any more innovative than that) Python Ruby blender (ok, so it wasn't OSS from the start, but it was free (beer) and the people who drove blender back then are the same that do it now, that's why I dare name it - and before you ask: It's Blenders Workspace Management that is to date unmatched by any application in existance. It's actually the successor to desktop-metaphor workspace.) verse, loqairou et al ( OK, so these are the rare things that are more innovative than Zope, they are the future of interface design and computer interaction and usage. I'd say ten years ahead. Go check if you don't believe me: www.quelsolaar.com/, http://www.uni-verse.org/Blender_Foundation.8.0.ht ml)
Bottom line: What you said is wrong in so many ways. The truth is, a lot or real high-end avantgarde innovation takes place in the OSS world. You just need to open your eyes and look around. But if your looking for innovation in openoffice your going to have a hard time, I'll promise you that.
If you're a company which wants to get some free source code to implement a complex feature set, but who doesn't want to have to share their enhancements, modifications, or any source code at all, then you'd probably like the BSD license better.
If it is THEIR code they can do with THEIR code WHATEVER THEY FRICKING WANT!. They can release every odd iteration under the GPL, every straight one under BSD, printout every tenth on every billboard on the planet, lock every 100th away in a vault and require people who want to look at it to chop their right arm off and sell their soul to the devil. IT IS THEIR CODE! THEY ABSOLUTAMENTE 0W|/|Z0R3D IT! They decide.
If I decide tomorrow the GPL sucks, I just don't publish any further developement under the GPL. If you want that feature I've developed after that you'll have to pay 10 000$ for each CPU using it and won't see a single line of code. And you won't be able to do anything about it. It is my code and my call under which licence I give it to you. Allthough you may go to sf.net and download the last GPLd iteration. But then you must comply with the GPL. It's that simple. Understand?
I'm reading here that people think once you've licenced your code under the GPL you have to GPL everything all the time. That's wrong. If the code is mine, I can do with it whatever I want whenever I want to do it. I can release v1 of myTool as GPL, use the codebase to develop v2 which is completely non-gpl. It is my code, and as long as no one else has commited GPL code to myTool v1 (or I prevent mixing of mine and his) I can drop the GPL like a bad habbit. I just can't withdraw what I've allready published as GPL code. The big and important part about the GPL is that you can't take OSS code, close it and redistribute it without the source without violating the GPL. That is the main reason for enterprises to choose GPL over BSD. Your competitors can't unhook you, they must cooperate if they use your code for their products. That's why GPL is better for enterprises than BSD licencing.
The bottom line to all this licence discussion is that 99% of the time people don't give a hoot about software licences. They just apply common sense and fairness. Which usually is the right thing to do.
The last few years of school I went to waldorf school. We actually learned to use log tables (still got my table book here) and calculators were forbidden. We'd draw roots using them and all. The reasoning was that anyone can keypunch but understanding what log actually mean is a differn't thing and requires getting your hands dirty. It was at that time when I started programming on my first computer - a PC 1402 Sharp Pocket Computer. Amongst my friends I was the only one that actually understood what these symbols really meant.
I'm gratefull for our teachers taking us that way. I'd actually do the same. Once you've really understood what logs are all about (and when you do your A levels with log tables you have understood what they're about) tackeling larger math problems is a piece of cake.
Take this advice: If you have kids, don't let them near/use an electronic calculator to early. Give them log tables or a slide ruler. It's the best was to learn higher math.
The shift you describe is called the "platonic worldyear" by astrologist and is taken into account with the so-called 'ayanamsa correction'. By professional astrologers that is. It is also utter nonsense that astrologers no nothing about astronomy. The opposite is true. In fact, every good astrologer I know (at least two) is nothing less an expert in astronomy aswell. And actually followed the temple mission with great interrest. I'd go so far as to say it is near impossible to become a good astrologer without expert knowledge in astronomy. And - in a way - vice versa.
By the way: You can recognize professional astrologers that deserve the name in that they usually don't make prognoses.
Last but not least: One of the most impressive open source tools for astrologists - astrolog - which was designed by a professional astrologer, is used by professional astronomers aswell. So much for astrologers being 'morons'.
