Well, the only thing missing from OS X is some of the heavy duty chip design software.
However, if I were a semiconductor company (I worked at one), I'd be banging on the vendors doors right now to do a port.
- Cheap 64-bit computing - Easy to use office software
A lot of us used to either run 2 machines (1 SUN and 1 PC for documentation) or run 1 SUN and huge-ass Citrix server for every small group.
You could do away with that in one swipe. 1 Mac for engineering and documentation (and other stuff). Decreased maintenance!
Yes, HP, Sun should be running scared right now. Previously we would not even consider switching to PC's for engineering work because it was not stable enough (when you _need_ your machine to stay up for days), and because of the scripts.
OS X, *BSD and *NIX script compatible and stable and easy to use. YEAH!
The batteries aren't affected by "memory", but they do have a limited number of recharges. For example, if they quote "500 recharges", it means 500 100% recharges from 0%.
Partial recharges count towards this total. i.e. 1000 50% recharges (from 50%-100% for example).
What is happenning is that these guys didn't read their manual. They left their batter in the machine when they plugged it in. The battery will normally drop to 97-99%, and then the charging kicks in. You can see that over the course of a day or 2, you can easily build up the equivalent of 100% charge cycle with many 1-3% charges.
There's nothing wrong with the battery. You've just used it up.
(I learned this the expensive way with my Thinkpad 770X).
In fact, it's even better. You can still purchase directly from IBM via their Passport Advantage program. You pay for license _and_ annual support subscription.
A license sounds pretty much like a brand new copy of software to me.
Use Java. That's what it's for. There were teething troubles early on, but most of that has been ironed out. Things run really, really, well, even large applications.
(Look, "Art Of Illusion" is a 3D modelling program written entirely in Java. It runs fine on my PII-300MHz _laptop_).
You get access, not only to SGI, Windows, Linux, AIX, Solaris, but just about any other platform with a JVM. And, Java is really nice to program in to boot.
If you really must use C, use C/C++ for the "back end" (so you can use gcc for everything, even Windows), and just use Java for the GUI.
Honestly. You may think you're skilled, but electrical+electronic+software guys are dime a dozen, even ones that speak 3 languages.
At least they are around here! Can you do physics and biology too? Can you play 3 different musical instruments, cook like a chef and also be near-top level athlete? Now you're talkin...
If you're so clever, go back to school for a graduate degree in something else, write some papers, go to conferences (in other parts of the world) with other people's funding.
Travelling on the cheap is nowhere near as fun as travelling in luxury, which you can do after you get a real job.
If you want to grow and deal with the big boys, use ESD protection. If the Cisco's and Lucent's come down and see you don't have any, it's unlikely they'll want to do business with you.
The reason is simple, ESD damage is REAL. The effects often manifest themselves in subtle ways in which damage is not totally obvious.
For example, one potential problem is a shift in the Vt threshold values of the transistors on the I/O pads of CMOS logic devices. It may still work, but perhaps slower or out of spec. And sometimes the conditions get worse in the field, so that even if it works now, it may not work in 1 year time.
Lastly, YOU may not generate much ESD, but you hire some guy, he wears different shoes, has sweaty or dry feet or whatever, and he zaps a lot of chips. (Don't laugh, this has happened to us. One guy, we don't know why, kept zapping chips. I suggested he change shoes, and the problem went away. But you need to avoid the problem in the first place with proper ESD protection).
But, as someone pointed out, if you're making $10 disposable devices, then who cares...
If you don't think it will cut it, then you probably don't know how to use it. Matlab has plenty of constructs for doing loops.
Also, there are often times when you DO NOT want to use loops with Matlab. For example, you may create a loop to do matrix multiplication, but you don't do that with Matlab, because it's already been optimized to calculate such stuff. In fact, anytime you can perform an operation with vector math instead of looping, it is _much_ faster.
Did you know you can also compile to C code with Matlab? Is that enough for you.
You have to think about what your target problem is. There are many professors in my department, most have switched OFF of FORTRAN. Why? My favourite quote from one guy (old guy), "I used to spend 2 days programming and debugging. Now it happens in 2 hours with Mathematica"
I feel the same. I get my work done much faster using Matlab/Maple/Mathematica. I don't care how fast the code runs, because the END RESULT is completed much more quickly.
