If you get in, please submit a better webpage than this:)
...made me think. Whoever can make it into this box gets to replace the web page with whatever they want...they become owners and get to be "King of the Hill". Plus, if they acquire root access, then they presumably have the power to patch whatever hole they crawled through, making the box that much more secure.
But what could really prove interesting is if someone tried to break in and steal from the stealer...knocking off the old King and resulting in a King of the Hill, and so on...
All the while, people would be stress-testing the system. And people will have an ego-incentive to discover security holes because, if they find a way in, they get to be "King of the Mountain" until someone else finds a new way to crack the box.
Support for a full, robust journalling filesystem would be worthy of a major number increment (Linux 3.0). Filesystems (especially modern journalling ones) are *very* complicated and *very* fundamental to the system. If your filesystem only works correctly 99.9% of the time, your system is *wholly* unusable.
The changes that you mention are in the planning stages, but will take a very long time to implement and an equally long time before they are deemed "stable". 2.4 is supposed to be a quick cycle, so such changes do not fit in its scope.
As for what *is* new in 2.4, Pranevich put together a nice piece called the "Wonderful World of Linux 2.4" (just as he did for Linux 2.2). It is on Linux Today, and I suggest you check it out.
...and then you pointed to Mackido for "intelligently-written" articles. That's when you lost credibility in my eyes.
I would really like the PowerPC to succeed. Its a nice design (fast, low power, clean architecture), but in the current market you pretty much have to buy a Mac (or IBM workstation) to get a functioning system with one. The chip itself comes at a very reasonable price, but that doesn't help us, the end consumers, very much.
And Intel is *not* behind the curve...yet. They may be shortly, but even if they do fall behind, there are other x86 makers. I have great hopes for AMD. I'm not sure how much more Intel can squeeze out of the dated P6 line, and they probably don't either. They intended to be transitioning to IA-64 by now. If the delays continue much longer, they could start to lose market share. But lose market share to whom?
I think the Windows crowd (read: the BIG market) is too tied to x86 to hop over to PowerPC or Alpha without a fight. I don't think that sort of change will happen so long as *someone* produces a decent x86.
I'm curious to see what will come out of the next few quarters. I think it will be an interesting time for microprocessor enthusiasts to watch.
I'd rather get a NLX case/MB and use standard PC hardware. I don't like the idea of scrounging for obscure (and likely expensive) hardware to get a free box working. Of course, anything free is cool, so I may have to get one anyway...
BTW- I've read that older Mac hard drives work well in the Multias...
And please keep in mind that the American attacks were an act of war. Should we take China's (believed) attacks against (presumably) American citizens and companies as an act of war?
Its all over...why didn't someone tell me? My IIIx is arriving on Monday! How could they do this too me?:)
I agree with the author: the Palm enthusiast craze is reminiscent of the early PC world. And they are ultra-cool. Heck, PalmChess is enough of a reason to own one.
BTW- All geeks should seriously think about picking up a Palm. They are almost requisite geek gear. The III's are really cheap right now, so you can jump on the boat for not much dough. Seriously, if I had waited much longer to get a Palm, my LUG probably would have kicked me out...
I'm rather sure that I have read that that was your stated opinion in multiple places. It seems that either I misremember, or those sources were incorrect. Sincere apologies: I am sorry to misquote you.
Obviously I need to be more careful about my quoting. It seems that *everyone* reads Slashdot these days. Hmmm, I used a Stroustrop quote a few days ago... I wonder if he happened to read my post? Atleast I pulled that one out of his book...
I will make one point. When Netscape released the browser source, it was unusable and uncompilable. There were large sections of code that were licensed from other companies and had to be ripped out before the source could be released. Mozilla started with a massive, hairy code base that was far from working order. That initial release was an overwhelming chunk of broken code, and it turned away many potential developers. JWZ has stated that it would have been better just to have started over from scratch. People wouldn't have had as much to learn before they became useful.
What I am saying is that Mozilla had problems acquiring developers because Netscape botched that initial release. In the Open Source world, you should always have a working chunk of code before announcing your project and looking to sign up developers.