... but heavens crickey this is an impressive heap of bullcrap that even exceeds the rumors. What was it that made him so famous? He programmed some badly designed mail tool, ignores bugfixes that deal with critical problems in it, calls himself ESR and is a type A redneck with opinions that make GW Bush appear like a hippie. And people still take his mental droppings for granted? I don't get it. But then again, this is slashdot, so I guess I don't have to understand.:-)
I set up a fresh workstation PC for my mother barely a year ago. New Linux compliant components, a top grade Asus Mobo, Infineon RAM, a nice case, etc. Time was getting short and I in the last moment I decided to screw Linux and install Win2K to avoid the driver setup hassle and have her a more stable DVD playback. (turns out that was pointless, since Win2k had more driver hassle than Linux later on) The first time it went onto the internet was across a brand new 56 anaog modem. I swear it was less than 15 Minutes when the first addware started to pop up - and we just had gone online for a very short period to test her mail account. My mother emphasised a clear "No go" and I felt the very same way. I went to the next convienience store, got a copy of Aurox (a european/polish magazine fedora-variant Linux distro) and installed it right away. I still use Win2K for the occasional task that can only be done with it, but I don't do anything mission critical with it anymore. Since 4 weeks ago my Mom has a Mac Mini (the PC had untracable power issues) and is happier than ever before. Bottom line: Mac to get the job done, x86 Debian or Ubuntu Linux for cheap PC workhorses/servers/tinkerboxes/old-hardware-recycl ing. Anything else I can't take serious anymore.
Slashdot Mirror
Wether a software is commercial or not has nothing to do with wether a software is open source or not. The question is pointless.
The question could be:
Will and can open source software become so powerfull that the paradise of hermetric workstation software the 3D Application Vendors have is penetraded and they have to rethink their business model a bit?
The answer is a clear "Yes". Blender - and this is what this discussion is all about - is forcing 3D app vendors to adjust their prices to sane numbers. This has allready taken direct effect with Softimage (softimage.com), Maya (alias.com) and Houdini (sidefx.com) (I'm to lazy to link, help yourself). Softimage has started a campaing called 3democracy and offers a substancial featureset of their XSI package for less than 500$, which is a pricedrop to 5% of what softimage used to cost. OSS and the competition is nibbeling at this market that is used to fanatic userbases paying insane prices. Everyone in the field will have to distinguish itself by price, performance, documentation and training. OSS or not. Blender is just speeding the process a little.
This doesn't mean free (beer) and non-free (beer) can't coexist. I use blender (even bought a licence back then) since 1.8 and just bought a student licence of Lightwave because it has better docs and (better) features that blender doesn't and I need. I got it for 500. A licence for 1200 would've been to expensive for me and I would've stuck to blender. Now I got LW and am about to shell out 100$ aprox. for documentation and maybe the one or other training CD. I couldn't care less if LW where OSS or not.
Do the math.
...the only existing professional 2D design/drawing/layout pakage on Linux?
I've been doing professional work with Corel Draw 9 for Linux - the Programm still is a first class industrial heavyweigth in the field. And it's a crying shame it's not available anymore.
So does this Inkscape release compete in some way?
Anybody with a clue about professional software care to provide expertise?
BTW: Slashdotters who've never delivered a professional print or foil-cutting job needn't even think about replying to this question.
... can't be THAT difficult: GarageGames.
Of course, it will take a few years and some buddies pithcing in at one time or the other, but in the end it isn't that much more difficult than building a good piece of software alltogether.
"You gotta be good at it, be patient and stick to it" - No, really?
If you wanna be a game designer, start now. Everything you need to build a game can be learned within a year by a skilled computer user and the tools nowadays cost a few hundred euros maximum. You won't build WoW of HalfLife3, because those need - most of all - huge man power. But you can build a good game. And have fun at it. You just have to do it.
Nice piece of humor.
It would be nice if the rest of the Apache team gets the message and changes some things.
For the record: I've been professionally doing webstuff since 1999 and still haven't mastered Apache. It's noticeable at every end that it's concepts are 10 years old at least.
Windows Fister - Guess what we're gonna do to you today.
LOL. Just great.
SCNR
and so doesn't anyone here.
A minimum of 2 and a max of about 4 portable USB Harddrives and daily overturnung backups, cronjobed. Take the current one with you and keep the remaining ones as spare, shrinkrapped and sealed. Anything else is ancient and/or pointless and/or a waste of time, money and resources.