If you don't want to pay for Matlab, Octave is free (and GPL).
There are times when you may still want to use FORTRAN, but that is if the program is relatively short and simple compared to the run-time. Also, for particular fields (e.g. particle physics), there may be "pre-done" routines in FORTRAN for analyzing data a certain way.
In general, I'd recommend staying way from it if you can.
...because you are too North American centric perhaps? Innotek is based in Germany, I believe, and way over in that island called Europe, there are apparently a lot of OS/2 users (i.e. companies) with deep enough pockets to fund this.
If you were still an OS/2 user, you'd know that IBM still offers updates to OS/2, and the past few rounds, they have been heavily subscribed that they can't press enough CD's in time.
No, OS/2 can't be released as free abandoned ware because it isn't abandoned yet. At least not officially.
You can still purchase OS/2 online (from IBM, who else?), and IBM is still sending out regular updates to customers. Yes, that includes single home-users like me. Every 6 months, I get a full CD install set of the latest revision, as well as CD's with update patches, features and programs.
All but 1 of the 5 biggest banks in Canada still run OS/2, and I haven't seen any "Windows transition" machines at a branch yet.
Funny, since OS/2 is dead, how come IBM mailed me (and many other users) a brand new copy of OS/2 a couple of weeks ago? Hmmmm....
I've used OS/2 and Linux extensively. How many of you whiners have actually used a recent version of OS/2?
OS/2 provides one of the most consistent interfaces around. It's more configurable than Windows, and easier to configure for Joe Average than anything on Linux.
Linux GUI's, even the latest KDE or GNOME have a long, long way to go to catchup to OS/2's PM + WPS. I only wish those people working on Linux would take a good look at OS/2 and see what's been done already and take some good ideas from it.
...the OS/2 WPS already has.
Per folder (as in real directories on your file system), you can define any window size, icon arrangement, background colour, font, layout (free, grid, etc), large/small icon or just text, just about anything you can imagine.
Customization of colours, fonts, background is all via simple drag 'n drop if you wish.
Great step forward for Linux, but it's just catching up to something been done waaay back in the mid-90's
Err...brilliant yes, but it's a case of BEEN THERE, DONE THAT! Who?
OS/2. No kidding, and you thought it was dead (it isn't).
Most apps are very well behaved, except for the compressed package it usually comes in, you are generally free to move stuff around as you wish.
In fact Serenity Systems (www.serenity-systems.com) has taken this and run with it. Drag 'n drop installation over the network. Deploy your apps to many workstations via a single drag 'n drop.
It can be done because nearly all the functionality is already built into OS/2's WPS.
It may sound revolutionary to some of you, but millions of OS/2 users have already seen this.
We had a project that was probably similar in concept, maybe slightly lower throughput. I don't think the claims are that far fetched.
However, getting one chip working is one thing. Getting an entire box is a whole 'nother trick entirely, as I'm sure they will discover.
They are, obviously short on technical details, but I find no particular reason to disbelieve them. There are a lot of "real" tech companies in Montreal (my ex-company had a branch there), and fewer fakes than other places.
$70million won't last you very long without any other source of revenue. If they are lucky and really, really good, they may have a product out in production in 2-3 years.
No, you need it. Everything is that much sharper.
I run 1280x1024 on a 13.7" LCD screen, no panning. The clarity is noticeable. (It's an IBM Thinkpad).
My next one will be the new Thinkpads, with 1600x1200 on a 14"-15" screen. Awesome.
Resolution doesn't necessarily mean size. You can always scale up icons and fonts (oh wait, you _are_ running an OS that can do that, aren't you?). With that kind of pixel density, it gets closer and closer to printer output
Hey, I still use OS/2...because it works, and it works WELL.
Maybe some of you "enlightened" people might do to get out and open your mind a bit before criticizing it. How many of you have actually _used_ OS/2 extensively?
I have used Solaris, HP-UX extensively day in, day out for nearly 10 years. I've used Windows since 3.0 came out...right up to WinXP now. I still have an original Mac Classic. I've been diddling with Linux since back in the RedHat 3.0 days, right up to the the latest version.
