I always see people from the other side of the "pond" saying how glad they are they don't live in America. Also many times I've read how they'd NEVER live here and would move if the same thing happened there.
Well its almost put up or shut up time. It will be interesting to see if people actually move because of this.
Note: I'm not trolling here, I am actually interested to see what happens. There has been a lot of talk and commotion from some people about never stepping foot in America because of the DMCA.
Pretty much. I don't really see how you can question if there is a demand for stuff like this. There are sh*tloads of websites dedicated to wallpapers, icons, desktop widgets, screensavers, news feeds, etc. Obviously people care very much what's on their desktops background.
Most people think of their pc as more than just a place to do work. People like to customize their desktop and have all sorts of cool stuff(to them) going on in the background.
So while you thinks it's boring and has no purpose I guess a lot of others would disagree.
"I like the concept of open source and all, but it's not as "open" as it's made out to be."
Sorry your having problems, but just because your can't get help with your problem doesn't mean open source isn't "open" as you say.
No one ever said just because you have access to the source code that your were entitled to free tech support.
If your commenting as a developer and did actually write some code and can't get it added as you've hinted, then maintain your own branch. You know how many people let alone big companies have their own line of kernels because their code doesn't get it? Tons. You said your problem is too small to cause problems for most people so I don't know why expected code to get right in the mainline kernel.
"Emulators are off in 'feel', and if you like games, it is like a bad controller, just not worth it."
Nah not really, its just in your head. Buy or build a decent controller and you won't know the difference. Hell build the cabinet yourself and through in some happ controllers if you need the ultimate in realism. You certainly can't say anything feels "off" then. On the cheap side a Dual Shock with PC adapter works great for games like Smash TV and Robotron IMO.
On the practical side how many people have the space or more importantly the money to spend on dozens of mint condition arcade machines? MAME let's people experience games from their youth and let's the youth get to now where modern gaming sprung up from. Sure they'll never know the joy of getting change from a Fat sweaty guy smoking a stinky cigar in the back, but heh something don't need to be seen first hand.
Eventually all those old machine will break down and become too expensive to maintain(actually that's already the case). Luckily computers that can use MAME will be around for a long time. It's not like I don't think cabinets aren't great, but from a practical standpoint MAME is the way to go for the vast majority of people.
I don't get why that's a problem for you. Why aren't you sticking with one distro anyway? Realistically, who cares if Suse does this or that? Same goes with any other distro than the one I'm using. Stick to one distro and only packages that are specificially made for it.
This isn't a problem for the end user(how many distros does one person need?), this isn't a problem for companies(only crazy ones don't standardize on distro).
The problem your describing is only a problem for developers who write apps for linux. So you are right that for some people this can be a problem, but unlike your implying for end users it definitely isn't something to get your panties in a knot about.
"They probably limit downlink speed but don't bother to tell anyone about it."
No they don't limit download speed at all. Many people download 20-30GB a month on OOL and they don't care at all. I've seen downloads which run overnight at the modems max speed and OOL never bothers.
For some reason though OOL is really pissy about uploading these days. A year or two ago you could upload all you want(ie many gigs), but with the rise of P2P OOL has literlly put the brakes on uploading. I don't know if its a liability thing or what, but things sure have changed.
What a stupid question followed up by a even dumber point. At what point is something consumer or business? Why TF give someone 1Mb of upload speed and then say you can only use it for "a little while".
If OOL doesn't want people to actually use their bandwidth then they shouldn't have given everyone 10Mb/1Mb lines.
"just keep in mind that it is people like the Gentoo team that have made Linux the phenomenon that it is"
Err not really. Gentoo came along way way after linux became a "phenomenon". Its also very much a minority distro. If you want to thank someone, thank Slackware, Red Hat, and Debian who have been giving and giving for years now.
Nothing against Gentoo, but let's give credit where credit it due. It's going to be a long time before Gentoo can be lumped in with the above distros.
