No it isn't. I don't talk on my cell when driving even with my bluetooth headset but... I was driving down the road the other day and saw a grass fire. Then I used my hands free to call 911 to report it.
I also use the voice dialing all the time with my cell because I don't have to take it out of my pocket to dial.
Two grand for a dev kit is cheap. You will pay more than that to develop a good website, or a good gaming PC. Garage-style shop != parent's basement.
What you are talking about is a hobbyist system. If you really want to develop games on the cheap write them for Linux. There are even wiimote drivers available for Linux so knock yourself out.
Back to the question of WHY Windows. The only answer that I can guess is simply they figure that there will always be a Windows OS. When OS/2 went south they where forced to migrate and develop new software from the ground up. That is the only logical answer I can think of. Then the next question is why the heck don't they have watchdog hardware to do an automatic reset when they do BSOD! A small micro with a network connection could notify the NOC when one went down and allow them to issue a reset.
The English where settlers. Who where the first to cross the Atlantic? The Vikings and the Spanish. Who was the first to cross the Pacific?
The English did do some exploring but they where not pioneers for the most part. They came and settled the lands that other had "found". That was their great achievement. Being the first to walk on some hunk of land is nice for getting your name in the history books but living on it and living well is the real achievement. The English know about pioneers getting slaughtered all to well. One that case that jumps right out at me is the Comet. Look at the history of the pioneering Comet and the the "settlers" the 707 and DC-8 that came behind it. How about Capitan Cook vs the Hudson Bay Company? I should have said that British where very successful settlers. And I should have used pioneers instead of explorers. since they are two different things.
Do you use an Altair PC? Fly on planes made by Curtis Wright Aircraft? Use Visicalc for your Spreadsheets? Armstrong wasn't the pioneer that would have been Robert Goddard.
Going first always has costs and risks and more often then not it pays off for the people that go in to a land or market second or third.
IBM wasn't the first to produce a computer they followed Sperry. Apple and IBM where not first with home computers or PCs they where following Altar and IMSA. Buying an $700 DX10 Video card before there are any DX10 games means that you will pay a lot for a card that will cost a lot with very little return.
"Steam engines are valued for their excellent power to weight ratios," Compared to what? Gas turbines have a much higher power to weight ratio as do internal combustion engines. "general efficiency," again compared to what? The most efficient prime movers are turbo diesels. Take a look at some of the engines that they use in modern ships they bet the daylights out of a steam. Diesels have replaced steam for rail roads and shipping because it is more efficient, has a higher power to weight ratio, and lower matance.
and greater torque capacity. " Yea they are good at that.
Steam turbines are very efficient but they are not the top of the list for power to weight or efficiency. There big win is that they are very fuel flexible the can work with solar, coal, geotheraml, or nuclear power anything that gets hot enough to boil a fluid.
Don't blame Nvidia blame Microsoft. DX10 is Vista only. You have to look at the market share. There are a lot more XP machines than Vista. If you write to DX9 your potential market is about I would guess 100 times the size of a Vista only game. Notice that Microsoft's Flight Simulator 10 was written for DX9. But thanks buying a bleeding edge card. In three years when I pay $200 for my DX10 card it will probably be faster than your $800 card. With out people like you the rest of us wouldn't get to buy good cards for $200. There is an old saying. Pioneers get slaughtered, settlers get rich.
"I am happy for the BBC to spend a reasonable amount of money adding useful new features that are available to almost everyone. I would not be happy if they started spending a silly amount of money catering to every tiny but highly vocal minority who deliberately chose to go down a different route to most people knowing that this sort of issue was likely and then complain afterwards." I do agree but... The But is that using Theora wouldn't cost on cent more than using Windows media. The solution is simple only stream in a DOCUMENTED open format. If you want that stream to work with that ToyOS you wrote in CS class you can. Just write the code. This would open the market up to many vendors including some in the UK. They could create all sorts of new products that enable you to view this content anywhere you want to. Why give your money to Microsoft and then them free marketing and income. Every dollar spent on a Widows PC is money sent to the US.