My OS of choice is still OS/2, because it's got the applications to get my work done, it's stable, easy to use and easy to maintain.
IBM is STILL putting out fixes and updates and new features for it. Right, how many of you can shove in a CD-RW in your drive and format it to UDF format using a single command line like "format s:/FS:UDF"? How many of you have an OS that supports USB CD-RW? Hands up if your OS supports up to _64_ way SMP? Who here can still run a pre-emptive multi-tasking OS complete with GUI on a i486, 16MB and fit the OS in under 150MB? It isn't Linux with X. The list of awesome features goes on and on...
It looks like the GRAPE boards should be re-configurable. Why'd they do it with custom chips?
A whack of FPGA's should be pretty decent, but you can configure it for more than just as a N-body gravitational problem.
BTW, Akhihabara is over-rated. There's a WHACK of stuff there that we don't get in North. America. But wander for a few hours, and you soon realize that the same store exists on every block, repeated over and over and over...
Besides Akihabara doesn't usually have the best prices. I loafed around all over Tokyo, and it usually has the highest prices. Just pop over on the train to Ikebukero or something, they'll have the same mega chain stores (just not repeated every block) and usually lower prices.
I found digital cameras weren't cheaper or better. The MD players kick ass! 320min playtime per disk now in about the size of 3 3.5" floppies stacked up.
And there there's the colour, digital cell phones about 1/2 the size of ours for about $10-50US. Woohoo!
That depends on your own specific needs.
If you can download and compile your own Linux distro for free, why would anyone pay for a copy of RedHat or Slackware or.... That should answer your own question.
If you are using BeOS, one reason to switch is that OS/2 or eComstation is _alive_, the company isn't looking for a buyout like Be, Inc. is. Another reason is that you can get productive on OS/2 or eCS. On top of big office suites like Lotus Smartsuite or StarOffice, there are many individual apps that are as good or better! Out of all the "alternative" OS, OS/2 has probably one of the hugest software bases of them. (Does Linux count as "alternative" any more?:)
I think same argument could be made for *BSD! Drivers are pretty darn good for OS/2 | eCS too. How many "alternative" OS have support for the DVD, USB including USB CD-RW's?
As for Linux, that's up to you. Some people like fiddling around and re-compiling their kernels and mussing around with LIB hell. Some don't, I tried and I don't. I just use OS/2 and keep on using and using and using...To me, Linux is not ready yet.
If you are running a big web server farm like Google, OS/2 is probably not your best choice. If you want to play games, OS/2 is probably not your best choice, due to lack of games. If you consider yourself a "power" user, but are not a "hacker" type and you're sick of Windows crap, OS/2 is a good choice.
Look around, compare the offerings and pick the one that is best for your job.
KEEP AN OPEN MIND!
And to those of you who think OS/2 is dead... you should keep up with the times. IBM is still spending $$$ on programmers to update and bug fix OS/2. Do you think they blow money just for the heck of it? They do it because they have many, many paying customers that justify the expense.
No I'm not. Read what I said carefully.
You are perfectly correct, it can switch between streams of data every 5ns.
Let's hope that your data arrives in one stream, because if that single 1Gb/s data stream you sent out is switched in the mid-stream, you have a bottle neck.
You weenies! Whip out your calculators.
Switching packets at 5ns is switching them at 200MHz.
Assuming you're not using any double edge clocking scheme, that's only 200Mbit/s.
With data streams coming in at well over 1Gb/s, that's a pretty high latency. Once you accomplish the switch, you better be pumping a lot of data through that channel so as not to be a bottleneck. Else, it will be holding up all that traffic.
Who cares? If you want an Ogg Vorbis accelerator, there's nothing to stop you from implementing that in an FPGA RIGHT NOW. Go ahead. Isn't it open source? You only have to port it to VHDL or Verilog.
So now you've done that. You got a working FPGA. What are you going to do with it? Riiiight...we should all go about building our own audio hardware accelerators.
Well, it might work if you actually make CPU's, where people can just plug it into their motherboards. Even then, it's really kind of pointless. If I have the "code" for a SPARC, and I give it to you, that's still almost worthless.
1) You have to Fabricate this damn chip. Do you have $250,000US kicking around? That's about how much you'll need for a 0.25um mask set (yup, not even cutting edge). Minimum 6-8 weeks to get this done.