This only encourages Adobe to put even less effort in linux. Why bother making your product work properly on linux when you can have others do it for you free of charge?
This is just free money for Adobe and lets them sell additional copies without having to worry about support or how well the product works. This isn't going to pressure Adobe into anything.
Taking Wine to its obvious conclusion you have to ask yourself, why turn Linux into a Windows clone?
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see the Adobe products come to linux. It's just that I don't see Wine doing anything but crippling linux in the long run.
I agree with the other poster. All running MS apps on Linux does is extend MS's monopoly to Linux. Why bother with linux when you computer comes with Windows and runs all those apps perfectly in the first place?
The only other thing this does is ensure that Adobe never creates any native apps for Linux.
"Faster file access and directory listing in Konquerer. Comparison: Windows - to view C:\mp3 takes 3 seconds. Mandrake - to view \mnt\Windows\mp3 takes 9 seconds."
Your comparison is flawed. Why are you comparing how long it takes to get to a folder 3 submenus deep vs. one which is only one menu deep?
IMO Konq is a better explorer then explorer any day of the week. Explorer has always been a crappy file manager IMO.
"3. Please, give us the option of a double-click interface."
Err KDE has offered double-click as an option for years now.
I just singed up for Cingular National yesterday and yes its GSM afaik. I know jack about cell phones but now I'm hearing TDMA has much better coverage and that GSM might be having more trouble insides building and everywhere else in general. I guess pretty much like the parent stated.
Any truth to this? Are all networks going GSM now, and that is just a transitional thing? Was signing up for Cingular a mistake?
As probably one of the few people here who actually knows what Banyan was I'd have to agree completely. Novell simply didn't transition to ANYTHING since 4.11. When the world went app server crazy in the mid 90's they left Novell behind. Look at how shitty NT 4.0 was when it came out. Look at how fast ISV's and companies fled Novell and their crappy programing interfaces. Oh sure a bunch of companies keep Novell around for File/Print/Directory services, but for Internet apps and groupware apps, Windows ate Novell's lunch.
Novell is dying, its just a question of when. New companies simply don't invest in Novell, its mostly just old investments which are keeping them afloat. As a CNE and longtime Novell admin its not like I don't appreciate what Netware does/did well, but like the parent mentioned talk to any reseller. They'll be the first to tell you that Novell peaked in the early 90's and has gone downhill since.
I'm not really sure what this means for Ximian. Perhaps this is more of an exit stratedy for Novell more than anything else since its obvious that Netware isn't going to be a reliable cash source forever. At least with Ximian they have at least some sort of opportunity for new growth.
I appreciate your loyalty to Mandrake, but to say "They weren't ever off-track" except for some little things like oh say blowing through millions of capital while going into bankruptcy sounds pretty foolish. Mandrake was off track, waaay off track. I am glad they didn't disappear entirely and that they are still around since we need more desktop linux vendors, but at the same time I'll never have the faith in them I once did.
"Now, imagine what they could do if they had enough resources to employ more hackers?"
I don't know, they had a lot more resource available not long ago and it seemed to me that they were really just good at blowing money. Maybe the people that ran Mandrake into the ground are gone now?
Former Mandrake user.
Nope your Definitely NOT alone
on
Is Louder Better?
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· Score: 2, Informative
I used to think it was just me as well for a while, but I've read a lot of people complaining about it. Poor center mixing is the plague of the DVD industry. For some reason Hollywood engineers think its fun to go from total silence to huge noises constantly. That gets old after your first few movies once your done being wowed with surround sound. In fact I was just watching that new Jackie Chan movie shanghigh nights or whatever and most of the movie was fine even though I had the sound cranked up, but right when they played music in a few parts it was blaringly loud for no reason.
I'm told by A/V snobs that the loud parts are supposed to sound LOUD, but really if you end up having to constantly turn down the volume for certain parts they aren't doing a good job mixing for home theaters. Dynamic compression is no panacea either.
