I'm surprised that it's gotten this far without somebody mentioning science fiction.
H. Beam Piper's stories included a standard trope, in which there were many publicly available cameras in various places. "Telescreen" users used their output instead of wallpaper images, and Pappy Jack used surveillance images of a forest fire to scare Little Fuzzy.
Hey, slashdotters! Who wants to step up and provide that service?
This is a bit of technojargon. As far as I know, it originated with op-amp developers. Alsee has it right, but perhaps you'd like a little more development of the idea.
"Chopping" refers to turning the DC on and off so as to generate an alternating current that can be used in transformers. Modern power supplies do it the way described because higher frequencies allow smaller and lighter transformers for the same power level. Older-style, mains-frequency transformers are big and heavy, and aren't efficient -- largely because the low frequency means they need iron, and the iron has hysteresis and other losses.
Really small, cheap, low-power power supplies don't even use transformers any more. They use capacitors and diodes in voltage-doubler circuits.
The problem Ballard (and almost everyone else) is having is the catalyst.
Fuel cells require platinum as a catalyst to keep the reaction temperature down to where the materials can survive. I've been following the tech desultorily for quite a while; several people have tried palladium or rhenium, with generally bad results, and anyway rhenium is harder to get than platinum, and all the palladium is going into catalytic reactors for cars.
The problem is that platinum is hard to work with; a very high melting point, low vapor pressure, and not very "sticky". So all the wonderful vacuum-deposition tricks that are useful with aluminum and other metals fall down.
Which leaves foil and pressure, which is what they mostly use. The trouble with that is that it uses a _lot_ of platinum -- the foil has to be thick enough to handle, which is way overkill for the amount needed for the fuel cell. The number I heard was that a 1000KW fuel cell -- about right for a high-powered car, or a medium-small truck -- would need $30,000 worth of platinum. Ouch.
So put your thinking caps on. If you can work out a reliable, relatively cheap way to do vacuum deposition of platinum that can be process controlled to give an even coat at the one-molecule-thick level, load the gear on your truck and take it to Vancouver. The folks at Ballard will be glad to see you.
For roughly a decade, Bill & Co. could Do No Wrong. Darlings of the press, celebrated in every computer rag.
Once at the lake I was watching as a couple of drunk teenagers took daddy's boat around at high speed. Another boat got in front; the driver chopped the throttle -- and the following wave drowned the $5,000 highly chromed super duper engine. glug!
Or you might like Jeremiah better: They that sow the wind, shall reap the whirl-wind.
Mr. Perens has (as usual) an apt comment. Disclaimers: 1) IANAL 2) I am not directly associated with Open Source Software.
The concept of due diligence is hyper important. In fact, a finding of negligence is essentially a finding that due diligence was not performed.
What I have seen of Open Source indicates that the people who work on it are extremely "diligent" where bugs of all kinds, not just security bugs, are concerned. When one is reported, generally someone gets after it right away, to (1) confirm it's there (2) figure out what a fix should be and (3) fix it. This is an historical pattern, I believe, and could be substantiated by lots of testimony.
Note that the Law doesn't require that the bugs actually be fixed, or that the fix be better than the bug was. Due diligence simply means that all reasonable methods were used to conclude what the problem was and how it might be fixed, and to fix it if it seemed warranted.
Note that in the Pinto and GM Truck cases mentioned above, due diligence broke down -- the companies involved concluded that the problem existed, but that it wasn't economically justifiable to fix it, that is, the necessary fix would cost so much that it wasn't worth it. The Court, in general, is hostile to this view, to say the least.
There's also the matter of 'deep pockets' and political correctness. Even with all the malicious hacker stories in the press, you still wouldn't get very many lawyers willing to sue some 26-year-old nerd for negligence in fixing a software bug; defense lawyer starts telling sob stories, and it's likely to turn the whole thing around -- plus, how much are you likely to get? An Open Source programmer isn't likely to have much. Companies like Red Hat theoretically have money, although most of it's virtual, Stock Market valuations that probably couldn't be realized. With BMW payments to make, how many will chance it? Microsoft on the other hand is known to have a pile of real cash, easily converted to your Actual Folding -- just what a plaintiff's lawyer likes to see.