2) You want to make changes to a working design? HAHA! Another quarter million to Fab that change. And another 6-8 weeks.
3) Ooops! The new design didn't quite work. Why not? Do you know how to debug? Let's say yes. Do you have access to a high-speed IC tester to check it out? $5million a pop. Or maybe you can rent one. That's about $300/hour.
By this time, you should be thinking "Why don't I just walk over the the local computer shop 10minutes away and plunk down $200 for a new K7?"
I mean, if I think I had something to contribute to CPU design, I might (wild idea), GO GET A JOB at AMD, or Intel or wherever...
There's not too much value in open-sourcing your CPU design. The Verilog or VHDL code may be verified to be 100% correct, but that code doesn't mean that your silicon is 100% correct.
Hey, I worked in US for a bit just outside the capital area. You call that freedom? You get watched everywhere you go it seems. Security checks for public monuments that are more stringent than what I get at the airport back home.
Canada, I feel safe. Not only from crime, but from "Big Brother" or whatever you wanna call it. Is the government watching my back? Ha! Don't know and don't care because I know nothing will happen of it.
Yup, I feel FREE here (not as in beer), I can do and go wherever I want and nobody really bothers me.
Look, if you are used to living in the USA, Canada is similar. Except nobody's after us, and we're a laid back peaceful lot, so Da Man has no reason (or money) to keep an eye on everyone. That and we managed to teach our kids Metric. We don't live in igloos. Really.
(Hey, but if you come up, leave your guns and pissy beer down there, eh?)
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Well, the only thing missing from OS X is some of the heavy duty chip design software.
However, if I were a semiconductor company (I worked at one), I'd be banging on the vendors doors right now to do a port.
- Cheap 64-bit computing
- Easy to use office software
A lot of us used to either run 2 machines (1 SUN and 1 PC for documentation) or run 1 SUN and huge-ass Citrix server for every small group.
You could do away with that in one swipe.
1 Mac for engineering and documentation (and other stuff). Decreased maintenance!
Yes, HP, Sun should be running scared right now.
Previously we would not even consider switching to PC's for engineering work because it was not stable enough (when you _need_ your machine to stay up for days), and because of the scripts.
OS X, *BSD and *NIX script compatible and stable and easy to use. YEAH!
What are you talking about? 8000hours straight is less than 1 year.
Oh yeah, maybe you run some crappy operating system...
I dunno about your stuff, but our machines stay on 24x7 all year...for several years.
Get a reak operating system.
We've got you beat. Downtown Vancouver, Canada.
;-)
I get 10Mb/s both ways, full Ethernet. No restrictions. $25/month CANADIAN.
You work that out in USD$.
For $75/month CDN, I get full 10Mb/s both ways plus dedicated IP address and gobs of disk space.
Eat your heart out....
He's not charging it up properly.
The batteries aren't affected by "memory", but they do have a limited number of recharges.
For example, if they quote "500 recharges", it means 500 100% recharges from 0%.
Partial recharges count towards this total. i.e. 1000 50% recharges (from 50%-100% for example).
What is happenning is that these guys didn't read their manual. They left their batter in the machine when they plugged it in. The battery will normally drop to 97-99%, and then the charging kicks in.
You can see that over the course of a day or 2, you can easily build up the equivalent of 100% charge cycle with many 1-3% charges.
There's nothing wrong with the battery. You've just used it up.
(I learned this the expensive way with my Thinkpad 770X).
In fact, it's even better. You can still purchase directly from IBM via their Passport Advantage program. You pay for license _and_ annual support subscription.
A license sounds pretty much like a brand new copy of software to me.
That point of purchase has not been end-of-lifed.
Get it right! She has a mouth. It's under the fur. How do you think she talks? Huh?
The creator said so herself:
Use Java. That's what it's for.
There were teething troubles early on, but most of that has been ironed out. Things run really, really, well, even large applications.
(Look, "Art Of Illusion" is a 3D modelling program written entirely in Java. It runs fine on my PII-300MHz _laptop_).
You get access, not only to SGI, Windows, Linux, AIX, Solaris, but just about any other platform with a JVM. And, Java is really nice to program in to boot.
