But I think the important point that you miss is that file extensions can be spoofed too -- look at all the windows script viruses that had an extension like file.jpg.vbs, and people fell for it by the millions.
Ahh, but the problem here isn't with the actual file extension, the issue comes with Windows' handling of said extension. If my memory serves me correctly, default on Win98+ is to hide the file extensions from the user as much as possible, and include a mime-type description in the left frame of the IE file system browser... So, for example, the file "foo.jpg" would be visible in the window as just "foo" and would have an image icon. When someone sends a file like "foo.jpg.vbs" to a windows user, with the default setup, the.vbs is stripped, leaving the filename "foo.jpg" in the file browser... looks like an innocuous jpeg file. This is what was causing the problems with that type of "exploit".
Actually, I think there are four PvP (preferable term to PK, according to Verant) with different rulesets.
Two free-for-all servers, where anyone can attack anyone within certain level limits (one allows item looting, one per kill, and coin, the other is coin only).
The third is a "teams" server where there's a four-way fight between humans, shorties (halflings, gnomes), elves, and "evil" races (ogres, trolls, etc..)
Fourth is a "no holds barred" server, highest level characters can kill level 1 newbies all day, there basically are no rules about gameplay (player conduct, on the other hand is still dealt with if it becomes troublesome). This server was sort of a thought experiment, seeing how the player community would react and organize to the suspension of the "play nice" policies instituted by Verant/SOE.
Didn't he frame him to make it look like Johnny stole the money that everyone suspected Jimmy did, from that airplane heist? Or didn't Johnny do it? I forget which it was:)
Just because the Amiga niche is even smaller than the linux niche doesn't mean the Linux niche is economically viable... and remember, we're not referring to the Linux community as a whole, we're referring to gamers who use Linux...
Gaming on linux is much more difficult than gaming on windows... needed drivers often aren't there, unless you buy just the right hardware, you have to get the right drivers for the right game, set up the game to use the drivers, the list goes on, as opposed to popping the CD-ROM in the drive and clicking install. Lazy? You're damn straight... if I just picked up Quake9 or something like that, I don't want to have to spend hours futzing with drivers and config files and what not, I wanna frag something!
Until you can dumb down Linux to the point where it really is just click and go, you're going to keep a large portion of the market away, myself included, and I'm a big fan of Linux... I'm more than happy to use two OS's for different purposes, and treat my gaming rig like a big overblown console, and be productive with Linux.
My plot to paint an ominous picture of the open source movement has failed again! Bill will not be pleased! And I would have succeeded if it weren't for you meddling anonymous cowards!!!
Sonofabitch, I kicked my keyboard out of the damn socket =) To finish my post... while Linux API's may lag behind a little bit, the article's author states that the "quality gap" is rapidly closing between the two, and that linux gaming API's aren't what are holding back the developers.
Guess which one is the support nightmare. Pretty easy when you have to support several different video card manufacturers, even ones that don't exsist any more like VooDoo. Yet, the small, vocal, they-will-get-my-VooDoo-when-they-pry-it-from-my-c old-dead-hands crowd clamors for support and then whines when they can't get it.
I'd beg to differ... both Windows and linux have sets of standard-ish API's that developers can use in their applications to abstract away hardware considerations to the point where it's not an issue... DirectX, OpenGL/AL, SDL, etc... In this respect, gaming development in the console and desktop arenas are actually converging... while console developers can expect a common hardware platform which will behave identically on any given system, PC developers are rapidly approaching a common hardware abstraction which will also (ideally) behave the same on any given system. While the Linux API's may lag behind a little bit
As an avid gamer and coder, I'd have to say that linux really isn't going to catch the gaming market in the forseeable future. Call me a pessimist if you like, but that's the way I see it. Gaming may be a large market, but right now, the market is firmly entrenched on a Microsoft codebase. As the guy from Maxis pointed out, it's not that the tools aren't there, or that they're not professional quality...
Porting games really isn't a solution, as Loki found out... any gamer that's serious about playing isn't going to wait for the linux port to maybe make the rounds, if someone decides to pick it up... so they basically exist to serve two VERY niche markets... the "I won't run anything unless it's on linux" and the "I'd rather run it on linux" groups. Concurrent development for multiple architectures is indeed expensive and carries with it a lot of overhead, EVEN if it's planned from day one! While this may have benefits in the long term, as with the Sims linux code being used as a base for the Sims Online project, I believe that this is still the exception rather than the rule.