Go spin you warped Pro-Republican tripe elsewhere. How this crap got modded up I'll never know.
Since were being "honest" here, how about explaining why the Republicans ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS choose white over black, rich over poor, corporate rights over worker and consumer rights, and Church dogma over individual choice? Hmm? Hmmm?
You'd also be surprised how many Fortune 500 companies have DOS running in some fashion or another. Hell more than "10,000 financial institutions use the DOS-based FedLine to transfer billions of dollars daily." http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1712,00.asp Old OS's and computers aren't going away anytime soon.
This is one part where I don't agree with Thunderbird. It's my understanding that all its ever going to be by default is a basic mail/news client. Well IMO there are better mail clients and certainly MUCH better news clients out there. I think the route of adding more functionality from the start is the way to go. Simply put the world myself included needs things like Calendaring and complete palm syncing from the start. On linux Evolution is better and on Windows of course Outlook has everything you would ever need. I don't mean it has to have groupware capabilities, but at least it needs to be a full featured PIM that works perfectly with Palms.
I've been using a Palm with email/calendar app for a long time now and at this point like many others I can't live without it. Installing the sometimes flaky calendar addon and hoping someday that it all works as well as Evolution/Outlook is not a route I plan to take at this time.
Of course its possible that I'm just thinking wrong about this and I should just look at it as a product which fills another niche. But at the same time something that let's me replace Outlook on windows and Evolution on linux could only be a good thing. I think a lot of people especially business users are going to feel the same way.
"because it's fundamentally impossible (STILL) to run a business any other way"
Why? Because your developers are 100% Windows users and can't live without it? How does that prove anything?
According to you, your company represents every single company in the world and no other possibility exists. How is that possible?
Linux has been a viable desktop for years now. It all depends on what your using it for. But then since your company doesn't use it as a desktop nobody else possibly can. What strange logic.
"but there is No Reasonable Alternative To Windows On The Desktop"
Again with the proclamations. You know saying something over and over doesn't mean its going to come true right? Well since its already been proven that some companies do in fact run linux I'd say you don't really have a leg to stand on here. The point is that your not wrong when you say most companies use windows, but your dead wrong to suggest that it's not possible to survive without it.
Also btw in case you hadn't heard there is a little thing called OSX.
"Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, let the 80's die a noble quick death, not a lingering bedridden death like the 70's. Ironic that I would say that, as I played in a 80's cover band, friends don't let friends share Def Leppard."
I love when people tell me what music sucks and what music I "should" be listening to. It makes my life so much easier.
Considering the Billions of dollars(Yes Billions) lost to flaws in IE and Outlook every year I'd say its the nicest system that most people don't even use.
Who the hell wants to have to download some 3rd party app from someonoe you don't know that's then going to download whatever files they feel like.
Put the files up and and let me download them. I don't need yet another program on my machine, especially one that so easy to trojan. The type of people who want to mod their installs certainly are capable of backing up a few files and then using new versions of them.
If bending over and taking it form some source I don't know is the only way to mod vice city then I'll be passing.
I can't remember if I had mentioned this before, but a relative of mine who is an attorney represented someone who was charged by a cable company for buying a descrambler. Basically the company that sold them got busted and their records were seized. They went right down the list suing every person on it. You either had to pay like 10 grand or go to jail. There was no "I have a lawyer so fuck off" going on like some people are suggesting here. Also you couldn't claim you A)never used it, or B) you never got it, C) insert excuse here. Lawyers aren't always a get out of jail free card. Those cable theft laws are the best money can buy so don't think you have a leg to stand on.
Anyway this case might not be the same since I assume their might be other legal reason to own a smart card programmer(I know nothing about the topic). Be warned that the same doesn't go for the cable descramblers they sell on the net or where ever. If the place that sells them goes down, those who weren't smart enough to pay by money order and send to a fake address etc are going to go down as well.
