Ditch white headphones, switch to a single coiled silicone with a latex earplug. Put your finger on it every half a minute and mumble something. Add in dark glasses and a black suit. You'll never get mugged. Promise.
Errm, isn't the nature of CSS the answer to this?
on
CSS for the LDP?
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· Score: 1
Set up / define standard tag attributes and ask everybody involved to use them from now on. It should be more than 20 or 30 css classes. Keep the classes empty. Then let the designers lose on the styles. Don't, I repeat: DON'T waste a single second on CSS design. There are people who can to that better than any OSS admin. Trust me on that one.
I personally think it would be cool to have a set of styles to switch. Imagine LDP docs fitting your desktop theme. Which would be no problem if I had a set of classes I knew I could trust to be applied allready.:-)
Bottom line: If you use CSS as it is intended, this will be no problem whatsoever. I actually don't quite understand why you're asking the question anyway.
Without Microsoft, we wouldn't have had motivation for more than half of the stuff we have here today. Also, our gaming would be nowhere near as good as it is -- Take at Direct X for example.
OpenGL was way ahead of DX. Everybody and his brother in the gaming industry protested when MS said they did'nt give a damn and started to roll their own. Which came on par with OpenGL something around DX 4 or 5. In fact DX is a prime example for MS'es embrace and extend - even if it is at the _cost_ of inovation. OpenGL is heading for V.2 and it's behind DX only since the DX 7 days. V2 will catch up almost entirely again. Even though the OpenGL consortium has nearly zilch power in the gaming field nowadays. If MS had used and joined OpenGL, computer GFX optimization would be way further today. But I guess marketing-buzz weighs heavier than true innovation. You're statement actually proves the shareholders of MS right, in a way.
What would the world be like today if Daimler Benz had a de-facto monopoly on cars just like MS has a de-facto monopoly on Software? Right. A world free of MS: Think various flavors of DOS and various flavors of GUIs, something like a Geos 2004 (that would probably be better even that todays Aqua) and competitors and Apple would be smaller yet due to the lack of contrast it could provide in a truly free market. And we'd all have fun and a feeling of meaning to what we're doing: tinkering with computer stuff. Right now I only have that feeling when I'm working with Linux and am not forced to emulate a sick proprietary application or 'standard'.
Some people here think that MS forced innovation, but that's absolutely wrong in ever which way. They only managed the near impossible: Lock in a actually open plattform: the PC. And that did nothing but seriously stall inovation. SW Developement would be ten years ahead today. Think somethink like BeOS V.9.0 with a GUI burned onto a BiosChip that boots into GUI in 5 seconds flat. MS managed to lurr all vendors into the now-yet-more-crappyness upgrade mill promising everybody who joined big bucks. They made the biggest bucks. Curiously, I recall it started to become evident with the Windows Keyboard stunt. The Keyboard vendors kissed MS feet for having them sell new KBs.
No, look at it from the distance and it's absolutely evident: We have to programm every single bit of our stuff ourselves in order to reclaim a minimum of control that we had in the Amiga days. And Amiga was a proprietary Plattform!
In fact, if DRM/TCPA would get foothhold in a way that MS would like it, I'd aktually drop out of computing entirely - even though I've been with it since nearly 20 years and Sharp PC 1402 assembler. But hopefully that will never happen, since VIA and Transmeta would rejoice over a DRMing/TCPAing Intel and AMD. Thank God MS doesn't have control over the x86 hardware. Not yet at least.
This is not the last thing to happen in PC gaming. The gaming industry is one that can get away pretty easyly with a high throughput of titles, because gamers always want the new and shiny with more polygons. I expect the gaming industry to take a hit as soon as OSS gaming engines and tools like crystal space or Blender get a grip. We'll have games for free, the mod community utilizing them (they work for free allready) and the money will be made in providing not a game but the service around it: Servers, special distributions (just like Linux), gaming leagues, high quality mods, automatic online updates - think 'Loki Linux Installer' which makes maintaining UT under Linux easyer thatn under Windows - and other stuff like that. Closed Source Games are going to be the last thing to experience the OSS impact, but they're going to feel it nonetheless. In fact, this outsourcing thing is a shure sigh for a local industry to get moving into service rather than pushing for cheaper production. No way can anyone in Europe or the US outprogramm a slavic, indian or far-east programmer for the same amount of money. As soon as people hereabouts will get that, the pain will stop.