If you really must use C, use C/C++ for the "back end" (so you can use gcc for everything, even Windows), and just use Java for the GUI.
Honestly. You may think you're skilled, but electrical+electronic+software guys are dime a dozen, even ones that speak 3 languages.
At least they are around here! Can you do physics and biology too? Can you play 3 different musical instruments, cook like a chef and also be near-top level athlete? Now you're talkin...
If you're so clever, go back to school for a graduate degree in something else, write some papers, go to conferences (in other parts of the world) with other people's funding.
Travelling on the cheap is nowhere near as fun as travelling in luxury, which you can do after you get a real job.
Or go teach English in Japan...
Right. That will fix everything. Except an encased chip is TOTALLY USELESS!!!!
You have to get signals in and out of the chip somehow. Either it's pins, solderballs or whatever. The point is that it's a conductive connection.
You _still_ have ESD problem...
If you want to grow and deal with the big boys, use ESD protection. If the Cisco's and Lucent's come down and see you don't have any, it's unlikely they'll want to do business with you.
The reason is simple, ESD damage is REAL. The effects often manifest themselves in subtle ways in which damage is not totally obvious.
For example, one potential problem is a shift in the Vt threshold values of the transistors on the I/O pads of CMOS logic devices. It may still work, but perhaps slower or out of spec. And sometimes the conditions get worse in the field, so that even if it works now, it may not work in 1 year time.
Lastly, YOU may not generate much ESD, but you hire some guy, he wears different shoes, has sweaty or dry feet or whatever, and he zaps a lot of chips.
(Don't laugh, this has happened to us. One guy, we don't know why, kept zapping chips. I suggested he change shoes, and the problem went away. But you need to avoid the problem in the first place with proper ESD protection).
But, as someone pointed out, if you're making $10 disposable devices, then who cares...
If you don't think it will cut it, then you probably don't know how to use it. Matlab has plenty of constructs for doing loops.
Also, there are often times when you DO NOT want to use loops with Matlab. For example, you may create a loop to do matrix multiplication, but you don't do that with Matlab, because it's already been optimized to calculate such stuff. In fact, anytime you can perform an operation with vector math instead of looping, it is _much_ faster.
Did you know you can also compile to C code with Matlab? Is that enough for you.
You have to think about what your target problem is. There are many professors in my department, most have switched OFF of FORTRAN. Why? My favourite quote from one guy (old guy), "I used to spend 2 days programming and debugging. Now it happens in 2 hours with Mathematica"
I feel the same. I get my work done much faster using Matlab/Maple/Mathematica. I don't care how fast the code runs, because the END RESULT is completed much more quickly.
If you don't want to pay for Matlab, Octave is free (and GPL).
There are times when you may still want to use FORTRAN, but that is if the program is relatively short and simple compared to the run-time. Also, for particular fields (e.g. particle physics), there may be "pre-done" routines in FORTRAN for analyzing data a certain way.
In general, I'd recommend staying way from it if you can.
...because you are too North American centric perhaps?
Innotek is based in Germany, I believe, and way over in that island called Europe, there are apparently a lot of OS/2 users (i.e. companies) with deep enough pockets to fund this.
If you were still an OS/2 user, you'd know that IBM still offers updates to OS/2, and the past few rounds, they have been heavily subscribed that they can't press enough CD's in time.
No, OS/2 can't be released as free abandoned ware because it isn't abandoned yet. At least not officially.
You can still purchase OS/2 online (from IBM, who else?), and IBM is still sending out regular updates to customers.
Yes, that includes single home-users like me. Every 6 months, I get a full CD install set of the latest revision, as well as CD's with update patches, features and programs.
All but 1 of the 5 biggest banks in Canada still run OS/2, and I haven't seen any "Windows transition" machines at a branch yet.
Funny, since OS/2 is dead, how come IBM mailed me (and many other users) a brand new copy of OS/2 a couple of weeks ago? Hmmmm....
I've used OS/2 and Linux extensively. How many of you whiners have actually used a recent version of OS/2?
OS/2 provides one of the most consistent interfaces around. It's more configurable than Windows, and easier to configure for Joe Average than anything on Linux.