A web browser is a large project, but is it fundamentally more difficult than a kernel, or a compiler? I do not believe it is. The initial reaction was problematic, but perhaps as the milestones roll on, more developers will get their hands dirty in the project. As for "flocks of developers", I don't think Netscape or the community realistically expected that. What *is* expected is a community willing to fill out bug reports.
You can by cynical about the project if you like, but I'm not sure why you are smearing it around Slashdot. Does it offend you that some are optimistic about the project? If you don't think its going anywhere, just ignore it -- you can filter out Netscape stories from your Slashdot account. I, for one, really *want* it to succeed, because once we have it, I can eliminate Netscape which is the last proprietary chunk of code on my box.
--Lenny, who is going to download the latest build right now.
It is a piece of advice in "The C++ Programming Language". I believe the quote runs:
Never attempt a technological solution to a sociological problem.
I think that this advice is valid here as well. Now, raising a child is a social activity. Keeping that child away from harmful influences should also be a social activity. Parents and teachers should be interacting with a child, and teaching them what is "right", in addition to shielding them from what is "wrong".
It seems, though, that the schools do not want to provide guidence to the children. They do not want to take an active role in the child rearing. Perhaps that would be too much trouble? Instead, they let the TV or internet bring up a child. It is too much trouble to be actively involved in a child's activities, so they want to buy a box that will do the parenting for them. That is the real problem: many people are hoping that some commercial product can replace parental guidance, and teaching.
We know that web censorship can not work because we understand how vast and uncharted the web truly is. However, there are more fundamental problems with the scheme: this is an improper application of technology. Software can never replace parental care and intervention. Never.
Also: kids are going to find their way to illicit material no matter what their guardians do. When I was a kid in the pre-web world, we all had access bomb guides, satanic writings, and porn. We were curious, so we explored. Very few got wrapped up in it, and we're all balanced adults now. The web doesn't fundamentally change children's curiousity, it just makes information more accessible.
Finally, let me say that the importance of good teaching is terribly overlooked in American schools. I think that the money schools are spending on computers, televisions, and internet access could be much better applied to finding good teachers and paying them reasonably. I took my HS CS courses with archaic hardware and software, but I had a fabulous teacher and, as a result, learned a great deal. Tech is glittery and exciting, but no replacement for old-fashioned good teaching
and hence can't have a single filesystem striped across it (atleast not in the sense that ext2fs is a filesystem), but I have to wonder... What is the upward limit on the size of an ext2fs partition?
The capacity of hard drives seems to be increasing exponentially, and I wonder how long ext2fs will remain serviceable. Of course, there are a few replacements already in the works, and hopefully we'll have the IRIX filesystem soon, anyway.
All that said, everything important on my system (less the mp3's) still fits on a 1.6 GB drive. Linux installs just *don't* take that much space. Maybe I should get into sound editing to fill up my other drive...
What makes the Visual Workstations better than a Dell is their very customized video subsystems. I can't quote exact numbers, but the systems have ridiculously video high bandwidth, which makes them usable in video applications that traditional PC's would fall flat in.
Besides the video system, though, I think the rest of the appeal is the industrial design aspect. Cool looking (Non-translucent) cases, and sci-fi looking LCD displays.
I can't speak at how proprietary the hardware is, but if they write open source drivers for it so that they can install Linux, do you really care? Closed hardware doesn't bother me at all, but closed API's do, and if their drivers are GPL (or something close to it), and they don't try to close the thing up like Glide, everything is fine.
And it seems that they really are embracing Linux. Lets not forget their intent to release IRIX's journalling filesystem. This is no small deal: the lack of a journalling FS has been holding Linux back. Quite likely, they will phase out IRIX and slowly contribute to Linux those few high end features which it still lacks.
so that Linux can catch up to the big boys in the FS department. This is no small act, and I do hope that it is executed quickly.
With them releasing Linux boxes, we should atleast get drivers out of them (hopefully free), and hopefully they will support some of the big projects.
