Perhaps they ZDnet is afraid that these young'ns might actually understand the technology better than they do and will give the PHBs... Uhm, I mean *IT Professionals*, unbiased information.;-) Thad
Dosen't that get a bit steep. What with having to fork over $80-100 for each Win9X setup?
Well, at least three of the systems were purchased with Win95 already on them, so those are legal. One system only has a DOS partition (it is too slow to play BattleZone anyway). I'm not sure about the last system. It has a legal copy of NT but I honestly can't remember where the Win95 came from. It was probably purchased with Win95 but that may not be the copy that was reinstalled when I repartitioned and put NT on it.
Yes, it is steep, and that is why I am a big advocate of games for Linux (I'm even writing one of my own).
Yes, our cryptography laws here in America are idiotic in the extreme. I am personally embarassed by it. Several years ago I developed an SSL capable web server for Netware and we had a bitch of time getting export approval for it.
And this excuse that we need to make strong crypto illegal or terrorist will use it... what a crock of shit! As if our LAWS are going to stop CRIMINALS from using technology that is freely and legally donwloaded from other countries and even available in textbooks. Yah, right. The result will be that only the terrorists will be using strong crypto (in America anyway) and the law abiding citizens will be vulnerable.
Besides, the really savy criminals will be burying their encrypted messages in what looks like white noise in sound and image files so know one will even know there is a message to decode.
And you wondered why MP3 is so popular.;-)
Thad -- Make guns illegal and only criminals will have them.
American programmers may be lazy SOBs... I don't know and I'm not about to argue that point. I've only met a tiny fraction of all the programmers in America.
LOC is, however, a nearly useless way to measure productivity. Line churn as a work metric encourages inefficient coding. This has been demonstrated in earlier studies. The better way to measure things is how well you are hitting your project objectives and are you staying within the timeline. This requires proper planning at the outset and good project management throughout... which damn few places seem to do. That is the REAL problem with software development in America.
This is all IMHO, but then again I've been doing this for 13 years so my oppinion must be worth something by now.;-)
Thad (who has never missed a coding deadline but has no idea how many lines he has churned out)
Currently I use Linux happily, and am thinking of giving *BSD a shot. However, I haven't found much in terms of support for my Gravis Gamepad (says it supports a standard joystick, but I want my 10 buttons:-)) Also, what about TV tuners? Does anybody have any info?
Driver support for this type of hardware is likely to lag on FreeBSD... it is intendended primarily as a server OS after all. If you seriously want to use consumer (not server) peripherals like tuners and joysticks, you are probably better off with Linux.
That said, by all means install FreeBSD and tinker with it. It never hurts to broaden your skills. I run a headless FreeBSD box at home and use Linux to telnet and X into it. You could always pick up an old 486 for next to nothing, or go the dual boot route. Good luck.
BTW, I'll let you in on a secret. One reason I run so many operating systems at home, each on their own hardware? Every system has a win95 partition so I can occasionaly reboot 'em all and host Quake/BattleZone frag fests.:) I currently have 5 systems on the house network... I think I've got parts lying around to make a sixth.
Thad (hoping I can still claim my *cross platform testing lab* as a tax writeoff) >:)
I've been a happy FreeBSD user for years; I run my business on it. For Internet/Intranet server i've found it to be a very efficient and scaleable box (kicked NT's but on the same hardware anyway). I know of many other companies using it for same and I see no compelling reason to switch. That is not to say I won't be using Linux also. Linux is also a great OS and it appears to be attracting more applications and desktop services. I'm running two Linux systems at home (as well as FreeBSD, NetWare, Windows95, and WindowsNT) and it has become my primary desktop.
And contrary to some comments I've seen saying otherwise, FreeBSD's install is really slick. Redhat and other Linux distros have only recently caught up to where FreeBSD has been for some time in ease of install. Furthermore, the Ports system rocks! Linux needs something like this.
BTW, Jordan Hubbard seems like a rather nice guy. He provided me some very useful feedback on a project I'm working on. Comparing him to Linus, I'd be hard pressed to say which one is more cool.;-)
There should be a web site to collect stories of this kind. Anyone heard of one? Anyone want to host it? It could be fun and possibly even theraputic to trade project disaster tales. Heck, it was a screwed up work environment that encouraged me to go the self employed route.
Thad
He's got it backwards
on
Gene Leakage
·
· Score: 1
Doctor Jones warns that insect resistant plant could lead to a world wide disaster, and he holds up penicillin resistant bacteria as a supporting example... but he has it backwards!
If history teaches us anything (particularly the penicillin example) it is that evolution will adapt around GM modified plants. Some version of insect that likes the plants will emerge. Exactly this sort of thing has occured with standard pesticides. Farmers dump chemicals on their fields, the insects most vulnerable die, those most resistant survice. Over time, evolutions selects toward an insect that is totally resistant to the chemicals.
There are *bazillions* of insects in the world, and most of them have very short breeding cycles and a huge number of offspring. The insect world is evolution in high gear.
I find it odd that he choose penicillin to illustrate his point, as this example points to exacly the same pattern: nature adapting around our tampering and surviving despite our best efforts. Hey, I'm not a geneticist, so take this with a grain of salt... but it seems almost common sense to me. Thad
> There will always be free software. People > will produce it because of varying reasons, > philosophical beliefs, just for fun, they wrote > it but don't want to support it, etc, but there > may not always be the "buzz" associated with it > that there is now.
Yes, the buzz will die down, not because OSS will die out, but because it will be accepted as just the normal way that things are done. Sort of like they way the Internet is becoming commonplace in the minds of most people... when it used to be *this amazing new thing* that the media had discovered. Is that a Paradigm I hear shifting?:-)
> That's a rather eccentric use of the word > "hubris". I suspect the reviewer might have > meant to use "humility." (Hint: they are > opposites.)