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I always see people from the other side of the "pond" saying how glad they are they don't live in America. Also many times I've read how they'd NEVER live here and would move if the same thing happened there.
Well its almost put up or shut up time. It will be interesting to see if people actually move because of this.
Note: I'm not trolling here, I am actually interested to see what happens. There has been a lot of talk and commotion from some people about never stepping foot in America because of the DMCA.
"Am I totally missing the point"
Pretty much. I don't really see how you can question if there is a demand for stuff like this. There are sh*tloads of websites dedicated to wallpapers, icons, desktop widgets, screensavers, news feeds, etc. Obviously people care very much what's on their desktops background.
Most people think of their pc as more than just a place to do work. People like to customize their desktop and have all sorts of cool stuff(to them) going on in the background.
So while you thinks it's boring and has no purpose I guess a lot of others would disagree.
"I like the concept of open source and all, but it's not as "open" as it's made out to be."
Sorry your having problems, but just because your can't get help with your problem doesn't mean open source isn't "open" as you say.
No one ever said just because you have access to the source code that your were entitled to free tech support.
If your commenting as a developer and did actually write some code and can't get it added as you've hinted, then maintain your own branch. You know how many people let alone big companies have their own line of kernels because their code doesn't get it? Tons. You said your problem is too small to cause problems for most people so I don't know why expected code to get right in the mainline kernel.
How to build a MAME cabinet in 24 hrs
"Emulators are off in 'feel', and if you like games, it is like a bad controller, just not worth it."
Nah not really, its just in your head. Buy or build a decent controller and you won't know the difference. Hell build the cabinet yourself and through in some happ controllers if you need the ultimate in realism. You certainly can't say anything feels "off" then. On the cheap side a Dual Shock with PC adapter works great for games like Smash TV and Robotron IMO.
On the practical side how many people have the space or more importantly the money to spend on dozens of mint condition arcade machines? MAME let's people experience games from their youth and let's the youth get to now where modern gaming sprung up from. Sure they'll never know the joy of getting change from a Fat sweaty guy smoking a stinky cigar in the back, but heh something don't need to be seen first hand.
Eventually all those old machine will break down and become too expensive to maintain(actually that's already the case). Luckily computers that can use MAME will be around for a long time. It's not like I don't think cabinets aren't great, but from a practical standpoint MAME is the way to go for the vast majority of people.
I don't get why that's a problem for you. Why aren't you sticking with one distro anyway? Realistically, who cares if Suse does this or that? Same goes with any other distro than the one I'm using. Stick to one distro and only packages that are specificially made for it.
This isn't a problem for the end user(how many distros does one person need?), this isn't a problem for companies(only crazy ones don't standardize on distro).
The problem your describing is only a problem for developers who write apps for linux. So you are right that for some people this can be a problem, but unlike your implying for end users it definitely isn't something to get your panties in a knot about.
"They probably limit downlink speed but don't bother to tell anyone about it."
No they don't limit download speed at all. Many people download 20-30GB a month on OOL and they don't care at all. I've seen downloads which run overnight at the modems max speed and OOL never bothers.
For some reason though OOL is really pissy about uploading these days. A year or two ago you could upload all you want(ie many gigs), but with the rise of P2P OOL has literlly put the brakes on uploading. I don't know if its a liability thing or what, but things sure have changed.
What a stupid question followed up by a even dumber point. At what point is something consumer or business? Why TF give someone 1Mb of upload speed and then say you can only use it for "a little while".
If OOL doesn't want people to actually use their bandwidth then they shouldn't have given everyone 10Mb/1Mb lines.
"just keep in mind that it is people like the Gentoo team that have made Linux the phenomenon that it is"
Err not really. Gentoo came along way way after linux became a "phenomenon". Its also very much a minority distro. If you want to thank someone, thank Slackware, Red Hat, and Debian who have been giving and giving for years now.
Nothing against Gentoo, but let's give credit where credit it due. It's going to be a long time before Gentoo can be lumped in with the above distros.