I always liked that the Palm was monochrome. Its useful for text, organizers, and maybe small games (chess and interactive fiction!). I see little benefit that those apps would receive from color.
Plus, the Palm platform is all about *efficiency*. One of the coolest thing about them is that a III will run for months on the same batteries. I fear that color displays and the processors to drive them will greatly increase the battery consumption of these devices, and provide little benefit.
Of course, color makes people say "ooooh, aaaaah", which might sell more Palms, but does it really help productivity? I've always knocked the wince machines for being hardware pieced together with no direct use in mind. They just don't seem well thought-out. It's as if the designers were thinking: "Cool! It's like Windows, but smaller!" That's how I think of the color displays, as well. Why does a pad need to have color? "Because my desktop system has color!"
Now, the one thing that *could* be done with bright colors is a transition to a combined portable organizer/game machine. (Heck, even Game Boy went color). I must confess, I would like a Palm that could occasionally pick up a Game Gear game or two. Of course, none could be as cool as Palm Chess, but...
This thing is written in PERL/GTK. The moment you need a disk partitioner is during initial install. However, during install you probably don't have PERL or GTK installed.
The whole idea of a GUI based install seems slightly suspect to me: I want to be relying on as few components as possible during install. This program depends on having X configured/ running (even if only with a default VGA server), perhaps a basic window manager, a (kitchen-sink) kernel, probably a shell (ash?), PERL and GTK. That is quite a bit of code.
In this decadent era of LCD displays and bootable CD-ROMs, it may well be possible to keep all these dependencies on a "live" filesystem on the CD-ROM. In such case, this may be a workable solution. However, I do all my installs over FTP, and I don't want to have to pull all that code base over a pipe (especially a modem), just so I can look at pictures instead of ASCII.
I like Mandrake, and I'm glad they are trying to further the cause. And, despite my views, having a graphical partitioning program is probably a Good Thing for bringing more users to Linux. But, I still think that, in this case, the minimal approach is the wiser.
I happened to be on the Palm site this morning and saw the IIIe section -- of which I had never heard. I quickly scoured the net looking for information on it, but could find none. I guess I happened on it just before the press release. It's pretty good when you are more current than Slashdot...:)
Anyway, the comparison is as follows: it is a III with the newer screen and OS. Otherwise it is the same (also 2 MB of RAM) except that it isn't upgradeable. Oh, and its slightly cheaper.
It sounds like a fair deal to me, actually... -Lenny
Are you telling us that extra-beautiful is bad because it may make some people have lower self-esteem?
Like it or not, quite a large portion of society feels this way. I know many feminists who rant on and on about how they despise models because they set "an impossible standard" against which all women unconsciously compare themselves. The feminists are certainly not the only ones who feel this is true, either.
Certainly quite a number of American women are obsessed with weight. I know a number of fairly intelligent women who work desperately to acquire or maintain a medically unhealthy weight. They feel they are "too fat", no matter what medical science tells them.
I tend to agree with you: self image problems are a result of the individual, not this whispy "cultural ideal" that is supposedly formed by models and entertainers. However, our voices are dwarfed by the large number of people who do blame the media. I find that quite a lot of women resent the modelling industry even as they try desperately to resemble models.
First of all, I don't really believe that VIA/Cyrix has the funding, staff or reputation to take be a contender in the forseeable future.
Second, my impression of the Cyrix acquisition was that VIA took the parts of Cyrix that National was going to chop: specifically the x86 pin compatible line. I believe that National has held onto the MediaGX line, which means VIA probably only got their hands on the 686/MII lines -- none of the "integration" products. No doubt these cores could be helpful to them in developing a new SOAC, but they still have a ways to go.
Anyone know any hard facts about what VIA bought from National? --Lenny
I didn't say anything bad about QNX, I was just griping about a part of their press release, which was probably inserted by marketing-types.
I understand that QNX is a solid RTOS, and very stable. As for POSIX, even NT has a a POSIX layer. However, the "20 years" statement was misleading, because it implied that Unix and BSD are young, immature and somehow less "advanced". I expect they define advanced to mean "hard real-time". Well, QNX will definately win that battle because it is designed to be RT, and Linux/BSD are designed to be general purpose.