So no, I can't see open source being in much danger from negligence suits for software bugs. It isn't an attractive target for such suits, and a fairly strong defense is on hand. Bill & Steve might should sweat it.
WSJ isn't aimed at geeks -- although I think they'd be surprised how many pay attention, especially after the RedHat IPO!
For the audience this is aimed at, it's a nice short 'executive summary.' Leaves out a lot of things some of us consider important, but that's the nature of the beast.
Don't expect a mass newspaper aimed at financial types, managers, etc. to cover (or be interested in) all the fiddlin' details. Instead, rejoice that they're paying any attention at all -- and be joyful and thankful that the errors are of omission. What's there is right, which is better than 90% of today's journalists can say.
This doesn't actually involve killing anybody. They can put that together in hours.
Therefore, it cannot be done in the time (putatively) allowed, because we are dealing with dyed-in-the-wool bureaucrats here. These are people who need a couple of days, and a regulation change, to find their asses -- which is why so many of them have *that* expression most of the time.
I have no idea what's in the report -- but the report already exists, and the Committee is there to rubberstamp it. After a decent interval of course.
Somebody else already pointed it out, but it's worth repeating: They only have four months to get this done!
Look, this is a bunch of people who couldn't decide on, frame, and write the order for Perrier vs. Evian and get it out to the caterers in four months. Whatever will be in the report has already been written. The Committee, as such, is strictly a Supreme Soviet.
Does anybody have any idea how it might be possible to submarine in and find out what's in the report? Then we'd have something to talk about.
Look, several folks have commented on working for a "temp agency" that takes most of what the corp pays for their services, leaving them with 30-35% (about typical.) Even the worst-case union dues are a teeny fraction of what a body shop skims off. So, start your own body shop. Advertise: "Don't go to work for the corp, come to work for us. Our skim is less than anybody's--and we'll carry you when you're out of work, and send our lawyer to help when the PHB wants the other 108 hours." Being a temp is a good position -- and the ideal would fit precisely with the Management Theory of the Week, which is "outsource it all." Fine. Go to company xx and say, "Hey. Give us the job descriptions, fire HR, and sign the contract. We'll screen the people and see the job gets done." They'll love you for it! Of course you can't do that, can you? It's what Henry Ford wanted "unions" to do, and you're too fskin' busy printing "rather push a Chevy than drive a Ford" t-shirts. And don't protest, seen too much of it. Regards, Ric
Lots of us are unhappy that Microsoft did what they did--but that isn't the point.
There may be some Microsoft-haters (many!) who just get off on insults, but you aren't getting the point, or you don't know what you're talking about.
Caldera (and DR before them) didn't want Microsoft to spend R&D money accommodating Windows to DR Dos. It was never requested. If it had been, Microsoft would have been fully justified in sending them a copy of the cartoon. You know it: three little guys ROFL, and the caption is, "You wanted WHAT?"
What DR wanted, what they should have had, was the same deal every other software writer got: a copy of the Beta, so DR could spend the R&D money making it compatible.
Instead Microsoft spent the R&D money making it incompatible on purpose. Is that against the law? The courts will decide.
NASA does a lot of this. It's a little more complex than just printing it, though, and I haven't seen any fractals (my subscription to NASA Tech Briefs lapsed.)
You have to have more than one layer, and it works best with slot antennas. A slot antenna is one of the solutions to Maxwell's equations that can be done; the length of the slot is the width of the wire, and vice versa. They use the technique to make antennas that are flat, for e.g. sticking on the skin of an airplane or spacecraft.
Actually, it sounds like an ideal use for the fractals, and if the picture is an indication, that's pretty much what they're doing.
In David Brin's Brightness Reef series, a woman who's been associating with Galactic technology all her life is dumped among primitives who among other things print books.
She takes a look at it.
"Ah!" she says. "A portable, random access information store that can't be detected from orbit."
Ric Locke warlocke@wf.net "Humble Opinion" is an oxymoron
Sorry, Panzer, I understand from the above that you're a Serb and therefore emotionally involved. But don't listen too hard to that kind of stuff. The United States simply doesn't have that kind of forward-looking planning--we can't put it together, because we're always running in circles about something else.