Linux GUI's, even the latest KDE or GNOME have a long, long way to go to catchup to OS/2's PM + WPS. I only wish those people working on Linux would take a good look at OS/2 and see what's been done already and take some good ideas from it.
...the OS/2 WPS already has.
Per folder (as in real directories on your file system), you can define any window size, icon arrangement, background colour, font, layout (free, grid, etc), large/small icon or just text, just about anything you can imagine.
Customization of colours, fonts, background is all via simple drag 'n drop if you wish.
Great step forward for Linux, but it's just catching up to something been done waaay back in the mid-90's
Err...brilliant yes, but it's a case of BEEN THERE, DONE THAT! Who?
OS/2. No kidding, and you thought it was dead (it isn't).
Most apps are very well behaved, except for the compressed package it usually comes in, you are generally free to move stuff around as you wish.
In fact Serenity Systems (www.serenity-systems.com) has taken this and run with it. Drag 'n drop installation over the network. Deploy your apps to many workstations via a single drag 'n drop.
It can be done because nearly all the functionality is already built into OS/2's WPS.
It may sound revolutionary to some of you, but millions of OS/2 users have already seen this.
We had a project that was probably similar in concept, maybe slightly lower throughput. I don't think the claims are that far fetched.
However, getting one chip working is one thing. Getting an entire box is a whole 'nother trick entirely, as I'm sure they will discover.
They are, obviously short on technical details, but I find no particular reason to disbelieve them. There are a lot of "real" tech companies in Montreal (my ex-company had a branch there), and fewer fakes than other places.
$70million won't last you very long without any other source of revenue. If they are lucky and really, really good, they may have a product out in production in 2-3 years.
No, you need it. Everything is that much sharper.
I run 1280x1024 on a 13.7" LCD screen, no panning. The clarity is noticeable. (It's an IBM Thinkpad).
My next one will be the new Thinkpads, with 1600x1200 on a 14"-15" screen. Awesome.
Resolution doesn't necessarily mean size. You can always scale up icons and fonts (oh wait, you _are_ running an OS that can do that, aren't you?). With that kind of pixel density, it gets closer and closer to printer output
Hey, I still use OS/2...because it works, and it works WELL.
/FS:UDF"? How many of you have an OS that supports USB CD-RW? Hands up if your OS supports up to _64_ way SMP? Who here can still run a pre-emptive multi-tasking OS complete with GUI on a i486, 16MB and fit the OS in under 150MB? It isn't Linux with X. The list of awesome features goes on and on...
Maybe some of you "enlightened" people might do to get out and open your mind a bit before criticizing it. How many of you have actually _used_ OS/2 extensively?
I have used Solaris, HP-UX extensively day in, day out for nearly 10 years. I've used Windows since 3.0 came out...right up to WinXP now. I still have an original Mac Classic. I've been diddling with Linux since back in the RedHat 3.0 days, right up to the the latest version.
My OS of choice is still OS/2, because it's got the applications to get my work done, it's stable, easy to use and easy to maintain.
IBM is STILL putting out fixes and updates and new features for it. Right, how many of you can shove in a CD-RW in your drive and format it to UDF format using a single command line like "format s:
Do your research before you start flaming away?
It looks like the GRAPE boards should be re-configurable. Why'd they do it with custom chips?
A whack of FPGA's should be pretty decent, but you can configure it for more than just as a N-body gravitational problem.
BTW, Akhihabara is over-rated. There's a WHACK of stuff there that we don't get in North. America. But wander for a few hours, and you soon realize that the same store exists on every block, repeated over and over and over...
Besides Akihabara doesn't usually have the best prices. I loafed around all over Tokyo, and it usually has the highest prices. Just pop over on the train to Ikebukero or something, they'll have the same mega chain stores (just not repeated every block) and usually lower prices.
I found digital cameras weren't cheaper or better. The MD players kick ass! 320min playtime per disk now in about the size of 3 3.5" floppies stacked up.
And there there's the colour, digital cell phones about 1/2 the size of ours for about $10-50US. Woohoo!
That depends on your own specific needs. .... That should answer your own question.