I'll also tell you that I have no need for a RTOS, and wonder how they think having one will benefit the next Amiga. Amiga has long been a tool of the video editor, but I would like to point out that video is a *soft* real-time application. Where you really *need* something like QNX is in medical or industrial machinery.
Also, any QNX fans out there should check out RTLinux :
http://rtlinux.cs.nmt.edu/~rtlinux/
Its not just a hack on top Linux...in fact, its a hack *under* Linux since they run a Linux kernel as a user process on top of a hard real time kernel. It looks very interesting to me and supposedly gets good performance.
Certainly it is less expensive than QNX. It would be great for anyone who just has a personal interest in learning about hard real time systems.
One quote I cannot let lie...the articles mentions that QNX is often compared to Unix, Linux and BSD, and counters, saying:
Based on 20 years of OS experience, QNX has a radically more advanced architecture.
While Linux may be relatively young, Unix and BSD are older than that, my friend. And about the most advanced "architecture" that I've ever seen is the BeOS, which is far from old. Age means maturity and often stability, but its correlation to how "advanced" an OS is just isn't very solid.
I also agree with the above posters: Where's the Amiga? This looks like 100% QNX software and x86 hardware. --Lenny
The Alfredo Interview was posted earlier...
on
QuickieWorld
·
· Score: 2
And I'll restate that Alfredo needs a new computer! He mentions in the interview that he develops Window Maker on a P100/16MB machine. Even $200 worth of upgrade hardware would make all the difference in the world.
There are plenty of Window Maker lovers on Slashdot. Could we put together an "Alfredo Needs An Upgrade" fund? If it was organized by someone trustworthy like Rob, I'd pitch in my US$20.
anyone else with me, or should I bring it up with my LUG? --Lenny
You know, I had been meaning to send Alfredo a CD for some time. (I'm thinking he could use something good and Texan, like Stevie Ray Vaughn) But after reading about his P100/16 MB development machine, I am thinking about taking up a collection to buy the boy a new computer!
These days you can grab a K6-2/400 and 64 MB of the good stuff on a decent motherboard for around $200 online. I'm seriously thinking about passing the hat at the next LUG meeting. Its certainly a good cause... EVERYONE loves Window Maker.
I fully believe that Window Maker is the best window manager ever written, and I feel a great debt to Alfredo for this solid and well-designed piece of code. I'm forever spoiled for other window managers.
I'm just curious about the shipping to Brazil, --Lenny
anyone pronouncing this SDMI format as "sodomy" yet. I'm telling you, it will be the next cute net joke. Why, its almost as easy as "wince".
I've never been much for the disparaging name thing (though I do say "wince"). But, I really think this one is inevitable. So, we go from "scuzzy" to "sodomy". Why not?
This is ridiculous, ESR keeps trying to lay claim on all of the success of Linux, GNU et al. As if OSI magically made this all happen, and we should thank him dearly for giving us our operating systems.
Can he really *believe* that? ESR is an outspoken advocate, but that is about all as for as I am concered. RMS created this movement to begin with, and wrote a big chunk of the software himself. I don't take GNU lightly.
ESR thinks that RMS is too extreme to be an effective advocate. He is right, but I don't think that advocacy is first on RMS's mind. He wants to write the software, and share it with other hackers. He also wants to get his message across, but his message is "freedom is important, don't give it up", rather than "please, please use this software".
Who's talking and who's coding? RMS's responce was short and to the point. I expect after hitting "send" he went straight back to hacking. What did ESR do?
I saw "Quake II for Linux" advertised. I was shocked. Not only were they stocking a version specifically for Linux, they were advertising it in the paper. They must perceive a market.
To me, this is a strong indication that the change is taking place.
I am not surprised that AMD decided not to sell this chip as the "K7". Why? Simple: they think that they really have something on their hands this time around. They want a trademarkable name to prevent anyone from trying to make "knock-off" K7's! This is exactly the reason that Intel called the 586 the "Pentium" -- so that AMD and Cyrix couldn't sell their designs with the same name. Intel tried to trademark "586", but the courts said that it was too generic to own. I expect that "K7" is no different.
