I won't fall into the trap of criticizing BBOS on its merits, then. Instead, I will simply point out that its invisibility to nearly everyone on the planet might be interpreted as a sign that either (a) the company has utterly failed to make a compelling case for it, or (b) the company has utterly failed to make a compelling product. And really, it makes no difference which of those is actually the case. Their product is as good as dead, and that's not likely to change.
Wow, slashdot has come a long way from when I first started reading "chips & dips" in 1997. Even just 10 years ago, a story like this would have been met with enthusiasm and honest support, with a virtual pat on the back to the developers.
Today, a story like this is reduced to a mere platform for chest-beating
To be fair, the vast world of computers and software has come a long way since 1997. What might have been an interesting accomplishment in 1997 is now basically an exercise in pointlessness. Sure, it can be done. Sure, it's small and fast. But so what? What was actually accomplished that's worth anything? Processor power and memory advances since 1997 have obviated any reasonable need for an operating system such as the one described here, and the demands made on modern operating systems pretty much dictate that they be a whole lot more maintainable than any assembly code will ever be.
The fact that *some* green light is reflected from blood misses the point. It absorbs *most* of the green light, and therefore green is useful. And if you want to quibble with that, then you probably suck at your job.
While there are a few examples of wristwatch design prior (especially for the military), in 1904 Dumont asked Cartier to design a watch he could wear and still keep both hands free for flying. Jaeger designed a wristwatch for Cartier called the "Dumont", after the famous aviator, in 1911 for commercial sale and the "trendy set" rushed to buy them. Sounds like a pretty familiar story to me... even a bit sheeplish, don't you think? I believe that some things never really change, but of course, that's just my opinion.
That might explain the initial rush, but it utterly fails to explain why wristwatches became the de-facto standard for the next 90-odd years.
When you have to do frequent hand washing (in the last 35 years I have been employed in the meat industry, food industry, childcare and elder care
Good point. Clearly, this device isn't suitable for anyone in any of those professions, so it should probably not be allowed to exist.
Wait, so you put your clean hand in your dirty pocket and then touch meat with that now-filthy hand? Or do you touch meat and then put your filthy hand in your pocket? Either way, ewwww.
Because if they were square, they could be turned sideways, rotated 45 degrees, and dropped through the hole. As it turns out, this holds true for any shape with an even number of sides, until the length of each side drops below a threshold that's related to the lip of the hole.
Practically any material can cause terrific explosions when powdered and airborne. Sawdust explosions have reduced more than one lumber mill to ash, but that doesn't mean we stop building houses from wood.
Time out outlaw bakeries. That flour is a fire hazard!
After all, Apple continues to sell Macs, they get a lot of press, people love talking about their Macbook Air and such, but the reality is the Mac has about 6% of the overall PC market. That percentage hasn't moved up or down much in a long time.
There is a market for the Mac, but it isn't ever going to be larger than 5-7% of the PC market unless they change their prices and make them easier to modify.
I stopped reading at the highlighted text. I think you've amply demonstrated that you have no fucking idea what you're talking about. All the other PC makers joined into that race to the bottom, and look where it got them.
Sure there are people driving them. They just happen to represent the vast minority, and there are reasons for that.
I'd like to see electric cars succeed, but they won't as they are now.
Have you ever notice that adoption of any new technology happens on a curve? Only the lunatics at first, and then a trickle of brave folks, and then all of a sudden ordinary people start adopting the technology? Yeah. Phase III has already started. You probably didn't notice it, or maybe it hasn't happened in your region before.
a) The timing belt was a good number of years ago b) Automatic transmissions take a dump sometimes. It's not uncommon, even on decent cars that seemingly have plenty of life left in them. I was certainly not driving junkers. c) I'm now driving an electric car, so your triangulation is shit.
And this is the kind of free charging that I expect will be going away as the number of electric cars increases.
The chargers are generally not free, the major exception being chargers provided by employers. Chargepoint (among other companies) has built out extensive infrastructure, deploying chargers that take contactless credit cards as well as the companies own smart cards. You get an account, you pull up, wave your card, plug in, and charge. Costs vary by installation (the property owner sets rates) but it's usually based on kW/h, sometimes with a flat parking charge. It's still quite reasonable, and works well.
Or, more to the point: the infrastructure already exists, and it is being extensively used.
And charging your car at home depends on having a garage, or at least a special carport. But I believe that more than half of the cars are parked on the street. (For that matter, in San Francisco there are already more cars than places to park them most of the time. So it only works at all because there's always some cars prowling for a parking place.)
When I was growing up in Sunnyvale most of the cars were parked beside the houses. When I went back recently, in the same neighborhood with minimal new construction more than half of the cars appeared to be parked on the streed. And Sunnyvale counts as a suburb. (Well, I *think* it still counts as a suburb.)
So you're saying that until everyone on the planet has a garage, electric cars will not catch on? Because I'm pretty sure that's not the case. Nobody is saying electric cars will work for everyone. But they will work for a *lot* of people, and a statistically significant number of people have already reached that conclusion and are now happily driving electric cars.