You've actually hit an unknown pride ...
on
Cebit 2004 Coverage
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· Score: 1
... and patriotisim spot on me:
You got it wrong. It's the largest IT fair in the _world_.
Things I consider interessting for foreign visitors to Hannover, if you have some time of you might want to check them out:
1) Food: "Das Pfannenkuchen Haus" in the city 'district' Calenberg. German style Pancakes and good german beer in original-stle potterware beermugs. And patented beer-scales. Go and see what I mean.:-)
2) Recreational: Herrenhauser Gaerten (The Herrenhaus Gardens): A large baroque style Garden complex north west of central Hannover. They've got opening times - check with the tourist information for details. Just before it are the Georgengarten and the university. Also good enough for a walk.
3) Maschsee. The towns semi-artificial lake. Runners and Skaters paradise. Right on the townside shore is the Sprengel Museum, specialised in modern Art. They have an large awesome Richard Deacon piece in their collection - if you're lucky it's in exibit.
3) A more quiet and comfortable shopping area is the pedestrian zone 'Lister Meile', leading straight north away from downtown. You can actually walk from 'Kroepcke' all the way under the Main Train Station all the way through a subterran mall to the 'Raschplatz' (some nice cinemas focues on more indepentent and european movies) all the way to 'Lister Tor', where the 'Lister Meile' starts. Here a lot of the old prewar buildings are still intact. Nice old europen town architecture here - could be interessting for people from the US.
5) Downtown itself. Kroepcke being the center, you'll notice all the crappy 70ties architecture around you. The old stuff was bombed during the 2nd world war. The opera is still intact though. If your standing at Kroepcke, the remaining old town is to the south, just behing that you'll find Calenberg and the afore mentioned 'Pfannenkuchen Haus'. All this in walking distance, conected by pedestrian zones.
Note that Hannover is a somewhat compact large city. You can reach each spot by bike in roughly half an hour. It's large enough to offer anything you can think of but small enough to be centralized. If you have access to a car you may want to take a ride south, something like 40-50 kilometers you'll come to the norhtern outskirts of the Harz 'Mountains'. Some very nice medieval castles in that area (again, cool for RPG afiliated geeks, US visitors and... everybody else aswell actually), and a freeckimbing area too (The 'Ith' ridge).
Have a nice time in Hannover.
I studied in Hannover. It's a very nice City and I miss it (I currently reside in Krefeld, west germany) which is the crappiest town of the country and is world second only to Bombay in terms of dirtyness.
Ok, folks. Now that MS is going to drop out of the 1st league in a measurable amount of time (estimate: ~2 years) I think it's time to declare SuSE enemy and honor it with the title 'prime slashdot target numero uno', moving MS to position two. I for my part want a borg cameleon and an automatic +3 insightfull for every rant about SuSE lock-in behaviour plus an extra 'SuSE sucks, Debian rulez' subject on/. And lengthy rant.. err... reviews of even the slightes bug in YaST that the/. editors can come up with.
I'll make a start on the comenting side:
SuSE sucks because they use RPM and only look at the money that comes from sleek boxing of products. Debian apt-get is much more superior. How long will customers put up with this SuSE crap?
(The joke been made, I'd like to add that SuSE migrated me and that they're my fist recomendation for every Linux n00b)
...I'm just wondering when they're going to openly admit that to themselves and the public. For years I've been wondering why Microsoft doesn't join the corporate fray of OSS, on the way mixing it with their branding and doing a branding variant of the 'embrace and extend' thing they're into. After all, nobody gave a damn about licensing until MS started ranting about the GPL being anti-american and at the same time screwing up their licensing as to piss everybody off.
Anyway, I've narrowed in on some optinal answers to this question: 1) MS is to big, slow and stupid and the chiefs are to Windows-focused that they don't see the light. --I don't think this is the real truth. It fits into a typical MS rant and would fit to a megacorporation the size of MS, but considering that they actually are a software company, and a quite succesfull one I think this answer is to simple.