So AMD now thinks that, with this chip, they can crawl out from under Intel, and become a dominant player. So dominant, that they fear AMD clones.
What happens when the clones get cloned? --Lenny (who likes AMD)
Slashdot Mirror
But what could really prove interesting is if someone tried to break in and steal from the stealer...knocking off the old King and resulting in a King of the Hill, and so on...
All the while, people would be stress-testing the system. And people will have an ego-incentive to discover security holes because, if they find a way in, they get to be "King of the Mountain" until someone else finds a new way to crack the box.
Oh what a game this could become!!!
--Lenny
Support for a full, robust journalling filesystem would be worthy of a major number increment (Linux 3.0). Filesystems (especially modern journalling ones) are *very* complicated and *very* fundamental to the system. If your filesystem only works correctly 99.9% of the time, your system is *wholly* unusable.
The changes that you mention are in the planning stages, but will take a very long time to implement and an equally long time before they are deemed "stable". 2.4 is supposed to be a quick cycle, so such changes do not fit in its scope.
As for what *is* new in 2.4, Pranevich put together a nice piece called the "Wonderful World of Linux 2.4" (just as he did for Linux 2.2). It is on Linux Today, and I suggest you check it out.
--Lenny
...and then you pointed to Mackido for "intelligently-written" articles. That's when you lost credibility in my eyes.
I would really like the PowerPC to succeed. Its a nice design (fast, low power, clean architecture), but in the current market you pretty much have to buy a Mac (or IBM workstation) to get a functioning system with one. The chip itself comes at a very reasonable price, but that doesn't help us, the end consumers, very much.
And Intel is *not* behind the curve...yet. They may be shortly, but even if they do fall behind, there are other x86 makers. I have great hopes for AMD. I'm not sure how much more Intel can squeeze out of the dated P6 line, and they probably don't either. They intended to be transitioning to IA-64 by now. If the delays continue much longer, they could start to lose market share. But lose market share to whom?
I think the Windows crowd (read: the BIG market) is too tied to x86 to hop over to PowerPC or Alpha without a fight. I don't think that sort of change will happen so long as *someone* produces a decent x86.
I'm curious to see what will come out of the next few quarters. I think it will be an interesting time for microprocessor enthusiasts to watch.
--Lenny
I'd rather get a NLX case/MB and use standard PC hardware. I don't like the idea of scrounging for obscure (and likely expensive) hardware to get a free box working. Of course, anything free is cool, so I may have to get one anyway...
BTW- I've read that older Mac hard drives work well in the Multias...
--Lenny
And please keep in mind that the American attacks were an act of war. Should we take China's (believed) attacks against (presumably) American citizens and companies as an act of war?
--Lenny
Its all over...why didn't someone tell me? My IIIx is arriving on Monday! How could they do this too me? :)
I agree with the author: the Palm enthusiast craze is reminiscent of the early PC world. And they are ultra-cool. Heck, PalmChess is enough of a reason to own one.
BTW- All geeks should seriously think about picking up a Palm. They are almost requisite geek gear. The III's are really cheap right now, so you can jump on the boat for not much dough. Seriously, if I had waited much longer to get a Palm, my LUG probably would have kicked me out...
--Lenny
I'm rather sure that I have read that that was your stated opinion in multiple places. It seems that either I misremember, or those sources were incorrect. Sincere apologies: I am sorry to misquote you.
... I wonder if he happened to read my post? Atleast I pulled that one out of his book...
Obviously I need to be more careful about my quoting. It seems that *everyone* reads Slashdot these days. Hmmm, I used a Stroustrop quote a few days ago
BTW- JWZ: I love xscreensaver.
--Lenny
I will make one point. When Netscape released the browser source, it was unusable and uncompilable. There were large sections of code that were licensed from other companies and had to be ripped out before the source could be released. Mozilla started with a massive, hairy code base that was far from working order. That initial release was an overwhelming chunk of broken code, and it turned away many potential developers. JWZ has stated that it would have been better just to have started over from scratch. People wouldn't have had as much to learn before they became useful.