:)
If you can download and compile your own Linux distro for free, why would anyone pay for a copy of RedHat or Slackware or
If you are using BeOS, one reason to switch is that OS/2 or eComstation is _alive_, the company isn't looking for a buyout like Be, Inc. is. Another reason is that you can get productive on OS/2 or eCS. On top of big office suites like Lotus Smartsuite or StarOffice, there are many individual apps that are as good or better! Out of all the "alternative" OS, OS/2 has probably one of the hugest software bases of them. (Does Linux count as "alternative" any more?
I think same argument could be made for *BSD! Drivers are pretty darn good for OS/2 | eCS too. How many "alternative" OS have support for the DVD, USB including USB CD-RW's?
As for Linux, that's up to you. Some people like fiddling around and re-compiling their kernels and mussing around with LIB hell. Some don't, I tried and I don't. I just use OS/2 and keep on using and using and using...To me, Linux is not ready yet.
If you are running a big web server farm like Google, OS/2 is probably not your best choice. If you want to play games, OS/2 is probably not your best choice, due to lack of games. If you consider yourself a "power" user, but are not a "hacker" type and you're sick of Windows crap, OS/2 is a good choice.
Look around, compare the offerings and pick the one that is best for your job.
KEEP AN OPEN MIND!
And to those of you who think OS/2 is dead... you should keep up with the times. IBM is still spending $$$ on programmers to update and bug fix OS/2. Do you think they blow money just for the heck of it? They do it because they have many, many paying customers that justify the expense.
No I'm not. Read what I said carefully.
You are perfectly correct, it can switch between streams of data every 5ns.
Let's hope that your data arrives in one stream, because if that single 1Gb/s data stream you sent out is switched in the mid-stream, you have a bottle neck.
You weenies! Whip out your calculators.
Switching packets at 5ns is switching them at 200MHz.
Assuming you're not using any double edge clocking scheme, that's only 200Mbit/s.
With data streams coming in at well over 1Gb/s, that's a pretty high latency. Once you accomplish the switch, you better be pumping a lot of data through that channel so as not to be a bottleneck. Else, it will be holding up all that traffic.
Who cares? If you want an Ogg Vorbis accelerator, there's nothing to stop you from implementing that in an FPGA RIGHT NOW. Go ahead. Isn't it open source? You only have to port it to VHDL or Verilog.
So now you've done that. You got a working FPGA. What are you going to do with it? Riiiight...we should all go about building our own audio hardware accelerators.
Well, it might work if you actually make CPU's, where people can just plug it into their motherboards. Even then, it's really kind of pointless. If I have the "code" for a SPARC, and I give it to you, that's still almost worthless.
1) You have to Fabricate this damn chip. Do you have $250,000US kicking around? That's about how much you'll need for a 0.25um mask set (yup, not even cutting edge). Minimum 6-8 weeks to get this done.
2) You want to make changes to a working design? HAHA! Another quarter million to Fab that change. And another 6-8 weeks.
3) Ooops! The new design didn't quite work. Why not? Do you know how to debug? Let's say yes. Do you have access to a high-speed IC tester to check it out? $5million a pop. Or maybe you can rent one. That's about $300/hour.
By this time, you should be thinking "Why don't I just walk over the the local computer shop 10minutes away and plunk down $200 for a new K7?"
I mean, if I think I had something to contribute to CPU design, I might (wild idea), GO GET A JOB at AMD, or Intel or wherever...
There's not too much value in open-sourcing your CPU design. The Verilog or VHDL code may be verified to be 100% correct, but that code doesn't mean that your silicon is 100% correct.
Hey, I worked in US for a bit just outside the capital area. You call that freedom? You get watched everywhere you go it seems. Security checks for public monuments that are more stringent than what I get at the airport back home.
Canada, I feel safe. Not only from crime, but from "Big Brother" or whatever you wanna call it. Is the government watching my back? Ha! Don't know and don't care because I know nothing will happen of it.
Yup, I feel FREE here (not as in beer), I can do and go wherever I want and nobody really bothers me.
Look, if you are used to living in the USA, Canada is similar. Except nobody's after us, and we're a laid back peaceful lot, so Da Man has no reason (or money) to keep an eye on everyone. That and we managed to teach our kids Metric. We don't live in igloos. Really.
(Hey, but if you come up, leave your guns and pissy beer down there, eh?)