2) MS couldn't care less. Even if they only hopp on in 2 years from now when they've milked the last proprietary cow, they'll just throw in a few billion, by the one or other Linux company, mix in a little DirectX and Exchange for Linux and squish RH, SuSE and Madrake along the way. --This seems more likely. But then again, if that's their plan, they would have started this much earlier. And I dont think they could gain foothold any more, neither now or 2 years from now.
3) The MS revenue stream relys so much on markting hype and exclusive Windows branding that MS has no other choice than to take up the fight, even if they're going to lose in the end anyway. They'd rather shoot themselves than admit that OSS has them by the balls and start an ordered retreat out of the proprietary software market in the long run. Taking every money they can get on the way and pushing forth into embedded and home entertainment systems. --I would think this to be the best answer. Yet even this way it's a dead end for MS as a monopoly. No way in hell can they stand up to a Sony & Matsushita tag team who've just decided to use Linux as their prime embeded system for home entertainment - because it's cheaper and has less lock-in.
Either way you put it, MS as the master-blaster-of-all-things-Computer is done with. They'll either manage to get the curve into a major service and embeded vendor and strengthen their strong branding in that area or they're going to end up like Commodore or something simular. My 2 Eurocents.
It's similat to computer spell checkers. Ever since people started relying on these, their spelling has gone way downhill simly because they don't bother thinking.... Computer do all the spelling for them. They don;t need a spell checker.... This si even worse. what the user means, get get it wrong half tyhe time.... etc.
Well, I can't say whether or not you're using a spellchecker (i'd guess not) but I'd bet my right arm your spelling couldn't get any worse if you did. I strongly suggest you try one.
If you're german, I don't quite see where your problem is. The new law explicitly _permits_ copying for private use if the source of the copy is legal. On top of that, it even explicitly _excludes_ market-restriction-technologies (Marktbeschraenkungsmassnahmen) from protection by the new law! Apart from the fact that this law is designed by politicians who all over the world won't get that there is no thing as 'digital copy protection'and that that in fact is a contradiction in term and has no place in the plaintext of a law, I find the new german law not all that bad. There were just to many tech-savy people and german jurists stating that a german DMCA would be impercise, technically false and unconstitutional. This luckyly prevented the goverment from releasing the piece of crap their first draft was into the wild. The law needs a serious redoo, no doubt, and it should have never be released, like lot's of other crap our politicians come up with these days, but what you're planning to do is currently perfectly legal nonetheless. Borrow your CDs from the local library or a friend or close relative and make a private copy to your iPod. Voila. As long as you don't trade online or with others and don't play your collection in public your not breaking any current german law.
Having a non-professional review computer stuff. (Am I'm not trying to offend anyone here - on the contrary) Example:"Available in a number of "flavors," Linux isn't perfect." Not: "Vendor support for Linux has room for improvement" or "x86 downsides become more apparent with Linux" Or: "Mac still rules Unix usability. And any other usability." I just had a chat 15 minutes ago with a guy that sells Windows boxen for small business and he seemed to know his way around computers (read: Windows PCs). He said that he expects Microsoft to buy Linux any time soon. I'm to bedazzeled and amazed experiencing the view of things some people have on this whole Linux/OSS/Computing issue to make jokes about it. I'm not a Mac user but I wonder what this guy would say if he where to test a mac. Probably that would be 'close to perfect' or something. I remember spending some time looking for a burn software on a G4 only to then notice that you just have to eject the CDR on which you dropped your stuff in order for the 'Shall I burn this for you?' Widget to pop up. If you ask me, this whole OSS migration taking so long is entirely just about people being used to certain stuff and having a hard time switching. That's all. When I see what crap standard windows users go through every day that's the only explaination that seems reasonable.
To be honest, I don't give a damn if drivers are closed, open or whatnot, as long as they actually work and properly use the cards features. That the Nvidia drivers are tied to the kernel is anoying, but bearable since they actually do work. Nvidias Linux support has been next to none - they've got high karma with me. From ATI though, I've heard only negative stuff. Same from Matrox, whos Linux support seems to be an utter joke. Can anybody confirm or debunk this about the new ATI drivers?