What I am saying is that Mozilla had problems acquiring developers because Netscape botched that initial release. In the Open Source world, you should always have a working chunk of code before announcing your project and looking to sign up developers.
A web browser is a large project, but is it fundamentally more difficult than a kernel, or a compiler? I do not believe it is. The initial reaction was problematic, but perhaps as the milestones roll on, more developers will get their hands dirty in the project. As for "flocks of developers", I don't think Netscape or the community realistically expected that. What *is* expected is a community willing to fill out bug reports.
You can by cynical about the project if you like, but I'm not sure why you are smearing it around Slashdot. Does it offend you that some are optimistic about the project? If you don't think its going anywhere, just ignore it -- you can filter out Netscape stories from your Slashdot account. I, for one, really *want* it to succeed, because once we have it, I can eliminate Netscape which is the last proprietary chunk of code on my box.
--Lenny, who is going to download the latest build right now.
It seems, though, that the schools do not want to provide guidence to the children. They do not want to take an active role in the child rearing. Perhaps that would be too much trouble? Instead, they let the TV or internet bring up a child. It is too much trouble to be actively involved in a child's activities, so they want to buy a box that will do the parenting for them. That is the real problem: many people are hoping that some commercial product can replace parental guidance, and teaching.
We know that web censorship can not work because we understand how vast and uncharted the web truly is. However, there are more fundamental problems with the scheme: this is an improper application of technology. Software can never replace parental care and intervention. Never.
Also: kids are going to find their way to illicit material no matter what their guardians do. When I was a kid in the pre-web world, we all had access bomb guides, satanic writings, and porn. We were curious, so we explored. Very few got wrapped up in it, and we're all balanced adults now. The web doesn't fundamentally change children's curiousity, it just makes information more accessible.
Finally, let me say that the importance of good teaching is terribly overlooked in American schools. I think that the money schools are spending on computers, televisions, and internet access could be much better applied to finding good teachers and paying them reasonably. I took my HS CS courses with archaic hardware and software, but I had a fabulous teacher and, as a result, learned a great deal. Tech is glittery and exciting, but no replacement for old-fashioned good teaching
--Lenny, who is ranting more than normal today.
and hence can't have a single filesystem striped across it (atleast not in the sense that ext2fs is a filesystem), but I have to wonder... What is the upward limit on the size of an ext2fs partition?
The capacity of hard drives seems to be increasing exponentially, and I wonder how long ext2fs will remain serviceable. Of course, there are a few replacements already in the works, and hopefully we'll have the IRIX filesystem soon, anyway.
All that said, everything important on my system (less the mp3's) still fits on a 1.6 GB drive. Linux installs just *don't* take that much space.
Maybe I should get into sound editing to fill up my other drive...
--Lenny
What makes the Visual Workstations better than a Dell is their very customized video subsystems. I can't quote exact numbers, but the systems have ridiculously video high bandwidth, which makes them usable in video applications that traditional PC's would fall flat in.
Besides the video system, though, I think the rest of the appeal is the industrial design aspect. Cool looking (Non-translucent) cases, and sci-fi looking LCD displays.
I can't speak at how proprietary the hardware is, but if they write open source drivers for it so that they can install Linux, do you really care? Closed hardware doesn't bother me at all, but closed API's do, and if their drivers are GPL (or something close to it), and they don't try to close the thing up like Glide, everything is fine.
And it seems that they really are embracing Linux. Lets not forget their intent to release IRIX's journalling filesystem. This is no small deal: the lack of a journalling FS has been holding Linux back. Quite likely, they will phase out IRIX and slowly contribute to Linux those few high end features which it still lacks.
so that Linux can catch up to the big boys in the FS department. This is no small act, and I do hope that it is executed quickly.
With them releasing Linux boxes, we should atleast get drivers out of them (hopefully free), and hopefully they will support some of the big projects.
Anyone out there use these things for a living?