I don't know about that; I've coded some truly amazing bugs in my time... bugs that I am very proud of. Any shlocky code-monkey can leave a dangling pointer. It takes *real* talent to hose up a program in so esoteric a way that debugging it becomes a challange of mythical proportion.
Unfortunately, GLIDE is just about the only game in town (presently) for support of 3D hardware on Linux. Other projects are being worked on, but are not *production ready* yet. Personally, I am keeping a close eye on GGI3D. Mesa, an OpenGL clone, is available for Linux but has limited hardware acceleration support (mainly using GLIDE). Direct3D is availble only on Windows and is a poor imitation of OpenGL anyway.
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps they ZDnet is afraid that these young'ns might actually understand the technology better than they do and will give the PHBs... Uhm, I mean *IT Professionals*, unbiased information. ;-) Thad
Well, at least three of the systems were purchased with Win95 already on them, so those are legal. One system only has a DOS partition (it is too slow to play BattleZone anyway). I'm not sure about the last system. It has a legal copy of NT but I honestly can't remember where the Win95 came from. It was probably purchased with Win95 but that may not be the copy that was reinstalled when I repartitioned and put NT on it.
Yes, it is steep, and that is why I am a big advocate of games for Linux (I'm even writing one of my own).
Thad
And this excuse that we need to make strong crypto illegal or terrorist will use it... what a crock of shit! As if our LAWS are going to stop CRIMINALS from using technology that is freely and legally donwloaded from other countries and even available in textbooks. Yah, right. The result will be that only the terrorists will be using strong crypto (in America anyway) and the law abiding citizens will be vulnerable.
Besides, the really savy criminals will be burying their encrypted messages in what looks like white noise in sound and image files so know one will even know there is a message to decode.
And you wondered why MP3 is so popular. ;-)
Thad
--
Make guns illegal and only criminals will have them.
LOC is, however, a nearly useless way to measure productivity. Line churn as a work metric encourages inefficient coding. This has been demonstrated in earlier studies. The better way to measure things is how well you are hitting your project objectives and are you staying within the timeline. This requires proper planning at the outset and good project management throughout... which damn few places seem to do. That is the REAL problem with software development in America.
This is all IMHO, but then again I've been doing this for 13 years so my oppinion must be worth something by now. ;-)
Thad (who has never missed a coding deadline but has no idea how many lines he has churned out)
Driver support for this type of hardware is likely to lag on FreeBSD... it is intendended primarily as a server OS after all. If you seriously want to use consumer (not server) peripherals like tuners and joysticks, you are probably better off with Linux.
That said, by all means install FreeBSD and tinker with it. It never hurts to broaden your skills. I run a headless FreeBSD box at home and use Linux to telnet and X into it. You could always pick up an old 486 for next to nothing, or go the dual boot route. Good luck.
BTW, I'll let you in on a secret. One reason I run so many operating systems at home, each on their own hardware? Every system has a win95 partition so I can occasionaly reboot 'em all and host Quake/BattleZone frag fests. :) I currently have 5 systems on the house network... I think I've got parts lying around to make a sixth.
Thad
(hoping I can still claim my *cross platform testing lab* as a tax writeoff) >:)
And contrary to some comments I've seen saying otherwise, FreeBSD's install is really slick. Redhat and other Linux distros have only recently caught up to where FreeBSD has been for some time in ease of install. Furthermore, the Ports system rocks! Linux needs something like this.
BTW, Jordan Hubbard seems like a rather nice guy. He provided me some very useful feedback on a project I'm working on. Comparing him to Linus, I'd be hard pressed to say which one is more cool. ;-)
Thad
Thad
If history teaches us anything (particularly the penicillin example) it is that evolution will adapt around GM modified plants. Some version of insect that likes the plants will emerge. Exactly this sort of thing has occured with standard pesticides. Farmers dump chemicals on their fields, the insects most vulnerable die, those most resistant survice. Over time, evolutions selects toward an insect that is totally resistant to the chemicals.
There are *bazillions* of insects in the world, and most of them have very short breeding cycles and a huge number of offspring. The insect world is evolution in high gear.
I find it odd that he choose penicillin to illustrate his point, as this example points to exacly the same pattern: nature adapting around our tampering and surviving despite our best efforts. Hey, I'm not a geneticist, so take this with a grain of salt... but it seems almost common sense to me. Thad
> There will always be free software. People
:-)
> will produce it because of varying reasons,
> philosophical beliefs, just for fun, they wrote
> it but don't want to support it, etc, but there
> may not always be the "buzz" associated with it
> that there is now.
Yes, the buzz will die down, not because OSS
will die out, but because it will be accepted as
just the normal way that things are done. Sort
of like they way the Internet is becoming
commonplace in the minds of most people... when
it used to be *this amazing new thing* that the
media had discovered. Is that a Paradigm I hear
shifting?
> That's a rather eccentric use of the word
> "hubris". I suspect the reviewer might have
> meant to use "humility." (Hint: they are
> opposites.)
I don't know about that; I've coded some truly
amazing bugs in my time... bugs that I am very
proud of. Any shlocky code-monkey can leave a
dangling pointer. It takes *real* talent to hose
up a program in so esoteric a way that debugging
it becomes a challange of mythical proportion.
>:)
Unfortunately, GLIDE is just about the only game
in town (presently) for support of 3D hardware
on Linux. Other projects are being worked on,
but are not *production ready* yet. Personally,
I am keeping a close eye on GGI3D. Mesa, an
OpenGL clone, is available for Linux but has
limited hardware acceleration support (mainly
using GLIDE). Direct3D is availble only on
Windows and is a poor imitation of OpenGL anyway.