When we start seeing pictures of Milosovic, or Saddam Hussein, killing people because they don't believe the same, or because they're in the way, it makes our blood boil. And yes, some of us are aware that Kosovo is vitally important to the Serb mythos of existence. Don't overrate that understanding. This is a country where evangelistics can preach hellfire and damnation from the pulpit for nonbelievers, but if the mosque across the street catches fire, the preacher and congregation will both be helping folks out of the building--and are pretty likely to offer the use of the building for services until the Moslems can rebuild.
The real root of this--besides what Jon has aptly pointed out, the attractions of Techno-War--go back to the fact that institutionally, the US feels guilty about not doing enough for the Jews during WWII, which in turn goes back to the multiethnic ideals of the US. True, we don't live up to those ideals, but at least the intellectual part of the US feels guilty about it and tries to do something, witness Civil Rights, et cetera.
And there's plenty to feel guilty about. Pol Pot, the various idiots in South and Central America, Idi Amin, and on and on. Offer Americans the chance to blow the crap out of one of those jackasses and watch the volunteers pour in.
The Air Farce HATES the A10 (all but the guys who fly it--they tend to be in love with the beast.)
The common name Warthog was not assigned out of affection, although the ones who use it now use it that way, a lot like most of us see geek and nerd.
A lot of that goes back to what Katz is talking about. Curtis LeMay, arguing for establishment of the Air Farce as a separate service, promised Congress and the United States that air war could win in clean, painless ways--and we're now seeing (again) that that just ain't so.
What the Air Farce wants is
Here we go, into the wild blue yonder Rising high, into the sun Contrails white, rising to meet our thunder...
That is, white scarf and shiny metal, clean sparks in a cerulean heaven.
The A10 is absolutely the antithesis of this. It's ugly, it's slow, it doesn't fly very high, and it's meant to get down into the mud and support the troops. Asking an Air Farce troop to get mud on his boots is like asking one of Jane Austen's heroes to go into 'trade.' So they've tried to kill it any number of times.
Running here: Ancient AMD 486-40, 8 MB. (The motherboard is VESA, and the BIOS date is 1992!)
Opera 3.51, Win 3.1, a nifty (and slightly buggy) little utility called Calmira that gives about 80% of the handy part of W95, all over DR-DOS 7 from Calmira (single user license free, commercial use $30 per machine.)
Runs rings around the PII 133, 32MB, W95/IE4 at work, except when the 486 is trying to render pages--then it (almost) keeps up. Stays up longer per session, too, especially on the Net.
Love to try Linux, but this will have to do until I can save up for a decent size disk.
Look, they even say on the web site that this is new for them and they're nervous about it. If you don't like the license, tell them so, civilly, rationally, and with maximum credit for trying. And if possible, tell them how they can make money (even a little), or avoid spending some, by changing it.
Like taming any other wild creature: calm demeanor, soft voice, and regular offers of food..:-)
Look, if you're a Randite Libertarian, the whole thing comes down to getting money when you supply something of value, right?
If so, anybody with money is a potential customer.
If you reserve the right to not supply your value to people for irrelevant reasons (i.e. anything but they don't have enough money), then you're not living your philosophy, you're contradicting it.
Releasing the source code won't do anything but embarrass them (that might be worth doing in and of itself, but they've been doing a fine job on their own.)
On the other hand, releasing the APIs and file formats doesn't confiscate what they claim is their most valuable asset. And back in the real world, if other developers could use the secret stuff Microsoft squirrels away to give their own app developers the advantage, the juggernaut wouldn't look very intimidating.
The DOJ stuff is a side issue. The real big deal here is the meltdown of 5.0/2K. The longer it goes without being released, and the worse it is when it finally does come out, the better off the rest of us are. It might make a few PHBs actually think about what to buy. Remember that PHBs are basically as fad-driven as their teenage kids are. Imagine a fad for software that works!
If we just let them alone they'll self-destruct. They're pretty close already.
I don't use Linux (I'm not smart and/or persistent enough), and maybe I've been contaminated by several years of hacking out chunks of embedded stuff.
But why does the word kernel turn it into some kind of black magic? It's software, dammit!
Ok, Ok, it talks to the hardware, and users need to keep fingers out. But still, it's software. If you need, or want, or feel like, modifying it, go ahead. From what I've seen, most of the majors even give you nice templates to help keep track of stuff that you could screw up.
It's software. Word processors are software. Device drivers are software. Kernels are software. Window managers are software.