Something like three years it was absolutely clear with *everyone* in the professional IT field that Linux/OSS would take off and soar. It went just as generally predicted, only did I lose a bet that Macromedia would have ported at least one app from the dreamteam to Linux within 2 years. And here is why they're to late for me to collect my dinner out: During the dot-bomb Flash was everybodys darling. There was no way you could design a solid site with predictable Layout behaviour without using flash. CSS was so crappy everyone just plain ignored it after playing with it for 2 hours. If you wanted a webdoc that was more than just a string of characters you had to use flash. Then came the bomb, the web grew up within 6 months flat, Flash was to crappy for solid client side apps and the remaining pros switched to functional sites, also ditching Dreamweavers template engine for the bazillion OSS CMSes popping up left right and center. In the mean time IE and Netscape 6.1/Mozilla finally fullfilled the promise CSS had been making for 5 years. That all together weighed in on MM. Flash lost big chunks of it's significance on a monthly basis. Nowadays Sites are cool and don't need no flash whatsoever. But here's a really interessting thing: I happend to work on a Rich Media Framework in Flash MX 2004 Pro. After 2.5 years ignoring it I was in pretty fast again. (Sidenote: Customer and Partners agreed to GPL it once the bills are payed!) I actually had to install Windows to do it. While the IDE still has the typical super-crappy anoying macromedia glitches and quirks in it, ActionScript 2 has become a full range PL. ECMA compliance, error handling, a stack of oreilly books for it and all. Rolling an XML controlled industry leading E-Learn-Player and Webpresentation framework was a piece of cake and took me and a guy I work with no more than 8 weeks. On top of that, Macromedia is getting a drift before anybody else in the app vendor field: Their newest product 'breeze', doesn't come in a box anymore. They sell it as a service! I presume that they saw income going down after the bomb and hushed and listend to the experts. I think there is a strong developers team with them that is seriously fed up with the crappy underlyings in their products (just like many of the professional customers) and that they have gotten a chance to call the shots. Not only is MM doing some very smart moves as a corp. right now, but a Flash MX 2k5 Pro for Linux would bring me right back onto their list. MM has had a steady revenue stream through nice packaging. Now that that doesn't work anymore, they're doing the next step. If I were to bet a fistfull of stockshares on a closed source software vendor, they'd be my first choice. Linux/OSS is rolling and there ain't no stopping it. And now that MM isn't everybody darling anymore they have to shape up and comply. All good news indeed.
For suckage-free OSS audio editing! Audio Editors don't get much attention. But when you need one it's so important to have one that does the basic stuff without a hinch and doesn't suck like the usual non-mainstream experimental OSS stuff that to often doesn't/didn't work as their teams like(d) to advertise. Audacity was the first one to work as advertised for me. It's one I gladly take to replace the usual suspects like cool edit. It was the first usable audio editor under Linux aswell. Thanks to the Audacity team for building this brick in the OSS builing and making it a good and reliable one. You rock! I could only wish for that any project or contribution to OSS I produce will be of equal significance.
SCO, mach einen Mucks und Du bist Geschichte! SCO, make one sound and you're history!
A much better one: (Re:thought experiment.)
on
Germany Muzzles SCO
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· Score: 1
Another thought experiment I've been waiting for in reality. I'd actually do this if i was the SCO Germany CEO - or try to at least.
Here it goes: By german law the CEO of a GmbH (a ldt. company) has to do everything to prevent serious damage to the companies assets, it property and health in general. That inculdes insubordinating orders given by the board of holders!. Especially if they would require actions in conflict with the law. If I were SCO Germany I would've pulled this PR stunt months ago: Publically stating that SCO germany does not comply whatsoever with the statements of SCO America concerning SCO IP in Linux, which up to date aren't prooven, and to prevent further damage by being recognized as a subsidary of SCO US SCO Germany has decided to change it's name to BHO (Bad Homburg Operation). That would be really cool.:-) And, on top of that, probably even be proven right in court.
Slashdot Mirror
...'Gee, Slashdot has some really interessting stuff today.'
LOL!
Ditch white headphones, switch to a single coiled silicone with a latex earplug. Put your finger on it every half a minute and mumble something.
Add in dark glasses and a black suit.
You'll never get mugged. Promise.
Set up / define standard tag attributes and ask everybody involved to use them from now on. It should be more than 20 or 30 css classes. Keep the classes empty. Then let the designers lose on the styles.