Unless you are backing up the bank of america this is the best solution I know. I recommend it to all my customers and it works with any OS and setup. I you look around you'll probably even find waterproof USB HDD cases. Add timer controlled power to them and they'll even be safe if they get in contact with water.
Backing up over the web is time consuming and unsecure if it's any more than a few tables and spreadsheets.
Even burining DVDs or CDs is silly compared to this, allthough those might even be more water proof.
The Truth being that this is nothing but the utter proof that US americans are - when it comes to anything remotely related to sex - exemplaric type A nutcases. Pardon my generalization, but you know what I mean.
I'm not US bashing here. Every nation has it's loony slants. Such as germans with their 'no-speedlimit' policy not matter how many people die in traffic each year.
But a game showing violence and promoting violent behaviour and being nothing but a ultra-gory hackfest such as Doom 3 hardly raises an eyebrow, while this hidded "sex mode" (that show a man fully dressed having sex) makes it into congress is nothing but silly.
Bottom line:
Pure and utter bizar US loonyness at work. Nothing special. Move along.
Since the screenshot is fake and the text describes getting gold by hopping in and out of a loadable area (the bugs description would mean a very basic, 1st grade programming error) this is nothing but someone trying to DDOS Blizzards gameservers by getting lots of people hopping back and forth over loading barriers.
Move along and spread the word in the forums.
When I'm playing tonight, I don't want the server brought down by a bunch of sheep hopping in and out of load-instances.
That's what this is all about.
If Longhorn is a bloated mess and comes with utter sillyness such as "monitor DRM" that requires you to buy a new monitor (remember the MS keyboard? Keyboard manufacturers were crawling up MS' ass to be able to build and sell them) then the hardware vendors will hail Longhorn as the best OS ever. And be happy to sell you the great hardware you need to honor this OS.
That's what this is all about.
I hope they screw this one up.
How about fixing your crappy OS security model and the crappierst of Mailers on the Planet, Outlook?
I have a month-old business, personal-handout-only E-Mail address, and allready spam is rolling in. It's because my business partners all use Outlook, which is near by default riddled with Spambots, Contact-grabbers and whatnot because of this shitpile of software those f*ckers over at redmond farted onto their harddisks.
MSses bullshitting policy couldn't care me less as long as they don't bug me with their crap. But spam popping up left, right and center once Jon Doe has your mailaddress on his box is NOTHING BUT MICROSOFTS FAULT!
Heavens, this issue gets me so pumped I want to go to Redmond and chop of heads ALL the time. That would be sweet.
There are these kind of youths around. It wasn't just the c64 days were kids could grasp computers.
I bumped into one on the tram 2 years back. He was about to dive into Visual Basic. I talked him into Python and Linux. 4 weeks later he was up and running SuSE and soon after that Debian.
He's allready done an internship with my business, is better than I at handling Linux and recently programmed an application that is about to become a cornerstone of our business. It was his first Java programm.
The point is, that whenever you bump into these kids and teens, we have to get them aware of the light side of the force. I'm shure this girl would rock doint OSS stuff aswell. But now it could be that won't come across it any time soon.
No big deal.
Why?
This is, of course, the only real next evolutionary step in keyboards. This is so obvious that it only was a matter of time until it went gold. I have an entire collection of PC input devices - from macro keyboards over special joysticks that cost an insane amount of money to the very first Wacom ArtPad, optical trackball and optical mouse. It has been clear to me for a very long time that this is what I'm waiting for. Glad it's there now.
In ten years all keyboards will be like this one. That's the simple truth.
If I had had the money, I would've come up with this piece of hardware myself. This one looks like a real good implementation of the concept. One that the concept deserves.
I hope for them they make a fortune.
Prime Reasons, no specific order:
... it's really no server system
--> crappiest default mailer ever concieved by living entities (Outlook) with potential to spoil email for ever by allowing spambots to grap 3rd party mailadresses and introducing extremely bad mailing habbits by default (thread breaking and fullquoting)
--> insecure by design, crappy intsable OS, still needs a lot of basic work before its ready for the desktop
--> letting everyday users to this windows is a security threat to the entire internet; not only is windows not ready for the desktop, it should be prohibited by law to use it with internet connection unless you've got a special licence in windows-patching
--> held and developed by a single company only, large potential for vendor lock-in, supplier has a proven track record of hating cooperation, disliking open source and pulling ilegal tricks
Ergo: Absolutely no go for business scenarios.