Several posters have grumbled about how little the J. Random Slashdotter knows about art and the humanities, and they're right. It's a damn shame when you try to talk about the Enlightenment, and the only response is, what about Gnome...
But if you really want to get scared, go ask an artist about technology. If the artist is a sculptor, you might get a little materials science, blacksmith-and-wizard variety; for the rest of them, fahgeddit.
They (as a group, with honorable exceptions) decided long ago that people who actually do things are essentially helots, necessary to a comfortable existence but beneath the dignity of high-class people. And then they took ars gratia artis and overgeneralized it into disappearing up their own assholes.
Sharyn McCrumb got it: "In the engineering department we [use email], and it won't take three thousand years for the English department to [start using it]. Two thousand tops." [from Bimbos of the Death Sun]
Slashdot is a little young, but check out some of the threads Nick Petreley gets at InfoWorld. You'd have a hell of a lot better chance getting an explanation of the Hundred Years War on Slashdot than you would of getting any clue as to what TCP/IP is all about from any artistic group.
And it's not because they're stupid, either. They've just decided that it's got no class.
Katz alludes to this, but maybe it's worth being explicit: flames are not new.
We generally agree nowadays that e.g. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln (to pick easy ones) were basically Good Guys(TM), even if we might want to pick apart some of their views and/or actions.
But you really ought to have a look back at some of the things their contemporaries had to say about them! True, there weren't quite so many ad hominem arguments--at least, it seems so to us--but that was more a matter of custom than anything. We seem to have lost the abilities to damn with faint praise, and call people dirty names without actually saying anything overtly nasty, that were pretty well taken for granted not long ago. Part of that's because so many of us are young, and haven't learned to let things go right past us if badly aimed.
Flames? I don't know if any of it's on line anywhere, but if you want to see flames, go back and look at what some of the contemporary newspapers had to say about Abraham Lincoln.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm surprised that it's gotten this far without somebody mentioning science fiction.
H. Beam Piper's stories included a standard trope, in which there were many publicly available cameras in various places. "Telescreen" users used their output instead of wallpaper images, and Pappy Jack used surveillance images of a forest fire to scare Little Fuzzy.
Hey, slashdotters! Who wants to step up and provide that service?
Regards,
Ric
This is a bit of technojargon. As far as I know, it originated with op-amp developers. Alsee has it right, but perhaps you'd like a little more development of the idea.
"Chopping" refers to turning the DC on and off so as to generate an alternating current that can be used in transformers. Modern power supplies do it the way described because higher frequencies allow smaller and lighter transformers for the same power level. Older-style, mains-frequency transformers are big and heavy, and aren't efficient -- largely because the low frequency means they need iron, and the iron has hysteresis and other losses.
Really small, cheap, low-power power supplies don't even use transformers any more. They use capacitors and diodes in voltage-doubler circuits.
Regards,
Ric
The problem Ballard (and almost everyone else) is having is the catalyst.
Fuel cells require platinum as a catalyst to keep the reaction temperature down to where the materials can survive. I've been following the tech desultorily for quite a while; several people have tried palladium or rhenium, with generally bad results, and anyway rhenium is harder to get than platinum, and all the palladium is going into catalytic reactors for cars.
The problem is that platinum is hard to work with; a very high melting point, low vapor pressure, and not very "sticky". So all the wonderful vacuum-deposition tricks that are useful with aluminum and other metals fall down.
Which leaves foil and pressure, which is what they mostly use. The trouble with that is that it uses a _lot_ of platinum -- the foil has to be thick enough to handle, which is way overkill for the amount needed for the fuel cell. The number I heard was that a 1000KW fuel cell -- about right for a high-powered car, or a medium-small truck -- would need $30,000 worth of platinum. Ouch.
So put your thinking caps on. If you can work out a reliable, relatively cheap way to do vacuum deposition of platinum that can be process controlled to give an even coat at the one-molecule-thick level, load the gear on your truck and take it to Vancouver. The folks at Ballard will be glad to see you.
Regards,
Ric
green swamp water.
For roughly a decade, Bill & Co. could Do No Wrong. Darlings of the press, celebrated in every computer rag.