So, you a cry, a killer app is perhaps warranted?
Difficulties abound in this scenario as well... any game that becomes immensely successful automatically spawns imitation... play-alikes would be appearing on the Windows platform in VERY short order, capitalizing on a much greater market that has been overlooked, purposefully OR unintentinoally, by the original creators.
Realistically, there's only one thing that will
make Linux a commercially viable platform for which companies can develop games: Linus' plan for world domination(tm). The game companies will go where the money is, that is the simple truth...
if the gamers come to Linux, the games will follow. Loki's "testing of the waters" showed that there isn't the demand yet to justify a supply.
As for the discussion on how to get people to Linux... well, that's a whole different can of worms, and one that I won't open in this thread.
I should probably (knowing/.) add the caveat that when I'm talking about games, I'm talking about modern, commercial-quality games, with Hollywoodian budgets and all the bells and whistles.
In addition, there are some things in our policy that should not change, and you shouldn't give in to the terrorist demands. For example, Bin Laden advocates the overthrow of non Muslim
governments and calls for their replacement with "just" Muslim ones.
*cough cough* And of course the United States has never given support to less than savory characters/organizations who advocated the overthrow of non-democratic governments.
This is an easy one. The pilots were lured out of the cockpits by terrorists who were threatening the flight attendants and passengers (basically, come out or we kill the stewardess... apparently they *did* kill some of them) The pilots were taken back with the other hostages while the terrorists took control of the plane.
Ordinarily, the pilots wouldn't have been incorrect in their actions, crew and passengers taken hostage are kept as bargaining chips in negotiations, so the pilot probably thought that he was acting in the best interest of his passengers by coming out of the cabin.
If they could get a large mass to follow them the whole way, then they'd have plenty of gravity. Of course, its size would need to be on the order of the Earth's, but I'll leave the
details of implementation to someone else.
Ahh yes... there was a McGyver episode about this... some evil drug dealer had trapped McGyver in deep space, and using an old bubblegum wrapper, a used bic lighter and some pocket lint he managed to create an artifical black hole which he dangled in front of him on a stick... when he wanted to go somewhere, he'd just point the stick at it, and he'd "fall" towards the black hole, coincidentally taking him in just the right direction! That McGuyver, he's so smaaaht! :-P
, I can't believe it wasn't released in Japan without dolby. I mean, Sony created that sound standard right?
Actually, the Dolby sound standard is property of Dolby Laboratories Inc, a standalone corporation that does creates signal processing devices in order to improve sound quality (from the tech overview on their site) Hardware vendors may license their tech (including dolby stereo, dolby noise reduction, AC-3 (dolby digital), AAC, dolby surround and Pro Logic)
Sorry if I sound like a marketroid, the point being it's not a standard like THX, nor an OEM feature, but rather third party technology that's been licensed by lots of different hardware manufacturers to enhance the sound output quality of their equipment. HTH,
Our company runs this exact service in the state of Georgia, and it's one of our highest-volume services. That said, I don't know how much effort was involved to get this service approved, and where the "push" for the service came from.
If a the only reasonable way a person can feed their family is by stealing, they are totally morally justified by doing so.
Ahhh, but when is enough enough? Should he steal enough for a loaf of bread, or a dinner for seven at a five-star restaurant? What about toothpaste, for his families' dental health? Cough medicine?
At what standard of living does stealing become "bad" again? What if he steals from people in even worse situations than he and his family are in?
You're vastly oversimplifying the situation here, and these examples, chock-full of idealistic situations don't really apply to real life.
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But I think the important point that you miss is that file extensions can be spoofed too -- look at all the windows script viruses that had an extension like file.jpg.vbs, and people fell for it by the millions.
Ahh, but the problem here isn't with the actual file extension, the issue comes with Windows' handling of said extension. If my memory serves me correctly, default on Win98+ is to hide the file extensions from the user as much as possible, and include a mime-type description in the left frame of the IE file system browser... So, for example, the file "foo.jpg" would be visible in the window as just "foo" and would have an image icon. When someone sends a file like "foo.jpg.vbs" to a windows user, with the default setup, the .vbs is stripped, leaving the filename "foo.jpg" in the file browser... looks like an innocuous jpeg file. This is what was causing the problems with that type of "exploit".