Don't, I repeat: DON'T waste a single second on CSS design. There are people who can to that better than any OSS admin. Trust me on that one.
I personally think it would be cool to have a set of styles to switch. Imagine LDP docs fitting your desktop theme. Which would be no problem if I had a set of classes I knew I could trust to be applied allready.:-)
Bottom line:
If you use CSS as it is intended, this will be no problem whatsoever. I actually don't quite understand why you're asking the question anyway.
Ok Folks, don't want to be picky, but just for your information, the name is:
Roentgen
Konrad Roentgen
He discovered the X-Ray, btw.
Curiously, they're called Roentgen-Rays (Roentgenstrahlen) in germany.
R o e n t g e n
Roentgen.
Closest pronounciation in english would be 'Rent-gen'. Make a hard 'g', like in 'gender'.
Without Microsoft, we wouldn't have had motivation for more than half of the stuff we have here today. Also, our gaming would be nowhere near as good as it is -- Take at Direct X for example.
OpenGL was way ahead of DX. Everybody and his brother in the gaming industry protested when MS said they did'nt give a damn and started to roll their own. Which came on par with OpenGL something around DX 4 or 5.
In fact DX is a prime example for MS'es embrace and extend - even if it is at the _cost_ of inovation. OpenGL is heading for V.2 and it's behind DX only since the DX 7 days. V2 will catch up almost entirely again. Even though the OpenGL consortium has nearly zilch power in the gaming field nowadays. If MS had used and joined OpenGL, computer GFX optimization would be way further today.
But I guess marketing-buzz weighs heavier than true innovation. You're statement actually proves the shareholders of MS right, in a way.
What would the world be like today if Daimler Benz had a de-facto monopoly on cars just like MS has a de-facto monopoly on Software?
Right.
A world free of MS: Think various flavors of DOS and various flavors of GUIs, something like a Geos 2004 (that would probably be better even that todays Aqua) and competitors and Apple would be smaller yet due to the lack of contrast it could provide in a truly free market. And we'd all have fun and a feeling of meaning to what we're doing: tinkering with computer stuff.
Right now I only have that feeling when I'm working with Linux and am not forced to emulate a sick proprietary application or 'standard'.
Some people here think that MS forced innovation, but that's absolutely wrong in ever which way. They only managed the near impossible: Lock in a actually open plattform: the PC. And that did nothing but seriously stall inovation.
SW Developement would be ten years ahead today. Think somethink like BeOS V.9.0 with a GUI burned onto a BiosChip that boots into GUI in 5 seconds flat.
MS managed to lurr all vendors into the now-yet-more-crappyness upgrade mill promising everybody who joined big bucks. They made the biggest bucks. Curiously, I recall it started to become evident with the Windows Keyboard stunt. The Keyboard vendors kissed MS feet for having them sell new KBs.
No, look at it from the distance and it's absolutely evident: We have to programm every single bit of our stuff ourselves in order to reclaim a minimum of control that we had in the Amiga days. And Amiga was a proprietary Plattform!
In fact, if DRM/TCPA would get foothhold in a way that MS would like it, I'd aktually drop out of computing entirely - even though I've been with it since nearly 20 years and Sharp PC 1402 assembler. But hopefully that will never happen, since VIA and Transmeta would rejoice over a DRMing/TCPAing Intel and AMD. Thank God MS doesn't have control over the x86 hardware. Not yet at least.
...gaming is next to be rearranged by OSS and ultracheap top quality stuff. As I said the other day.
Unless MS comes forward with DX9 and some good tools for Linux I don't see this taking off.
This is not the last thing to happen in PC gaming.
The gaming industry is one that can get away pretty easyly with a high throughput of titles, because gamers always want the new and shiny with more polygons.
I expect the gaming industry to take a hit as soon as OSS gaming engines and tools like crystal space or Blender get a grip. We'll have games for free, the mod community utilizing them (they work for free allready) and the money will be made in providing not a game but the service around it: Servers, special distributions (just like Linux), gaming leagues, high quality mods, automatic online updates - think 'Loki Linux Installer' which makes maintaining UT under Linux easyer thatn under Windows - and other stuff like that.
Closed Source Games are going to be the last thing to experience the OSS impact, but they're going to feel it nonetheless.