Why do you hate him? He isn't taking food from starving children. He isn't burning crosses on people's laws. He isn't killing people for some political agenda. He is writing software for Linux that people actually use. Because of Mono we do have F-Spot the photo manager, Banshee which is a good music player and podcast system, and the Beagle desktop search system, and Tomboy to name a few. They all make the Linux desktop better. I don't develop in Mono but there are some dang good programs that use it that I do use. I am more of a Java developer myself and feel that.NET was a scam to derail java. I still do in fact. But Miguel de icaza has done nothing worthy of such hatred. If you don't like mono don't use it but don't let it make you that angry. Life is too short to hate, go volunteer are Habitat for Humanity one weekend. You will make the much bigger impact on the world than hating someone will. Or if you are so dedicated to desktop Linux then write a better photo manager than F-Spot or some other piece of quality software.
Yes I would say the XBOX 360 is dead in Japan. I put that down more to prejudice and or nationalism than any real failings in the hardware.
The PS3 is massively under preforming in sales. That is the simple fact. The Wii is right now a runaway hit. My predictions are this. The Wii will start to get a lot more 3rd party software. Here is a news flash. Game companies are not in it for the art. They are in it for the money. The Wii will soon have an installed base bigger than even the 360. That will drive the developers to the Wii.
Here are how development costs break down. 1. Wii. The Wii has the lowest development costs of any of current Consoles. 2. XBox 360. Microsoft provides great tools for developers. 3. PS3. The tools are not as good as Microsoft's and it is a much more complex system than even the 360.
Market share. 1. 360. There are just more boxes on the market. 2. Wii. number two with a BIG BULLET. Soon to take the number one spot. 3. PS3. Only in Japan is it out selling the 360.
Raw power. 1. PS3 wins but not by much. The PS3 CPU is a lot harder to program for than the 360s. The extra floating point performance is at this moment in time mainly theoretical. The GPUs seem very close in performance as well. Where the PS3 does have an advantage is that all of them include a harddrive. That is IMHO the 360s only real fault. I am also guessing that most 360 users are buying the HD model. 2. 360. Microsoft should have put a HD on every one. 3. Wii. Yes the Wii is weaker than the all of it's competitors but it is more powerful than the PS2 and the XBox.
Yep unless there is a drastic change Nintendo is going to be the big winner this round.
"You're confusing Windows CE with desktop Windows. Windows CE is a whole different beast;" No I believe that you are confusing Embedded Windows with Windows CE. I am pretty sure that the ATMs are using Embedded Windows which is a stripped down version of XP or 2000. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default. mspx is a link to all of them.
WinCE mainly lives on the ARM. I know Microsoft had an X86 version they called CE but I am not sure if it was really CE or Embedded Windows. Since the older ATMs used OS/2 I would bet on the new ones running Embedded Windows over CE.
"ATMs running CE don't run Word, or have weird hardware, or have Windows UIs. So would you like to try constructing another straw man or two?" I guess you didn't understand my post. I was pointing out that Windows strengths, large selection of software, large base of supported hardware, and a familiar UI are not an advantage for an ATM! An ATM doesn't use Windows GUI, let people install strange new hardware, or run off the self software. So Windows isn't a big advantage.
BTW Win's CE uptime is worse than a properly maintained Windows 2003 Server or even a Win2K server. I hear the latest version of Win CE now called Windows Mobile is better but I have not played with it.
I think part of it is that people really don't change but things do. Star Trek shows a "perfected" humanity. Everyone just loves to go see people play Bach and be polite to one another. Only in DS9 my favorite Treks did we see people acting real. What I don't like is the overly negative nature of "hard core" Sci-Fi. I guess you need to have some kind of conflict but often that is all they show. I think Babylon 5 and DS9 tended to show the most realistic balance of human vice and virtue in the "normal" people around the main characters. You do have to have your heroes and villains after all.