Once at the lake I was watching as a couple of drunk teenagers took daddy's boat around at high speed. Another boat got in front; the driver chopped the throttle -- and the following wave drowned the $5,000 highly chromed super duper engine. glug!
Or you might like Jeremiah better: They that sow the wind, shall reap the whirl-wind.
The word is schadenfreude. Look it up.
Regards,
Ric
Mr. Perens has (as usual) an apt comment. Disclaimers:
1) IANAL
2) I am not directly associated with Open Source Software.
The concept of due diligence is hyper important. In fact, a finding of negligence is essentially a finding that due diligence was not performed.
What I have seen of Open Source indicates that the people who work on it are extremely "diligent" where bugs of all kinds, not just security bugs, are concerned. When one is reported, generally someone gets after it right away, to (1) confirm it's there (2) figure out what a fix should be and (3) fix it. This is an historical pattern, I believe, and could be substantiated by lots of testimony.
Note that the Law doesn't require that the bugs actually be fixed, or that the fix be better than the bug was. Due diligence simply means that all reasonable methods were used to conclude what the problem was and how it might be fixed, and to fix it if it seemed warranted.
Note that in the Pinto and GM Truck cases mentioned above, due diligence broke down -- the companies involved concluded that the problem existed, but that it wasn't economically justifiable to fix it, that is, the necessary fix would cost so much that it wasn't worth it. The Court, in general, is hostile to this view, to say the least.
There's also the matter of 'deep pockets' and political correctness. Even with all the malicious hacker stories in the press, you still wouldn't get very many lawyers willing to sue some 26-year-old nerd for negligence in fixing a software bug; defense lawyer starts telling sob stories, and it's likely to turn the whole thing around -- plus, how much are you likely to get? An Open Source programmer isn't likely to have much. Companies like Red Hat theoretically have money, although most of it's virtual, Stock Market valuations that probably couldn't be realized. With BMW payments to make, how many will chance it? Microsoft on the other hand is known to have a pile of real cash, easily converted to your Actual Folding -- just what a plaintiff's lawyer likes to see.
So no, I can't see open source being in much danger from negligence suits for software bugs. It isn't an attractive target for such suits, and a fairly strong defense is on hand. Bill & Steve might should sweat it.
Regards,
Ric
WSJ isn't aimed at geeks -- although I think they'd be surprised how many pay attention, especially after the RedHat IPO!
For the audience this is aimed at, it's a nice short 'executive summary.' Leaves out a lot of things some of us consider important, but that's the nature of the beast.
Don't expect a mass newspaper aimed at financial types, managers, etc. to cover (or be interested in) all the fiddlin' details. Instead, rejoice that they're paying any attention at all -- and be joyful and thankful that the errors are of omission. What's there is right, which is better than 90% of today's journalists can say.
Regards,
Ric
This doesn't actually involve killing anybody. They can put that together in hours.
Therefore, it cannot be done in the time (putatively) allowed, because we are dealing with dyed-in-the-wool bureaucrats here. These are people who need a couple of days, and a regulation change, to find their asses -- which is why so many of them have *that* expression most of the time.
I have no idea what's in the report -- but the report already exists, and the Committee is there to rubberstamp it. After a decent interval of course.
Regards,
Ric
Look, this is a bunch of people who couldn't decide on, frame, and write the order for Perrier vs. Evian and get it out to the caterers in four months. Whatever will be in the report has already been written. The Committee, as such, is strictly a Supreme Soviet.
Does anybody have any idea how it might be possible to submarine in and find out what's in the report? Then we'd have something to talk about.
Regards,
Ric
Look, several folks have commented on working for a "temp agency" that takes most of what the corp pays for their services, leaving them with 30-35% (about typical.)
Even the worst-case union dues are a teeny fraction of what a body shop skims off. So, start your own body shop.
Advertise: "Don't go to work for the corp, come to work for us. Our skim is less than anybody's--and we'll carry you when you're out of work, and send our lawyer to help when the PHB wants the other 108 hours."
Being a temp is a good position -- and the ideal would fit precisely with the Management Theory of the Week, which is "outsource it all." Fine. Go to company xx and say, "Hey. Give us the job descriptions, fire HR, and sign the contract. We'll screen the people and see the job gets done." They'll love you for it!
Of course you can't do that, can you?