In fact, this outsourcing thing is a shure sigh for a local industry to get moving into service rather than pushing for cheaper production. No way can anyone in Europe or the US outprogramm a slavic, indian or far-east programmer for the same amount of money. As soon as people hereabouts will get that, the pain will stop.
... and patriotisim spot on me:
:-)
You got it wrong. It's the largest IT fair in the _world_.
Things I consider interessting for foreign visitors to Hannover, if you have some time of you might want to check them out:
1) Food: "Das Pfannenkuchen Haus" in the city 'district' Calenberg. German style Pancakes and good german beer in original-stle potterware beermugs. And patented beer-scales. Go and see what I mean.
2) Recreational: Herrenhauser Gaerten (The Herrenhaus Gardens): A large baroque style Garden complex north west of central Hannover. They've got opening times - check with the tourist information for details. Just before it are the Georgengarten and the university. Also good enough for a walk.
3) Maschsee. The towns semi-artificial lake. Runners and Skaters paradise. Right on the townside shore is the Sprengel Museum, specialised in modern Art. They have an large awesome Richard Deacon piece in their collection - if you're lucky it's in exibit.
3) A more quiet and comfortable shopping area is the pedestrian zone 'Lister Meile', leading straight north away from downtown. You can actually walk from 'Kroepcke' all the way under the Main Train Station all the way through a subterran mall to the 'Raschplatz' (some nice cinemas focues on more indepentent and european movies) all the way to 'Lister Tor', where the 'Lister Meile' starts. Here a lot of the old prewar buildings are still intact. Nice old europen town architecture here - could be interessting for people from the US.
5) Downtown itself. Kroepcke being the center, you'll notice all the crappy 70ties architecture around you. The old stuff was bombed during the 2nd world war. The opera is still intact though. If your standing at Kroepcke, the remaining old town is to the south, just behing that you'll find Calenberg and the afore mentioned 'Pfannenkuchen Haus'. All this in walking distance, conected by pedestrian zones.
Note that Hannover is a somewhat compact large city. You can reach each spot by bike in roughly half an hour. It's large enough to offer anything you can think of but small enough to be centralized. If you have access to a car you may want to take a ride south, something like 40-50 kilometers you'll come to the norhtern outskirts of the Harz 'Mountains'. Some very nice medieval castles in that area (again, cool for RPG afiliated geeks, US visitors and... everybody else aswell actually), and a freeckimbing area too (The 'Ith' ridge).
Have a nice time in Hannover.
I studied in Hannover. It's a very nice City and I miss it (I currently reside in Krefeld, west germany) which is the crappiest town of the country and is world second only to Bombay in terms of dirtyness.
It was a joke, Mr. Troll Moderator.
Ok, folks. Now that MS is going to drop out of the 1st league in a measurable amount of time (estimate: ~2 years) I think it's time to declare SuSE enemy and honor it with the title 'prime slashdot target numero uno', moving MS to position two. /. And lengthy rant.. err... reviews of even the slightes bug in YaST that the /. editors can come up with.
I for my part want a borg cameleon and an automatic +3 insightfull for every rant about SuSE lock-in behaviour plus an extra 'SuSE sucks, Debian rulez' subject on
I'll make a start on the comenting side:
SuSE sucks because they use RPM and only look at the money that comes from sleek boxing of products. Debian apt-get is much more superior. How long will customers put up with this SuSE crap?
(The joke been made, I'd like to add that SuSE migrated me and that they're my fist recomendation for every Linux n00b)
...I'm just wondering when they're going to openly admit that to themselves and the public.
For years I've been wondering why Microsoft doesn't join the corporate fray of OSS, on the way mixing it with their branding and doing a branding variant of the 'embrace and extend' thing they're into. After all, nobody gave a damn about licensing until MS started ranting about the GPL being anti-american and at the same time screwing up their licensing as to piss everybody off.
Anyway, I've narrowed in on some optinal answers to this question:
1) MS is to big, slow and stupid and the chiefs are to Windows-focused that they don't see the light.
--I don't think this is the real truth. It fits into a typical MS rant and would fit to a megacorporation the size of MS, but considering that they actually are a software company, and a quite succesfull one I think this answer is to simple.