This only encourages Adobe to put even less effort in linux. Why bother making your product work properly on linux when you can have others do it for you free of charge?
This is just free money for Adobe and lets them sell additional copies without having to worry about support or how well the product works. This isn't going to pressure Adobe into anything.
Taking Wine to its obvious conclusion you have to ask yourself, why turn Linux into a Windows clone?
Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see the Adobe products come to linux. It's just that I don't see Wine doing anything but crippling linux in the long run.
I agree with the other poster. All running MS apps on Linux does is extend MS's monopoly to Linux. Why bother with linux when you computer comes with Windows and runs all those apps perfectly in the first place?
The only other thing this does is ensure that Adobe never creates any native apps for Linux.
Great.
"Faster file access and directory listing in Konquerer. Comparison:
Windows - to view C:\mp3 takes 3 seconds.
Mandrake - to view \mnt\Windows\mp3 takes 9 seconds."
Your comparison is flawed. Why are you comparing how long it takes to get to a folder 3 submenus deep vs. one which is only one menu deep?
IMO Konq is a better explorer then explorer any day of the week. Explorer has always been a crappy file manager IMO.
"3. Please, give us the option of a double-click interface."
Err KDE has offered double-click as an option for years now.
I just singed up for Cingular National yesterday and yes its GSM afaik. I know jack about cell phones but now I'm hearing TDMA has much better coverage and that GSM might be having more trouble insides building and everywhere else in general. I guess pretty much like the parent stated.
Any truth to this? Are all networks going GSM now, and that is just a transitional thing? Was signing up for Cingular a mistake?
Thanks for any who reply.
As probably one of the few people here who actually knows what Banyan was I'd have to agree completely. Novell simply didn't transition to ANYTHING since 4.11. When the world went app server crazy in the mid 90's they left Novell behind. Look at how shitty NT 4.0 was when it came out. Look at how fast ISV's and companies fled Novell and their crappy programing interfaces. Oh sure a bunch of companies keep Novell around for File/Print/Directory services, but for Internet apps and groupware apps, Windows ate Novell's lunch.
Novell is dying, its just a question of when. New companies simply don't invest in Novell, its mostly just old investments which are keeping them afloat. As a CNE and longtime Novell admin its not like I don't appreciate what Netware does/did well, but like the parent mentioned talk to any reseller. They'll be the first to tell you that Novell peaked in the early 90's and has gone downhill since.
I'm not really sure what this means for Ximian. Perhaps this is more of an exit stratedy for Novell more than anything else since its obvious that Netware isn't going to be a reliable cash source forever. At least with Ximian they have at least some sort of opportunity for new growth.
I appreciate your loyalty to Mandrake, but to say "They weren't ever off-track" except for some little things like oh say blowing through millions of capital while going into bankruptcy sounds pretty foolish. Mandrake was off track, waaay off track. I am glad they didn't disappear entirely and that they are still around since we need more desktop linux vendors, but at the same time I'll never have the faith in them I once did.
"Now, imagine what they could do if they had enough resources to employ more hackers?"
I don't know, they had a lot more resource available not long ago and it seemed to me that they were really just good at blowing money. Maybe the people that ran Mandrake into the ground are gone now?
Former Mandrake user.
I used to think it was just me as well for a while, but I've read a lot of people complaining about it. Poor center mixing is the plague of the DVD industry. For some reason Hollywood engineers think its fun to go from total silence to huge noises constantly. That gets old after your first few movies once your done being wowed with surround sound. In fact I was just watching that new Jackie Chan movie shanghigh nights or whatever and most of the movie was fine even though I had the sound cranked up, but right when they played music in a few parts it was blaringly loud for no reason.
I'm told by A/V snobs that the loud parts are supposed to sound LOUD, but really if you end up having to constantly turn down the volume for certain parts they aren't doing a good job mixing for home theaters. Dynamic compression is no panacea either.
Go spin you warped Pro-Republican tripe elsewhere.