Some people have a garage to store their car, and they have an obvious way to charge the car. Most people don't. Is everyone going to drive to Fry's every day to charge their car?
Here in California, chargers are everywhere. Because charging takes longer than filling up your tank with gas, the model has changed somewhat. People who own electric cars look for chargers when they do go out, and use them. They might only get an hour or two on the charger, but a level 2 charger will add 20 - 25 miles of range per hour. I can charge my car on 110 at home as well. It's slow, but overnight is more than enough to replenish two or three days worth of commuting. And on top of that, lots of larger employers are adding charging stations for their employees.
I personally know someone with a Tesla S that doesn't have a charger at home. He's managed for well over a year now, and it's his only car. I'd say that -- at least in California -- what you imagine to be impossible is quite the opposite.
You will save money and live in reality. Any talk of an electric car that competes with todays cars for price and utility is a fantasy. Electric cars are more destructive to the environment to build and use than any fossil fuel vehicle. The global warming cults only support electric cars as another control of peoples lives. Their cult leaders will still drive gas powered SUVs that take them from airport when their G5 lands then back to their 50,000 sq ft homes.
I am so tired of these fantasy land electric cars stories when the laws of thermodynamics say no. If you want a cheep commute vehicle (40 miles round trip) for 2-4 people then buy a big golf cart for $20,000. It will not save you money but you will stupid going to work. It may be cheaper to run if we could stuff the Jane Fonda's in a hole and build nuclear power plants to make electricity cheeper and more available.
What the hell, I'm going to blow some karma. You are an idiot. You know absolutely nothing about electric cars, you know nothing about climate change, and your ignorant rant makes you sound like a crazed chimp on helium. I strongly suggest that you crawl back under the rock from which you came and SHUT THE FUCK UP.
Slashdot Mirror
I won't fall into the trap of criticizing BBOS on its merits, then. Instead, I will simply point out that its invisibility to nearly everyone on the planet might be interpreted as a sign that either (a) the company has utterly failed to make a compelling case for it, or (b) the company has utterly failed to make a compelling product. And really, it makes no difference which of those is actually the case. Their product is as good as dead, and that's not likely to change.
What could possibly go wrong?
Google didn't force them, Apple simply just didn't want to pay.
See what I did there?
It wasn't money at stake. It was user privacy. I'm glad Apple didn't "pay".
and their website looks like it's from 1995 as well!
So its not bloated and it is fast too? Seems appropriate. :-)
I can state with authority that in 1995, there were exactly zero fast websites. Of this I am 100% certain.
Wow, slashdot has come a long way from when I first started reading "chips & dips" in 1997. Even just 10 years ago, a story like this would have been met with enthusiasm and honest support, with a virtual pat on the back to the developers.
Today, a story like this is reduced to a mere platform for chest-beating
To be fair, the vast world of computers and software has come a long way since 1997. What might have been an interesting accomplishment in 1997 is now basically an exercise in pointlessness. Sure, it can be done. Sure, it's small and fast. But so what? What was actually accomplished that's worth anything? Processor power and memory advances since 1997 have obviated any reasonable need for an operating system such as the one described here, and the demands made on modern operating systems pretty much dictate that they be a whole lot more maintainable than any assembly code will ever be.
Except edit text.
Best. Slashdot Comment. EVER!
Which means if they use 540nm green LEDs whereas blood typically reflects 560 nm (proven) then they just fucked themselves.
Go to an actual school for this, please.
In school, we call that "pedantic". I colloquial terms, we just call it "missing the forest for the trees".
The fact that *some* green light is reflected from blood misses the point. It absorbs *most* of the green light, and therefore green is useful. And if you want to quibble with that, then you probably suck at your job.
While there are a few examples of wristwatch design prior (especially for the military), in 1904 Dumont asked Cartier to design a watch he could wear and still keep both hands free for flying. Jaeger designed a wristwatch for Cartier called the "Dumont", after the famous aviator, in 1911 for commercial sale and the "trendy set" rushed to buy them. Sounds like a pretty familiar story to me... even a bit sheeplish, don't you think? I believe that some things never really change, but of course, that's just my opinion.
That might explain the initial rush, but it utterly fails to explain why wristwatches became the de-facto standard for the next 90-odd years.
When you have to do frequent hand washing (in the last 35 years I have been employed in the meat industry, food industry, childcare and elder care
Good point. Clearly, this device isn't suitable for anyone in any of those professions, so it should probably not be allowed to exist.
Wait, so you put your clean hand in your dirty pocket and then touch meat with that now-filthy hand? Or do you touch meat and then put your filthy hand in your pocket? Either way, ewwww.
I don't have a smartwatch and I'm not constantly pulling my phone out of my pocket.
You don't have to immediately respond to every vibrate/ring that comes along.
It's at least worth considering whether your needs are representative of the whole of humanity (or not). My guess is "not".
You already have a damned smartphone. All the functionality is there without the extra $350 expendature.
So you think that the whole world transitioned from pocket watches to wrist watches many decades ago because they were all sheeple?
Yes.
I couldn't resist answering this:
Why are manhole covers round?