I always liked that the Palm was monochrome. Its useful for text, organizers, and maybe small games (chess and interactive fiction!). I see little benefit that those apps would receive from color.
Plus, the Palm platform is all about *efficiency*. One of the coolest thing about them is that a III will run for months on the same batteries. I fear that color displays and the processors to drive them will greatly increase the battery consumption of these devices, and provide little benefit.
Of course, color makes people say "ooooh, aaaaah", which might sell more Palms, but does it really help productivity? I've always knocked the wince machines for being hardware pieced together with no direct use in mind. They just don't seem well thought-out. It's as if the designers were thinking: "Cool! It's like Windows, but smaller!" That's how I think of the color displays, as well. Why does a pad need to have color? "Because my desktop system has color!"
Now, the one thing that *could* be done with bright colors is a transition to a combined portable organizer/game machine. (Heck, even Game Boy went color). I must confess, I would like a Palm that could occasionally pick up a Game Gear game or two. Of course, none could be as cool as Palm Chess, but...
--Lenny
This thing is written in PERL/GTK. The moment you need a disk partitioner is during initial install. However, during install you probably don't have PERL or GTK installed.
The whole idea of a GUI based install seems slightly suspect to me: I want to be relying on as few components as possible during install. This program depends on having X configured/ running (even if only with a default VGA server), perhaps a basic window manager, a (kitchen-sink) kernel, probably a shell (ash?), PERL and GTK. That is quite a bit of code.
In this decadent era of LCD displays and bootable CD-ROMs, it may well be possible to keep all these dependencies on a "live" filesystem on the CD-ROM. In such case, this may be a workable solution. However, I do all my installs over FTP, and I don't want to have to pull all that code base over a pipe (especially a modem), just so I can look at pictures instead of ASCII.
I like Mandrake, and I'm glad they are trying to further the cause. And, despite my views, having a graphical partitioning program is probably a Good Thing for bringing more users to Linux. But, I still think that, in this case, the minimal approach is the wiser.
--Lenny
I happened to be on the Palm site this morning and saw the IIIe section -- of which I had never heard. I quickly scoured the net looking for information on it, but could find none. I guess I happened on it just before the press release. It's pretty good when you are more current than Slashdot... :)
Anyway, the comparison is as follows: it is a III with the newer screen and OS. Otherwise it is the same (also 2 MB of RAM) except that it isn't upgradeable. Oh, and its slightly cheaper.
It sounds like a fair deal to me, actually...
-Lenny
Certainly quite a number of American women are obsessed with weight. I know a number of fairly intelligent women who work desperately to acquire or maintain a medically unhealthy weight. They feel they are "too fat", no matter what medical science tells them.
I tend to agree with you: self image problems are a result of the individual, not this whispy "cultural ideal" that is supposedly formed by models and entertainers. However, our voices are dwarfed by the large number of people who do blame the media. I find that quite a lot of women resent the modelling industry even as they try desperately to resemble models.
--Lenny
First of all, I don't really believe that VIA/Cyrix has the funding, staff or reputation to take be a contender in the forseeable future.
Second, my impression of the Cyrix acquisition was that VIA took the parts of Cyrix that National was going to chop: specifically the x86 pin compatible line. I believe that National has held onto the MediaGX line, which means VIA probably only got their hands on the 686/MII lines -- none of the "integration" products. No doubt these cores could be helpful to them in developing a new SOAC, but they still have a ways to go.
Anyone know any hard facts about what VIA bought from National?
--Lenny
It would be nice. I look forward to the day when I can get a PPC system that I don't have to buy from Apple.
I'd love to learn more about the RS/6000. They are supposed to be solid boxes. And, stable as it may be, I've met few people who like using AIX.
More architectures is certainly a good thing.
--Lenny
I didn't say anything bad about QNX, I was just griping about a part of their press release, which was probably inserted by marketing-types.
I understand that QNX is a solid RTOS, and very stable. As for POSIX, even NT has a a POSIX layer. However, the "20 years" statement was misleading, because it implied that Unix and BSD are young, immature and somehow less "advanced". I expect they define advanced to mean "hard real-time". Well, QNX will definately win that battle because it is designed to be RT, and Linux/BSD are designed to be general purpose.