"The problem with killing Flash is that it will make Linux users second class citizens on the Internet if this silverlight crap gets a solid foothold."
Okay so where is my Linux Shockwave plugin.
You have some real hate issues with Mr. De Icaza, I am not a big fan of Mono and I have not learned C#. I DON"T like Flash or what I call Flash abuse. Opera has implemented a Theora tag for streaming video that could replace Flash for YouTube style websites if Microsoft, Apple, and Firefox implement it. PS don't hold your breath.
SVG could replace Flash for vector graphics if Microsoft, Apple, and Firefox implement it. I also wouldn't hold my breath for that one.
Adobe isn't that much better of a friend to Linux than Microsoft. They have been getting better so this is just a way to encourage them as far as I am concerned.
I know they have a significant presence but that doesn't answer why the benefits of Windows over power the drawbacks for this application. 1 Windows being the most common OS also makes it the most vulnerable to attack. The fact that it is so common makes it a rich target. 2. Windows was never intended to be secure. It is a single user consumer product by nature. High availably, stability, and security are not it's strengths.
Windows strengths and it does have a lot of them just do not matter in the ATM market. 1. Hardware support. For a device like an ATM you can pick an choose your hardware. No need to worry about people plugging in a XiHu 5000 network adapter they got on sale at BestCompMart. 2. Software selection. An ATM should only run the ATM software. You don't need Word or the latest game to run on it. 3. Familiar UI. You write the ATM's UI it doesn't work like Windows.
The one place that Windows does have an advantage over Linux is in developer tools. Eclipse-CDT and Kdevelope are good but not as feature rich as VIsual Studio. I would say they are good enough but Visual Studio is better. Even if Visual Studio isn't better it is better known. It is easier to find Windows developers than Linux or AIX developers.
To me I think it is a case of false economy. I have to wonder if this migration started before Linux became mainstream.
Really less than one year ago Flash for Linux was also behind. I don't see why Moonlight is any worse the Gnash. It is an FOSS project to support a standard cooked up by a closed source company.
"Some people may say "who cares?" since there are free (but not Free) flash players for every major OS (including Linux). " Frankly I am one of those people. If Adobe provided a good Linux flash player I would be fine with that. However Adobe doesn't support 64 bit Linux. They have finely put enough effort into Linux to provide a the latest and greatest version to Linux users but no 64 bit version. Also no version for Linux on the ARM.
This might actually be a good thing. Not great but good.
Okay except there has to be a manager that decides what to use. I am sure that at GM, Toyota, and Honda there are also managers but SOMEBODY with some some technical knowledge makes decisions about what technology goes into a product and why. IBM is pushing Linux right now but even discounting Linux they have AIX. Banks are comfortable with IBM on ATMs. They used OS/2 didn't they? So again why not AIX or Linux. Dumb management just doesn't make sense. There has to be a reason.
Yes but... So we are trading a closed plugin from Adobe with an FOSS plug in based on a standard from Microsoft. Flash is just plan nasty and Adobe doesn't support 64-bit Linux. This is FOSS so it can Support Linux, BSD, and run on CPUs beside the X86.
IF Adobe would make the flash player FOSS then Microsoft wouldn't have a leg to stand on. So yes you are right but I have to ask what is the problem with killing Flash?
Yea I want my SVG and Theora tags to replace Flash and Silverlight but I just don't see that happening.
You see that is one thing I don't get. Why Windows? You are not going to run any commodity software on an ATM. Why not Linux, BSD, some flavor of Unix, or even an Embedded OS like QNX? I just don't see any benifit to using Windows or CE for an ATM. Maybe they use Visual Basic to write the code for them... Shuddderr......
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No it isn't.
I don't talk on my cell when driving even with my bluetooth headset but... I was driving down the road the other day and saw a grass fire. Then I used my hands free to call 911 to report it.
I also use the voice dialing all the time with my cell because I don't have to take it out of my pocket to dial.
Okay I have to as where is this check box to turn this new feature?
I have never seen it.