Nice Space Ghost quote =) From my second fave episode too, after Chambragne...
Two free-for-all servers, where anyone can attack anyone within certain level limits (one allows item looting, one per kill, and coin, the other is coin only).
The third is a "teams" server where there's a four-way fight between humans, shorties (halflings, gnomes), elves, and "evil" races (ogres, trolls, etc..)
Fourth is a "no holds barred" server, highest level characters can kill level 1 newbies all day, there basically are no rules about gameplay (player conduct, on the other hand is still dealt with if it becomes troublesome). This server was sort of a thought experiment, seeing how the player community would react and organize to the suspension of the "play nice" policies instituted by Verant/SOE.
Didn't he frame him to make it look like Johnny stole the money that everyone suspected Jimmy did, from that airplane heist? Or didn't Johnny do it? I forget which it was :)
Heh... 4 wheel drives do not, contrary to popular percetpion, make the vehicle immune to the basic laws of physics.
LOL! Thank you sir, for brigtening my day =)
Just because the Amiga niche is even smaller than the linux niche doesn't mean the Linux niche is economically viable... and remember, we're not referring to the Linux community as a whole, we're referring to gamers who use Linux...
Gaming on linux is much more difficult than gaming on windows... needed drivers often aren't there, unless you buy just the right hardware, you have to get the right drivers for the right game, set up the game to use the drivers, the list goes on, as opposed to popping the CD-ROM in the drive and clicking install. Lazy? You're damn straight... if I just picked up Quake9 or something like that, I don't want to have to spend hours futzing with drivers and config files and what not, I wanna frag something!
Until you can dumb down Linux to the point where it really is just click and go, you're going to keep a large portion of the market away, myself included, and I'm a big fan of Linux... I'm more than happy to use two OS's for different purposes, and treat my gaming rig like a big overblown console, and be productive with Linux.
My plot to paint an ominous picture of the open source movement has failed again! Bill will not be pleased! And I would have succeeded if it weren't for you meddling anonymous cowards!!!
Sonofabitch, I kicked my keyboard out of the damn socket =) To finish my post... while Linux API's may lag behind a little bit, the article's author states that the "quality gap" is rapidly closing between the two, and that linux gaming API's aren't what are holding back the developers.
Guess which one is the support nightmare. Pretty easy when you have to support several different video card manufacturers, even ones that don't exsist any more like VooDoo. Yet, the small, vocal, they-will-get-my-VooDoo-when-they-pry-it-from-my-c old-dead-hands crowd clamors for support and then whines when they can't get it.
I'd beg to differ... both Windows and linux have sets of standard-ish API's that developers can use in their applications to abstract away hardware considerations to the point where it's not an issue... DirectX, OpenGL/AL, SDL, etc... In this respect, gaming development in the console and desktop arenas are actually converging... while console developers can expect a common hardware platform which will behave identically on any given system, PC developers are rapidly approaching a common hardware abstraction which will also (ideally) behave the same on any given system. While the Linux API's may lag behind a little bit
As an avid gamer and coder, I'd have to say that linux really isn't going to catch the gaming market in the forseeable future. Call me a pessimist if you like, but that's the way I see it. Gaming may be a large market, but right now, the market is firmly entrenched on a Microsoft codebase. As the guy from Maxis pointed out, it's not that the tools aren't there, or that they're not professional quality...
Porting games really isn't a solution, as Loki found out... any gamer that's serious about playing isn't going to wait for the linux port to maybe make the rounds, if someone decides to pick it up... so they basically exist to serve two VERY niche markets... the "I won't run anything unless it's on linux" and the "I'd rather run it on linux" groups. Concurrent development for multiple architectures is indeed expensive and carries with it a lot of overhead, EVEN if it's planned from day one! While this may have benefits in the long term, as with the Sims linux code being used as a base for the Sims Online project, I believe that this is still the exception rather than the rule.