I'll also tell you that I have no need for a RTOS, and wonder how they think having one will benefit the next Amiga. Amiga has long been a tool of the video editor, but I would like to point out that video is a *soft* real-time application. Where you really *need* something like QNX is in medical or industrial machinery.
Also, any QNX fans out there should check out RTLinux :
http://rtlinux.cs.nmt.edu/~rtlinux/
Its not just a hack on top Linux...in fact, its a hack *under* Linux since they run a Linux kernel as a user process on top of a hard real time kernel. It looks very interesting to me and supposedly gets good performance.
Certainly it is less expensive than QNX. It would be great for anyone who just has a personal interest in learning about hard real time systems.
--Lenny
I also agree with the above posters: Where's the Amiga? This looks like 100% QNX software and x86 hardware.
--Lenny
And I'll restate that Alfredo needs a new computer! He mentions in the interview that he develops Window Maker on a P100/16MB machine. Even $200 worth of upgrade hardware would make all the difference in the world.
There are plenty of Window Maker lovers on Slashdot. Could we put together an "Alfredo Needs An Upgrade" fund? If it was organized by someone trustworthy like Rob, I'd pitch in my US$20.
anyone else with me, or should I bring it up with my LUG?
--Lenny
You know, I had been meaning to send Alfredo a CD for some time. (I'm thinking he could use something good and Texan, like Stevie Ray Vaughn) But after reading about his P100/16 MB development machine, I am thinking about taking up a collection to buy the boy a new computer!
... EVERYONE loves Window Maker.
These days you can grab a K6-2/400 and 64 MB of the good stuff on a decent motherboard for around $200 online. I'm seriously thinking about passing the hat at the next LUG meeting. Its certainly a good cause
I fully believe that Window Maker is the best window manager ever written, and I feel a great debt to Alfredo for this solid and well-designed piece of code. I'm forever spoiled for other window managers.
I'm just curious about the shipping to Brazil,
--Lenny
anyone pronouncing this SDMI format as "sodomy" yet. I'm telling you, it will be the next cute net joke. Why, its almost as easy as "wince".
I've never been much for the disparaging name thing (though I do say "wince"). But, I really think this one is inevitable. So, we go from "scuzzy" to "sodomy". Why not?
Wow, I may have dubbed a pronounciation.
--Lenny
This is ridiculous, ESR keeps trying to lay claim on all of the success of Linux, GNU et al. As if OSI magically made this all happen, and we should thank him dearly for giving us our operating systems.
Can he really *believe* that? ESR is an outspoken advocate, but that is about all as for as I am concered. RMS created this movement to begin with, and wrote a big chunk of the software himself. I don't take GNU lightly.
ESR thinks that RMS is too extreme to be an effective advocate. He is right, but I don't think that advocacy is first on RMS's mind. He wants to write the software, and share it with other hackers. He also wants to get his message across, but his message is "freedom is important, don't give it up", rather than "please, please use this software".
Who's talking and who's coding? RMS's responce was short and to the point. I expect after hitting "send" he went straight back to hacking. What did ESR do?
--Lenny
I saw "Quake II for Linux" advertised. I was shocked. Not only were they stocking a version specifically for Linux, they were advertising it in the paper. They must perceive a market.
To me, this is a strong indication that the change is taking place.
--Lenny
I am not surprised that AMD decided not to sell this chip as the "K7". Why? Simple: they think that they really have something on their hands this time around. They want a trademarkable name to prevent anyone from trying to make "knock-off" K7's! This is exactly the reason that Intel called the 586 the "Pentium" -- so that AMD and Cyrix couldn't sell their designs with the same name. Intel tried to trademark "586", but the courts said that it was too generic to own. I expect that "K7" is no different.
So AMD now thinks that, with this chip, they can crawl out from under Intel, and become a dominant player. So dominant, that they fear AMD clones.
What happens when the clones get cloned?
--Lenny (who likes AMD)