I have to give a thumbs up to gtalk. It is the only IM I use daily. SMS would be nice as well.
Two grand for a dev kit is cheap.
You will pay more than that to develop a good website, or a good gaming PC.
Garage-style shop != parent's basement.
What you are talking about is a hobbyist system.
If you really want to develop games on the cheap write them for Linux.
There are even wiimote drivers available for Linux so knock yourself out.
Back to the question of WHY Windows. The only answer that I can guess is simply they figure that there will always be a Windows OS. When OS/2 went south they where forced to migrate and develop new software from the ground up.
That is the only logical answer I can think of.
Then the next question is why the heck don't they have watchdog hardware to do an automatic reset when they do BSOD!
A small micro with a network connection could notify the NOC when one went down and allow them to issue a reset.
The English where settlers.
Who where the first to cross the Atlantic? The Vikings and the Spanish.
Who was the first to cross the Pacific?
The English did do some exploring but they where not pioneers for the most part. They came and settled the lands that other had "found".
That was their great achievement. Being the first to walk on some hunk of land is nice for getting your name in the history books but living on it and living well is the real achievement.
The English know about pioneers getting slaughtered all to well. One that case that jumps right out at me is the Comet. Look at the history of the pioneering Comet and the the "settlers" the 707 and DC-8 that came behind it.
How about Capitan Cook vs the Hudson Bay Company?
I should have said that British where very successful settlers. And I should have used pioneers instead of explorers. since they are two different things.
The Britsh where settlers not explorers.
Do you use an Altair PC? Fly on planes made by Curtis Wright Aircraft? Use Visicalc for your Spreadsheets?
Armstrong wasn't the pioneer that would have been Robert Goddard.
Going first always has costs and risks and more often then not it pays off for the people that go in to a land or market second or third.
IBM wasn't the first to produce a computer they followed Sperry. Apple and IBM where not first with home computers or PCs they where following Altar and IMSA.
Buying an $700 DX10 Video card before there are any DX10 games means that you will pay a lot for a card that will cost a lot with very little return.
"Steam engines are valued for their excellent power to weight ratios,"
Compared to what? Gas turbines have a much higher power to weight ratio as do internal combustion engines.
"general efficiency," again compared to what? The most efficient prime movers are turbo diesels. Take a look at some of the engines that they use in modern ships they bet the daylights out of a steam.
Diesels have replaced steam for rail roads and shipping because it is more efficient, has a higher power to weight ratio, and lower matance.
and greater torque capacity. " Yea they are good at that.
Steam turbines are very efficient but they are not the top of the list for power to weight or efficiency. There big win is that they are very fuel flexible the can work with solar, coal, geotheraml, or nuclear power anything that gets hot enough to boil a fluid.
Don't blame Nvidia blame Microsoft.
DX10 is Vista only. You have to look at the market share. There are a lot more XP machines than Vista. If you write to DX9 your potential market is about I would guess 100 times the size of a Vista only game.
Notice that Microsoft's Flight Simulator 10 was written for DX9.
But thanks buying a bleeding edge card. In three years when I pay $200 for my DX10 card it will probably be faster than your $800 card. With out people like you the rest of us wouldn't get to buy good cards for $200.
There is an old saying.
Pioneers get slaughtered, settlers get rich.
"I am happy for the BBC to spend a reasonable amount of money adding useful new features that are available to almost everyone. I would not be happy if they started spending a silly amount of money catering to every tiny but highly vocal minority who deliberately chose to go down a different route to most people knowing that this sort of issue was likely and then complain afterwards."
I do agree but...
The But is that using Theora wouldn't cost on cent more than using Windows media.
The solution is simple only stream in a DOCUMENTED open format. If you want that stream to work with that ToyOS you wrote in CS class you can. Just write the code.
This would open the market up to many vendors including some in the UK. They could create all sorts of new products that enable you to view this content anywhere you want to. Why give your money to Microsoft and then them free marketing and income. Every dollar spent on a Widows PC is money sent to the US.