2) MS couldn't care less. Even if they only hopp on in 2 years from now when they've milked the last proprietary cow, they'll just throw in a few billion, by the one or other Linux company, mix in a little DirectX and Exchange for Linux and squish RH, SuSE and Madrake along the way.
--This seems more likely. But then again, if that's their plan, they would have started this much earlier. And I dont think they could gain foothold any more, neither now or 2 years from now.
3) The MS revenue stream relys so much on markting hype and exclusive Windows branding that MS has no other choice than to take up the fight, even if they're going to lose in the end anyway. They'd rather shoot themselves than admit that OSS has them by the balls and start an ordered retreat out of the proprietary software market in the long run. Taking every money they can get on the way and pushing forth into embedded and home entertainment systems.
--I would think this to be the best answer. Yet even this way it's a dead end for MS as a monopoly. No way in hell can they stand up to a Sony & Matsushita tag team who've just decided to use Linux as their prime embeded system for home entertainment - because it's cheaper and has less lock-in.
Either way you put it, MS as the master-blaster-of-all-things-Computer is done with. They'll either manage to get the curve into a major service and embeded vendor and strengthen their strong branding in that area or they're going to end up like Commodore or something simular.
My 2 Eurocents.
It's similat to computer spell checkers. Ever since people started relying on these, their spelling has gone way downhill simly because they don't bother thinking. ... ...
Computer do all the spelling for them.
They don;t need a spell checker.
This si even worse.
what the user means, get get it wrong half tyhe time....
etc.
Well, I can't say whether or not you're using a spellchecker (i'd guess not) but I'd bet my right arm your spelling couldn't get any worse if you did.
I strongly suggest you try one.
If you're german, I don't quite see where your problem is.
The new law explicitly _permits_ copying for private use if the source of the copy is legal. On top of that, it even explicitly _excludes_ market-restriction-technologies (Marktbeschraenkungsmassnahmen) from protection by the new law!
Apart from the fact that this law is designed by politicians who all over the world won't get that there is no thing as 'digital copy protection'and that that in fact is a contradiction in term and has no place in the plaintext of a law, I find the new german law not all that bad. There were just to many tech-savy people and german jurists stating that a german DMCA would be impercise, technically false and unconstitutional. This luckyly prevented the goverment from releasing the piece of crap their first draft was into the wild.
The law needs a serious redoo, no doubt, and it should have never be released, like lot's of other crap our politicians come up with these days, but what you're planning to do is currently perfectly legal nonetheless.
Borrow your CDs from the local library or a friend or close relative and make a private copy to your iPod. Voila. As long as you don't trade online or with others and don't play your collection in public your not breaking any current german law.
Having a non-professional review computer stuff. (Am I'm not trying to offend anyone here - on the contrary)
Example:"Available in a number of "flavors," Linux isn't perfect."
Not: "Vendor support for Linux has room for improvement" or "x86 downsides become more apparent with Linux" Or: "Mac still rules Unix usability. And any other usability."
I just had a chat 15 minutes ago with a guy that sells Windows boxen for small business and he seemed to know his way around computers (read: Windows PCs). He said that he expects Microsoft to buy Linux any time soon.
I'm to bedazzeled and amazed experiencing the view of things some people have on this whole Linux/OSS/Computing issue to make jokes about it.
I'm not a Mac user but I wonder what this guy would say if he where to test a mac. Probably that would be 'close to perfect' or something. I remember spending some time looking for a burn software on a G4 only to then notice that you just have to eject the CDR on which you dropped your stuff in order for the 'Shall I burn this for you?' Widget to pop up.
If you ask me, this whole OSS migration taking so long is entirely just about people being used to certain stuff and having a hard time switching. That's all. When I see what crap standard windows users go through every day that's the only explaination that seems reasonable.
So what's the big deal anyway?
Will they finally stop sucking?
To be honest, I don't give a damn if drivers are closed, open or whatnot, as long as they actually work and properly use the cards features.
That the Nvidia drivers are tied to the kernel is anoying, but bearable since they actually do work. Nvidias Linux support has been next to none - they've got high karma with me.
From ATI though, I've heard only negative stuff. Same from Matrox, whos Linux support seems to be an utter joke.
Can anybody confirm or debunk this about the new ATI drivers?