--> proven, extremly bad and instable server performance; not viable as a server system either.
--> windows remote operation and remote system integration is two decades behind
--> Kernel and GUI are to closely tied to make up for a usable desktop enviroment. Factually zero end user choice limit it's desktop capabilies further.
Bottom Line:
Windows is usable only for the most non-critical tasks. It has a reputation as a gaming operating system (where stability and security aren't that critical) and may be a choice in stand-alone scenarious were certain windows-only applications are needed for data migration. But for real production or mission critical enviroments Windows is not qualified.
I've moved more than once a year in the first 20 years of my life and visited 5 different school systems alltogether. I've seen many education systems as a first hand experience. Top-Level ultra expensive private schools, reformistic primary school, integrated high school (with school uniform, corporal punishment and the whole sheebang), etc. ... errrm ... was considered one of the better ones.
The last school I attended was a waldorf school (wikipedia info not very detailed but feasable). I was there for the last few years of my school time.
In my first hand experience the anthroposophical waldorf education system beats any other hands down. It had concepts one hundred years ago that are considered "brand new stuff" (such as early second language education) by others today.
The Epochal system makes learning fun and the results just stick. I rember our classes with tremendous detail. And, rumors to the contrary, their scientific education is top notch, often due to the pratical and experimental orientation of classes. Art is a core component (not just a nice extra) training social skills from the first day. Teachers usually are hard working idealists doing their best to aknowledge each individual pupil and supporting their talents. I mentioned their math classes in another comment the other day, which gives a clear picture of the general compentence of the waldorf system.
My daugther attends waldorf school and the extra money it costs is more than worth it. And I live in germany where the education system is
The truth is:
Every improvement regular western school education has gone through within the last century allways was a step towards the waldorf way of doing things.
It is my first hand experience that they are the bar for everything else.
That's what occured to me just watching.
Shrinkwrap Software only business is over. 50 Billion$ on the bank or not. That's the simple truth. Be it that MS will roll on with XBox 360, 720 or whatever. But their core milkcow is withering.
The CEO of MS having a sweet-little-nothings chinwag with one of his minions and hideously bullshitting 90% of the time won't change that.
You talk about lack of inovation and give openoffice as only example- an ex-commercial sad-and-sorry MS Office rippoff.
I'll give you some innovation in OSS:
Enlightenment
Konqueror (and it's extensions)
ogg
flac
Rox
zshell
Zope (you can hardly get any more innovative than that)
Python
Ruby
blender (ok, so it wasn't OSS from the start, but it was free (beer) and the people who drove blender back then are the same that do it now, that's why I dare name it - and before you ask: It's Blenders Workspace Management that is to date unmatched by any application in existance. It's actually the successor to desktop-metaphor workspace.)
verse, loqairou et al ( OK, so these are the rare things that are more innovative than Zope, they are the future of interface design and computer interaction and usage. I'd say ten years ahead. Go check if you don't believe me: www.quelsolaar.com/, http://www.uni-verse.org/Blender_Foundation.8.0.h
Bottom line:
What you said is wrong in so many ways. The truth is, a lot or real high-end avantgarde innovation takes place in the OSS world. You just need to open your eyes and look around.
But if your looking for innovation in openoffice your going to have a hard time, I'll promise you that.
Whatever you've smoked, please don't offer me anything of it.
Thank you for what will surely be the most intelligent post in this thread.
So sayeth one slashdot user to the other.
If you're a company which wants to get some free source code to implement a complex feature set, but who doesn't want to have to share their enhancements, modifications, or any source code at all, then you'd probably like the BSD license better.
If it is THEIR code they can do with THEIR code WHATEVER THEY FRICKING WANT!. They can release every odd iteration under the GPL, every straight one under BSD, printout every tenth on every billboard on the planet, lock every 100th away in a vault and require people who want to look at it to chop their right arm off and sell their soul to the devil. IT IS THEIR CODE! THEY ABSOLUTAMENTE 0W|/|Z0R3D IT! They decide.