It's what Henry Ford wanted "unions" to do, and you're too fskin' busy printing "rather push a Chevy than drive a Ford" t-shirts.
And don't protest, seen too much of it.
Regards,
Ric
Lots of us are unhappy that Microsoft did what they did--but that isn't the point.
There may be some Microsoft-haters (many!) who just get off on insults, but you aren't getting the point, or you don't know what you're talking about.
Caldera (and DR before them) didn't want Microsoft to spend R&D money accommodating Windows to DR Dos. It was never requested. If it had been, Microsoft would have been fully justified in sending them a copy of the cartoon. You know it: three little guys ROFL, and the caption is, "You wanted WHAT?"
What DR wanted, what they should have had, was the same deal every other software writer got: a copy of the Beta, so DR could spend the R&D money making it compatible.
Instead Microsoft spent the R&D money making it incompatible on purpose. Is that against the law? The courts will decide.
Regards,
Ric
NASA does a lot of this. It's a little more complex than just printing it, though, and I haven't seen any fractals (my subscription to NASA Tech Briefs lapsed.)
You have to have more than one layer, and it works best with slot antennas. A slot antenna is one of the solutions to Maxwell's equations that can be done; the length of the slot is the width of the wire, and vice versa. They use the technique to make antennas that are flat, for e.g. sticking on the skin of an airplane or spacecraft.
Actually, it sounds like an ideal use for the fractals, and if the picture is an indication, that's pretty much what they're doing.
Regards,
Ric
...to a server at Microsoft.
:-(
No more lost data. Comforting, eh?
Regards,
Ric
Along the same lines--
In David Brin's Brightness Reef series, a woman who's been associating with Galactic technology all her life is dumped among primitives who among other things print books.
She takes a look at it.
"Ah!" she says. "A portable, random access information store that can't be detected from orbit."
Ric Locke
warlocke@wf.net
"Humble Opinion" is an oxymoron
Bullshit.
Sorry, Panzer, I understand from the above that you're a Serb and therefore emotionally involved. But don't listen too hard to that kind of stuff. The United States simply doesn't have that kind of forward-looking planning--we can't put it together, because we're always running in circles about something else.
When we start seeing pictures of Milosovic, or Saddam Hussein, killing people because they don't believe the same, or because they're in the way, it makes our blood boil. And yes, some of us are aware that Kosovo is vitally important to the Serb mythos of existence. Don't overrate that understanding. This is a country where evangelistics can preach hellfire and damnation from the pulpit for nonbelievers, but if the mosque across the street catches fire, the preacher and congregation will both be helping folks out of the building--and are pretty likely to offer the use of the building for services until the Moslems can rebuild.
The real root of this--besides what Jon has aptly pointed out, the attractions of Techno-War--go back to the fact that institutionally, the US feels guilty about not doing enough for the Jews during WWII, which in turn goes back to the multiethnic ideals of the US. True, we don't live up to those ideals, but at least the intellectual part of the US feels guilty about it and tries to do something, witness Civil Rights, et cetera.
And there's plenty to feel guilty about. Pol Pot, the various idiots in South and Central America, Idi Amin, and on and on. Offer Americans the chance to blow the crap out of one of those jackasses and watch the volunteers pour in.
The Air Farce HATES the A10 (all but the guys who fly it--they tend to be in love with the beast.)
The common name Warthog was not assigned out of affection, although the ones who use it now use it that way, a lot like most of us see geek and nerd.
A lot of that goes back to what Katz is talking about. Curtis LeMay, arguing for establishment of the Air Farce as a separate service, promised Congress and the United States that air war could win in clean, painless ways--and we're now seeing (again) that that just ain't so.
What the Air Farce wants is
Here we go, into the wild blue yonder
Rising high, into the sun
Contrails white, rising to meet our thunder...
That is, white scarf and shiny metal, clean sparks in a cerulean heaven.
The A10 is absolutely the antithesis of this. It's ugly, it's slow, it doesn't fly very high, and it's meant to get down into the mud and support the troops. Asking an Air Farce troop to get mud on his boots is like asking one of Jane Austen's heroes to go into 'trade.' So they've tried to kill it any number of times.
Running here: Ancient AMD 486-40, 8 MB. (The motherboard is VESA, and the BIOS date is 1992!)