Something like three years it was absolutely clear with *everyone* in the professional IT field that Linux/OSS would take off and soar. It went just as generally predicted, only did I lose a bet that Macromedia would have ported at least one app from the dreamteam to Linux within 2 years.
And here is why they're to late for me to collect my dinner out:
During the dot-bomb Flash was everybodys darling. There was no way you could design a solid site with predictable Layout behaviour without using flash. CSS was so crappy everyone just plain ignored it after playing with it for 2 hours. If you wanted a webdoc that was more than just a string of characters you had to use flash.
Then came the bomb, the web grew up within 6 months flat, Flash was to crappy for solid client side apps and the remaining pros switched to functional sites, also ditching Dreamweavers template engine for the bazillion OSS CMSes popping up left right and center. In the mean time IE and Netscape 6.1/Mozilla finally fullfilled the promise CSS had been making for 5 years. That all together weighed in on MM. Flash lost big chunks of it's significance on a monthly basis.
Nowadays Sites are cool and don't need no flash whatsoever.
But here's a really interessting thing: I happend to work on a Rich Media Framework in Flash MX 2004 Pro. After 2.5 years ignoring it I was in pretty fast again. (Sidenote: Customer and Partners agreed to GPL it once the bills are payed!) I actually had to install Windows to do it. While the IDE still has the typical super-crappy anoying macromedia glitches and quirks in it, ActionScript 2 has become a full range PL. ECMA compliance, error handling, a stack of oreilly books for it and all. Rolling an XML controlled industry leading E-Learn-Player and Webpresentation framework was a piece of cake and took me and a guy I work with no more than 8 weeks. On top of that, Macromedia is getting a drift before anybody else in the app vendor field: Their newest product 'breeze', doesn't come in a box anymore. They sell it as a service!
I presume that they saw income going down after the bomb and hushed and listend to the experts. I think there is a strong developers team with them that is seriously fed up with the crappy underlyings in their products (just like many of the professional customers) and that they have gotten a chance to call the shots. Not only is MM doing some very smart moves as a corp. right now, but a Flash MX 2k5 Pro for Linux would bring me right back onto their list. MM has had a steady revenue stream through nice packaging. Now that that doesn't work anymore, they're doing the next step. If I were to bet a fistfull of stockshares on a closed source software vendor, they'd be my first choice.
Linux/OSS is rolling and there ain't no stopping it. And now that MM isn't everybody darling anymore they have to shape up and comply.
All good news indeed.
See headline.
Only the US?
You may toss.
Heads: I win.
Tails: You lose.
Nice and simple.
ROTFL! Absolutely hilarious!
:-)
Damn I got no mod points.
This is absolutely on par with the best english geek joke poems I've read. Really makes me wish all slashdotters could understand german.
For suckage-free OSS audio editing!
Audio Editors don't get much attention. But when you need one it's so important to have one that does the basic stuff without a hinch and doesn't suck like the usual non-mainstream experimental OSS stuff that to often doesn't/didn't work as their teams like(d) to advertise.
Audacity was the first one to work as advertised for me. It's one I gladly take to replace the usual suspects like cool edit. It was the first usable audio editor under Linux aswell.
Thanks to the Audacity team for building this brick in the OSS builing and making it a good and reliable one. You rock!
I could only wish for that any project or contribution to OSS I produce will be of equal significance.
Had to be said.
SCO, mach einen Mucks und Du bist Geschichte!
SCO, make one sound and you're history!
Another thought experiment I've been waiting for in reality. I'd actually do this if i was the SCO Germany CEO - or try to at least.
:-) And, on top of that, probably even be proven right in court.
Here it goes:
By german law the CEO of a GmbH (a ldt. company) has to do everything to prevent serious damage to the companies assets, it property and health in general. That inculdes insubordinating orders given by the board of holders!. Especially if they would require actions in conflict with the law.
If I were SCO Germany I would've pulled this PR stunt months ago: Publically stating that SCO germany does not comply whatsoever with the statements of SCO America concerning SCO IP in Linux, which up to date aren't prooven, and to prevent further damage by being recognized as a subsidary of SCO US SCO Germany has decided to change it's name to BHO (Bad Homburg Operation).
That would be really cool.