So are they using CE or Windows Embedded? Since people have reported ATM BSOD and I have never seen CE BSOD I am guessing Embedded Windows.
Why do you hate him? .NET was a scam to derail java. I still do in fact. But Miguel de icaza has done nothing worthy of such hatred. If you don't like mono don't use it but don't let it make you that angry. Life is too short to hate, go volunteer are Habitat for Humanity one weekend. You will make the much bigger impact on the world than hating someone will.
He isn't taking food from starving children.
He isn't burning crosses on people's laws.
He isn't killing people for some political agenda.
He is writing software for Linux that people actually use.
Because of Mono we do have F-Spot the photo manager, Banshee which is a good music player and podcast system, and the Beagle desktop search system, and Tomboy to name a few.
They all make the Linux desktop better.
I don't develop in Mono but there are some dang good programs that use it that I do use. I am more of a Java developer myself and feel that
Or if you are so dedicated to desktop Linux then write a better photo manager than F-Spot or some other piece of quality software.
Yes I would say the XBOX 360 is dead in Japan. I put that down more to prejudice and or nationalism than any real failings in the hardware.
The PS3 is massively under preforming in sales. That is the simple fact. The Wii is right now a runaway hit.
My predictions are this.
The Wii will start to get a lot more 3rd party software. Here is a news flash. Game companies are not in it for the art. They are in it for the money.
The Wii will soon have an installed base bigger than even the 360. That will drive the developers to the Wii.
Here are how development costs break down.
1. Wii. The Wii has the lowest development costs of any of current Consoles.
2. XBox 360. Microsoft provides great tools for developers.
3. PS3. The tools are not as good as Microsoft's and it is a much more complex system than even the 360.
Market share.
1. 360. There are just more boxes on the market.
2. Wii. number two with a BIG BULLET. Soon to take the number one spot.
3. PS3. Only in Japan is it out selling the 360.
Raw power.
1. PS3 wins but not by much. The PS3 CPU is a lot harder to program for than the 360s. The extra floating point performance is at this moment in time mainly theoretical. The GPUs seem very close in performance as well. Where the PS3 does have an advantage is that all of them include a harddrive. That is IMHO the 360s only real fault. I am also guessing that most 360 users are buying the HD model.
2. 360. Microsoft should have put a HD on every one.
3. Wii. Yes the Wii is weaker than the all of it's competitors but it is more powerful than the PS2 and the XBox.
Yep unless there is a drastic change Nintendo is going to be the big winner this round.
"You're confusing Windows CE with desktop Windows. Windows CE is a whole different beast;". mspx is a link to all of them.
No I believe that you are confusing Embedded Windows with Windows CE.
I am pretty sure that the ATMs are using Embedded Windows which is a stripped down version of XP or 2000.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default
WinCE mainly lives on the ARM. I know Microsoft had an X86 version they called CE but I am not sure if it was really CE or Embedded Windows. Since the older ATMs used OS/2 I would bet on the new ones running Embedded Windows over CE.
"ATMs running CE don't run Word, or have weird hardware, or have Windows UIs. So would you like to try constructing another straw man or two?"
I guess you didn't understand my post.
I was pointing out that Windows strengths, large selection of software, large base of supported hardware, and a familiar UI are not an advantage for an ATM!
An ATM doesn't use Windows GUI, let people install strange new hardware, or run off the self software. So Windows isn't a big advantage.
BTW Win's CE uptime is worse than a properly maintained Windows 2003 Server or even a Win2K server. I hear the latest version of Win CE now called Windows Mobile is better but I have not played with it.
I think part of it is that people really don't change but things do.
Star Trek shows a "perfected" humanity. Everyone just loves to go see people play Bach and be polite to one another.
Only in DS9 my favorite Treks did we see people acting real.
What I don't like is the overly negative nature of "hard core" Sci-Fi. I guess you need to have some kind of conflict but often that is all they show.
I think Babylon 5 and DS9 tended to show the most realistic balance of human vice and virtue in the "normal" people around the main characters. You do have to have your heroes and villains after all.