Opera 3.51, Win 3.1, a nifty (and slightly buggy) little utility called Calmira that gives about 80% of the handy part of W95, all over DR-DOS 7 from Calmira (single user license free, commercial use $30 per machine.)
Runs rings around the PII 133, 32MB, W95/IE4 at work, except when the 486 is trying to render pages--then it (almost) keeps up. Stays up longer per session, too, especially on the Net.
Love to try Linux, but this will have to do until I can save up for a decent size disk.
catchee monkey.
Look, they even say on the web site that this is new for them and they're nervous about it. If you don't like the license, tell them so, civilly, rationally, and with maximum credit for trying. And if possible, tell them how they can make money (even a little), or avoid spending some, by changing it.
Like taming any other wild creature: calm demeanor, soft voice, and regular offers of food..:-)
Look, if you're a Randite Libertarian, the whole thing comes down to getting money when you supply something of value, right?
If so, anybody with money is a potential customer.
If you reserve the right to not supply your value to people for irrelevant reasons (i.e. anything but they don't have enough money), then you're not living your philosophy, you're contradicting it.
Yes!
.)
Releasing the source code won't do anything but embarrass them (that might be worth doing in and of itself, but they've been doing a fine job on their own
On the other hand, releasing the APIs and file formats doesn't confiscate what they claim is their most valuable asset. And back in the real world, if other developers could use the secret stuff Microsoft squirrels away to give their own app developers the advantage, the juggernaut wouldn't look very intimidating.
The DOJ stuff is a side issue. The real big deal here is the meltdown of 5.0/2K. The longer it goes without being released, and the worse it is when it finally does come out, the better off the rest of us are. It might make a few PHBs actually think about what to buy. Remember that PHBs are basically as fad-driven as their teenage kids are. Imagine a fad for software that works!
If we just let them alone they'll self-destruct. They're pretty close already.
Sorry, I don't understand.
I don't use Linux (I'm not smart and/or persistent enough), and maybe I've been contaminated by several years of hacking out chunks of embedded stuff.
But why does the word kernel turn it into some kind of black magic? It's software, dammit!
Ok, Ok, it talks to the hardware, and users need to keep fingers out. But still, it's software. If you need, or want, or feel like, modifying it, go ahead. From what I've seen, most of the majors even give you nice templates to help keep track of stuff that you could screw up.
It's software. Word processors are software. Device drivers are software. Kernels are software. Window managers are software.
Install or change when you like.
Several posters have grumbled about how little the J. Random Slashdotter knows about art and the humanities, and they're right. It's a damn shame when you try to talk about the Enlightenment, and the only response is, what about Gnome...
But if you really want to get scared, go ask an artist about technology. If the artist is a sculptor, you might get a little materials science, blacksmith-and-wizard variety; for the rest of them, fahgeddit.
They (as a group, with honorable exceptions) decided long ago that people who actually do things are essentially helots, necessary to a comfortable existence but beneath the dignity of high-class people. And then they took ars gratia artis and overgeneralized it into disappearing up their own assholes.
Sharyn McCrumb got it: "In the engineering department we [use email], and it won't take three thousand years for the English department to [start using it]. Two thousand tops." [from Bimbos of the Death Sun]
Slashdot is a little young, but check out some of the threads Nick Petreley gets at InfoWorld. You'd have a hell of a lot better chance getting an explanation of the Hundred Years War on Slashdot than you would of getting any clue as to what TCP/IP is all about from any artistic group.
And it's not because they're stupid, either. They've just decided that it's got no class.
Katz alludes to this, but maybe it's worth being explicit: flames are not new.
We generally agree nowadays that e.g. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln (to pick easy ones) were basically Good Guys(TM), even if we might want to pick apart some of their views and/or actions.
But you really ought to have a look back at some of the things their contemporaries had to say about them! True, there weren't quite so many ad hominem arguments--at least, it seems so to us--but that was more a matter of custom than anything. We seem to have lost the abilities to damn with faint praise, and call people dirty names without actually saying anything overtly nasty, that were pretty well taken for granted not long ago. Part of that's because so many of us are young, and haven't learned to let things go right past us if badly aimed.
Flames? I don't know if any of it's on line anywhere, but if you want to see flames, go back and look at what some of the contemporary newspapers had to say about Abraham Lincoln.
Regards,
Ric Locke