So, you a cry, a killer app is perhaps warranted? Difficulties abound in this scenario as well... any game that becomes immensely successful automatically spawns imitation... play-alikes would be appearing on the Windows platform in VERY short order, capitalizing on a much greater market that has been overlooked, purposefully OR unintentinoally, by the original creators.
Realistically, there's only one thing that will make Linux a commercially viable platform for which companies can develop games: Linus' plan for world domination(tm). The game companies will go where the money is, that is the simple truth... if the gamers come to Linux, the games will follow. Loki's "testing of the waters" showed that there isn't the demand yet to justify a supply.
As for the discussion on how to get people to Linux... well, that's a whole different can of worms, and one that I won't open in this thread. I should probably (knowing /.) add the caveat that when I'm talking about games, I'm talking about modern, commercial-quality games, with Hollywoodian budgets and all the bells and whistles.
Just my two cents...
I stand corrected. Discordianism does appear to predate Wilson...
I'd just like to pipe in as well and say thanks for the interview Wil, +1 informative indeed! =)
Actually, it's from Robert A. Wilson's Illuminatus Trilogy, which predates Deus Ex by a decade or three...
*shudder* Deer Hunter on a console :(
Yes!!! But it will be a bump/dirtmapped ultra-high texture version of deer hunter!!!! At 60fps!!! To the extreme!!!!!!!
No he had an adimantium skeliton...... geese if the schools pushed more fine liturature like X-Men perhaps we would not have uneducated remarks :-)
Oh the irony...
Hehe you should write on and complain, and teach them a lesson!
In addition, there are some things in our policy that should not change, and you shouldn't give in to the terrorist demands. For example, Bin Laden advocates the overthrow of non Muslim governments and calls for their replacement with "just" Muslim ones.
*cough cough* And of course the United States has never given support to less than savory characters/organizations who advocated the overthrow of non-democratic governments.
This is an easy one. The pilots were lured out of the cockpits by terrorists who were threatening the flight attendants and passengers (basically, come out or we kill the stewardess... apparently they *did* kill some of them) The pilots were taken back with the other hostages while the terrorists took control of the plane.
Ordinarily, the pilots wouldn't have been incorrect in their actions, crew and passengers taken hostage are kept as bargaining chips in negotiations, so the pilot probably thought that he was acting in the best interest of his passengers by coming out of the cabin.
If they could get a large mass to follow them the whole way, then they'd have plenty of gravity. Of course, its size would need to be on the order of the Earth's, but I'll leave the details of implementation to someone else.
:-P
Ahh yes... there was a McGyver episode about this... some evil drug dealer had trapped McGyver in deep space, and using an old bubblegum wrapper, a used bic lighter and some pocket lint he managed to create an artifical black hole which he dangled in front of him on a stick... when he wanted to go somewhere, he'd just point the stick at it, and he'd "fall" towards the black hole, coincidentally taking him in just the right direction! That McGuyver, he's so smaaaht!
, I can't believe it wasn't released in Japan without dolby. I mean, Sony created that sound standard right?
Actually, the Dolby sound standard is property of Dolby Laboratories Inc, a standalone corporation that does creates signal processing devices in order to improve sound quality (from the tech overview on their site) Hardware vendors may license their tech (including dolby stereo, dolby noise reduction, AC-3 (dolby digital), AAC, dolby surround and Pro Logic)
Sorry if I sound like a marketroid, the point being it's not a standard like THX, nor an OEM feature, but rather third party technology that's been licensed by lots of different hardware manufacturers to enhance the sound output quality of their equipment. HTH,
Our company runs this exact service in the state of Georgia, and it's one of our highest-volume services. That said, I don't know how much effort was involved to get this service approved, and where the "push" for the service came from.
Boy I wish I had some moderator points left. *sigh*
Eww... a utilitarian.
If a the only reasonable way a person can feed their family is by stealing, they are totally morally justified by doing so.
Ahhh, but when is enough enough? Should he steal enough for a loaf of bread, or a dinner for seven at a five-star restaurant? What about toothpaste, for his families' dental health? Cough medicine? At what standard of living does stealing become "bad" again? What if he steals from people in even worse situations than he and his family are in? You're vastly oversimplifying the situation here, and these examples, chock-full of idealistic situations don't really apply to real life.
Hehe... the difference between science and religion is that scientists can admit to being wrong =)