I never thought of the Manchurian Candidate as sci-fi.
It was a great movie, I have never seen the new one and plan on keeping it that way.
Thanks I was about the make that exact same comment.
"The problem with killing Flash is that it will make Linux users second class citizens on the Internet if this silverlight crap gets a solid foothold."
Okay so where is my Linux Shockwave plugin.
You have some real hate issues with Mr. De Icaza, I am not a big fan of Mono and I have not learned C#. I DON"T like Flash or what I call Flash abuse. Opera has implemented a Theora tag for streaming video that could replace Flash for YouTube style websites if Microsoft, Apple, and Firefox implement it. PS don't hold your breath.
SVG could replace Flash for vector graphics if Microsoft, Apple, and Firefox implement it. I also wouldn't hold my breath for that one.
Adobe isn't that much better of a friend to Linux than Microsoft. They have been getting better so this is just a way to encourage them as far as I am concerned.
I know they have a significant presence but that doesn't answer why the benefits of Windows over power the drawbacks for this application.
1 Windows being the most common OS also makes it the most vulnerable to attack. The fact that it is so common makes it a rich target.
2. Windows was never intended to be secure. It is a single user consumer product by nature. High availably, stability, and security are not it's strengths.
Windows strengths and it does have a lot of them just do not matter in the ATM market.
1. Hardware support. For a device like an ATM you can pick an choose your hardware. No need to worry about people plugging in a XiHu 5000 network adapter they got on sale at BestCompMart.
2. Software selection. An ATM should only run the ATM software. You don't need Word or the latest game to run on it.
3. Familiar UI. You write the ATM's UI it doesn't work like Windows.
The one place that Windows does have an advantage over Linux is in developer tools. Eclipse-CDT and Kdevelope are good but not as feature rich as VIsual Studio. I would say they are good enough but Visual Studio is better.
Even if Visual Studio isn't better it is better known. It is easier to find Windows developers than Linux or AIX developers.
To me I think it is a case of false economy. I have to wonder if this migration started before Linux became mainstream.
Really less than one year ago Flash for Linux was also behind.
I don't see why Moonlight is any worse the Gnash. It is an FOSS project to support a standard cooked up by a closed source company.
"Some people may say "who cares?" since there are free (but not Free) flash players for every major OS (including Linux). "
Frankly I am one of those people. If Adobe provided a good Linux flash player I would be fine with that. However Adobe doesn't support 64 bit Linux.
They have finely put enough effort into Linux to provide a the latest and greatest version to Linux users but no 64 bit version.
Also no version for Linux on the ARM.
This might actually be a good thing. Not great but good.
Okay except there has to be a manager that decides what to use. I am sure that at GM, Toyota, and Honda there are also managers but SOMEBODY with some some technical knowledge makes decisions about what technology goes into a product and why.
IBM is pushing Linux right now but even discounting Linux they have AIX. Banks are comfortable with IBM on ATMs. They used OS/2 didn't they? So again why not AIX or Linux.
Dumb management just doesn't make sense. There has to be a reason.
Yes but...
So we are trading a closed plugin from Adobe with an FOSS plug in based on a standard from Microsoft.
Flash is just plan nasty and Adobe doesn't support 64-bit Linux. This is FOSS so it can Support Linux, BSD, and run on CPUs beside the X86.
IF Adobe would make the flash player FOSS then Microsoft wouldn't have a leg to stand on.
So yes you are right but I have to ask what is the problem with killing Flash?
Yea I want my SVG and Theora tags to replace Flash and Silverlight but I just don't see that happening.
Actually they where planing on using CFCs you know Freon. It is a much better green house gas than CO2.
You see that is one thing I don't get. Why Windows? You are not going to run any commodity software on an ATM. Why not Linux, BSD, some flavor of Unix, or even an Embedded OS like QNX? I just don't see any benifit to using Windows or CE for an ATM. Maybe they use Visual Basic to write the code for them... Shuddderr......