If I decide tomorrow the GPL sucks, I just don't publish any further developement under the GPL. If you want that feature I've developed after that you'll have to pay 10 000$ for each CPU using it and won't see a single line of code. And you won't be able to do anything about it. It is my code and my call under which licence I give it to you. Allthough you may go to sf.net and download the last GPLd iteration. But then you must comply with the GPL. It's that simple. Understand?
I'm reading here that people think once you've licenced your code under the GPL you have to GPL everything all the time. That's wrong.
If the code is mine, I can do with it whatever I want whenever I want to do it. I can release v1 of myTool as GPL, use the codebase to develop v2 which is completely non-gpl. It is my code, and as long as no one else has commited GPL code to myTool v1 (or I prevent mixing of mine and his) I can drop the GPL like a bad habbit. I just can't withdraw what I've allready published as GPL code.
The big and important part about the GPL is that you can't take OSS code, close it and redistribute it without the source without violating the GPL. That is the main reason for enterprises to choose GPL over BSD. Your competitors can't unhook you, they must cooperate if they use your code for their products.
That's why GPL is better for enterprises than BSD licencing.
The bottom line to all this licence discussion is that 99% of the time people don't give a hoot about software licences. They just apply common sense and fairness. Which usually is the right thing to do.
The last few years of school I went to waldorf school. We actually learned to use log tables (still got my table book here) and calculators were forbidden.
We'd draw roots using them and all.
The reasoning was that anyone can keypunch but understanding what log actually mean is a differn't thing and requires getting your hands dirty. It was at that time when I started programming on my first computer - a PC 1402 Sharp Pocket Computer. Amongst my friends I was the only one that actually understood what these symbols really meant.
I'm gratefull for our teachers taking us that way. I'd actually do the same. Once you've really understood what logs are all about (and when you do your A levels with log tables you have understood what they're about) tackeling larger math problems is a piece of cake.
Take this advice: If you have kids, don't let them near/use an electronic calculator to early. Give them log tables or a slide ruler. It's the best was to learn higher math.
The shift you describe is called the "platonic worldyear" by astrologist and is taken into account with the so-called 'ayanamsa correction'. By professional astrologers that is.
It is also utter nonsense that astrologers no nothing about astronomy. The opposite is true. In fact, every good astrologer I know (at least two) is nothing less an expert in astronomy aswell. And actually followed the temple mission with great interrest.
I'd go so far as to say it is near impossible to become a good astrologer without expert knowledge in astronomy. And - in a way - vice versa.
By the way: You can recognize professional astrologers that deserve the name in that they usually don't make prognoses.
Last but not least: One of the most impressive open source tools for astrologists - astrolog - which was designed by a professional astrologer, is used by professional astronomers aswell. So much for astrologers being 'morons'.
I swear, that trail of argument could've come straight from the MS marketing dept. .
... but heavens crickey this is an impressive heap of bullcrap that even exceeds the rumors. :-)
What was it that made him so famous? He programmed some badly designed mail tool, ignores bugfixes that deal with critical problems in it, calls himself ESR and is a type A redneck with opinions that make GW Bush appear like a hippie. And people still take his mental droppings for granted?
I don't get it.
But then again, this is slashdot, so I guess I don't have to understand.
I set up a fresh workstation PC for my mother barely a year ago. New Linux compliant components, a top grade Asus Mobo, Infineon RAM, a nice case, etc. Time was getting short and I in the last moment I decided to screw Linux and install Win2K to avoid the driver setup hassle and have her a more stable DVD playback. (turns out that was pointless, since Win2k had more driver hassle than Linux later on)l ing. Anything else I can't take serious anymore.
The first time it went onto the internet was across a brand new 56 anaog modem. I swear it was less than 15 Minutes when the first addware started to pop up - and we just had gone online for a very short period to test her mail account.
My mother emphasised a clear "No go" and I felt the very same way. I went to the next convienience store, got a copy of Aurox (a european/polish magazine fedora-variant Linux distro) and installed it right away.
I still use Win2K for the occasional task that can only be done with it, but I don't do anything mission critical with it anymore. Since 4 weeks ago my Mom has a Mac Mini (the PC had untracable power issues) and is happier than ever before.
Bottom line:
Mac to get the job done, x86 Debian or Ubuntu Linux for cheap PC workhorses/servers/tinkerboxes/old-hardware-recyc