Because if they were square, they could be turned sideways, rotated 45 degrees, and dropped through the hole. As it turns out, this holds true for any shape with an even number of sides, until the length of each side drops below a threshold that's related to the lip of the hole.
GP's comment on why Apple doesn't do that is accurate, but it doesn't change their market share.
Tell me why market share is important again?
Hint: It's not.
This is one of the things we europeans do right -- we build our houses out of stone.
That's awesome for regions that don't have appreciable seismic activity.
Practically any material can cause terrific explosions when powdered and airborne. Sawdust explosions have reduced more than one lumber mill to ash, but that doesn't mean we stop building houses from wood.
Time out outlaw bakeries. That flour is a fire hazard!
After all, Apple continues to sell Macs, they get a lot of press, people love talking about their Macbook Air and such, but the reality is the Mac has about 6% of the overall PC market. That percentage hasn't moved up or down much in a long time.
There is a market for the Mac, but it isn't ever going to be larger than 5-7% of the PC market unless they change their prices and make them easier to modify.
I stopped reading at the highlighted text. I think you've amply demonstrated that you have no fucking idea what you're talking about. All the other PC makers joined into that race to the bottom, and look where it got them.
Sure there are people driving them. They just happen to represent the vast minority, and there are reasons for that.
I'd like to see electric cars succeed, but they won't as they are now.
Have you ever notice that adoption of any new technology happens on a curve? Only the lunatics at first, and then a trickle of brave folks, and then all of a sudden ordinary people start adopting the technology? Yeah. Phase III has already started. You probably didn't notice it, or maybe it hasn't happened in your region before.
But it's definitely Phase III.
a) The timing belt was a good number of years ago
b) Automatic transmissions take a dump sometimes. It's not uncommon, even on decent cars that seemingly have plenty of life left in them. I was certainly not driving junkers.
c) I'm now driving an electric car, so your triangulation is shit.
And this is the kind of free charging that I expect will be going away as the number of electric cars increases.
The chargers are generally not free, the major exception being chargers provided by employers. Chargepoint (among other companies) has built out extensive infrastructure, deploying chargers that take contactless credit cards as well as the companies own smart cards. You get an account, you pull up, wave your card, plug in, and charge. Costs vary by installation (the property owner sets rates) but it's usually based on kW/h, sometimes with a flat parking charge. It's still quite reasonable, and works well.
Or, more to the point: the infrastructure already exists, and it is being extensively used.
And charging your car at home depends on having a garage, or at least a special carport. But I believe that more than half of the cars are parked on the street. (For that matter, in San Francisco there are already more cars than places to park them most of the time. So it only works at all because there's always some cars prowling for a parking place.)
When I was growing up in Sunnyvale most of the cars were parked beside the houses. When I went back recently, in the same neighborhood with minimal new construction more than half of the cars appeared to be parked on the streed. And Sunnyvale counts as a suburb. (Well, I *think* it still counts as a suburb.)
So you're saying that until everyone on the planet has a garage, electric cars will not catch on? Because I'm pretty sure that's not the case. Nobody is saying electric cars will work for everyone. But they will work for a *lot* of people, and a statistically significant number of people have already reached that conclusion and are now happily driving electric cars.
Some people have a garage to store their car, and they have an obvious way to charge the car. Most people don't. Is everyone going to drive to Fry's every day to charge their car?
Here in California, chargers are everywhere. Because charging takes longer than filling up your tank with gas, the model has changed somewhat. People who own electric cars look for chargers when they do go out, and use them. They might only get an hour or two on the charger, but a level 2 charger will add 20 - 25 miles of range per hour. I can charge my car on 110 at home as well. It's slow, but overnight is more than enough to replenish two or three days worth of commuting. And on top of that, lots of larger employers are adding charging stations for their employees.
I personally know someone with a Tesla S that doesn't have a charger at home. He's managed for well over a year now, and it's his only car. I'd say that -- at least in California -- what you imagine to be impossible is quite the opposite.
You will save money and live in reality. Any talk of an electric car that competes with todays cars for price and utility is a fantasy. Electric cars are more destructive to the environment to build and use than any fossil fuel vehicle. The global warming cults only support electric cars as another control of peoples lives. Their cult leaders will still drive gas powered SUVs that take them from airport when their G5 lands then back to their 50,000 sq ft homes.
I am so tired of these fantasy land electric cars stories when the laws of thermodynamics say no. If you want a cheep commute vehicle (40 miles round trip) for 2-4 people then buy a big golf cart for $20,000. It will not save you money but you will stupid going to work. It may be cheaper to run if we could stuff the Jane Fonda's in a hole and build nuclear power plants to make electricity cheeper and more available.
What the hell, I'm going to blow some karma. You are an idiot. You know absolutely nothing about electric cars, you know nothing about climate change, and your ignorant rant makes you sound like a crazed chimp on helium. I strongly suggest that you crawl back under the rock from which you came and SHUT THE FUCK UP.
Cheers,
zieroh
Oh, and Californians buy many Tesla cars. California is kind of hot, isn't it?
California is, on the whole, temperate. That's why so many people live here. Not hot, not cold.