How this crap got modded up I'll never know.
Since were being "honest" here, how about explaining why the Republicans ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS choose white over black, rich over poor, corporate rights over worker and consumer rights, and Church dogma over individual choice? Hmm? Hmmm?
Not to bring your down, but all signs are point to Doom3 being a lot longer than a few months away.
You'd also be surprised how many Fortune 500 companies have DOS running in some fashion or another. Hell more than "10,000 financial institutions use the DOS-based FedLine to transfer billions of dollars daily." http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1712,00.asp
Old OS's and computers aren't going away anytime soon.
This is one part where I don't agree with Thunderbird. It's my understanding that all its ever going to be by default is a basic mail/news client. Well IMO there are better mail clients and certainly MUCH better news clients out there. I think the route of adding more functionality from the start is the way to go. Simply put the world myself included needs things like Calendaring and complete palm syncing from the start. On linux Evolution is better and on Windows of course Outlook has everything you would ever need. I don't mean it has to have groupware capabilities, but at least it needs to be a full featured PIM that works perfectly with Palms.
I've been using a Palm with email/calendar app for a long time now and at this point like many others I can't live without it. Installing the sometimes flaky calendar addon and hoping someday that it all works as well as Evolution/Outlook is not a route I plan to take at this time.
Of course its possible that I'm just thinking wrong about this and I should just look at it as a product which fills another niche. But at the same time something that let's me replace Outlook on windows and Evolution on linux could only be a good thing. I think a lot of people especially business users are going to feel the same way.
"because it's fundamentally impossible (STILL) to run a business any other way"
Why? Because your developers are 100% Windows users and can't live without it? How does that prove anything?
According to you, your company represents every single company in the world and no other possibility exists. How is that possible?
Linux has been a viable desktop for years now. It all depends on what your using it for. But then since your company doesn't use it as a desktop nobody else possibly can. What strange logic.
"but there is No Reasonable Alternative To Windows On The Desktop"
Again with the proclamations. You know saying something over and over doesn't mean its going to come true right? Well since its already been proven that some companies do in fact run linux I'd say you don't really have a leg to stand on here. The point is that your not wrong when you say most companies use windows, but your dead wrong to suggest that it's not possible to survive without it.
Also btw in case you hadn't heard there is a little thing called OSX.
"Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, let the 80's die a noble quick death, not a lingering bedridden death like the 70's. Ironic that I would say that, as I played in a 80's cover band, friends don't let friends share Def Leppard."
I love when people tell me what music sucks and what music I "should" be listening to. It makes my life so much easier.
Considering the Billions of dollars(Yes Billions) lost to flaws in IE and Outlook every year I'd say its the nicest system that most people don't even use.
Who the hell wants to have to download some 3rd party app from someonoe you don't know that's then going to download whatever files they feel like.
Put the files up and and let me download them. I don't need yet another program on my machine, especially one that so easy to trojan. The type of people who want to mod their installs certainly are capable of backing up a few files and then using new versions of them.
If bending over and taking it form some source I don't know is the only way to mod vice city then I'll be passing.
Totally lame.
I can't remember if I had mentioned this before, but a relative of mine who is an attorney represented someone who was charged by a cable company for buying a descrambler. Basically the company that sold them got busted and their records were seized. They went right down the list suing every person on it. You either had to pay like 10 grand or go to jail. There was no "I have a lawyer so fuck off" going on like some people are suggesting here. Also you couldn't claim you A)never used it, or B) you never got it, C) insert excuse here. Lawyers aren't always a get out of jail free card. Those cable theft laws are the best money can buy so don't think you have a leg to stand on.
Anyway this case might not be the same since I assume their might be other legal reason to own a smart card programmer(I know nothing about the topic). Be warned that the same doesn't go for the cable descramblers they sell on the net or where ever. If the place that sells them goes down, those who weren't smart enough to pay by money order and send to a fake address etc are going to go down as well.