I own 3 Macs, 1 Powerbook, 1 Macbook,1 intel Mac Mini. I have not and definitely won't be installing OS-We-Gave-The-Graphic-Designers-Free-Reign-X on any of my machines. I own and make my money from, amongst other things, Adobe CS3 apps and Java. Both do not work completely or properly with OSX 10.5. Adobe will be bringing out an upgrade for Acrobat sometime in 2008 (yay), and Apple might honestly, never actually update Java to 1.6 on OS X. There is an open source JDK 1.6 available now, from scratch to RC1 faster than Apple took to withdraw their horribly broken 1.6 RC. And this is what is making me seriously think of moving to Linux and Windows.
I like OSX, since it's (was, at least in 10.4) very robust. But Apple has one big problem on their hands that goes hand in hand with Steve Jobs and his ego: Whatever SJ thinks is cool and perfect (and trendy for n00bs) goes in (Leopard comes with Ruby on Rails, yay), whatever he thinks is no longer cool (even though literally millions of coders make their money with Java on the server and especially on handies, Google mail, maps and calendar all run just fine in Java on my 2 year old Sony-Ericsson) goes out. This leaves many people frustrated as hell, since it makes work like sitting on a violently rocking boat which might overturn at any time.
On top of this, Apple, in a very Microsoft-like move, killed off a perfectly working Bootcamp on OSX 10.4, forcing all the thousands of poor morons who have Windows in dual boot on their machines upgrade to Vistard and make Apple some extra cash. In addition, installing Windows on Vistard 10.5 Bootcamp is tricky, because if you delete the Vistard created partition and create your own with the Windows installer, the 10.5 Bootcamp no longer sees it. This wasn't the case with the Bootcamp in 10.4, so it must be a Steve Jobs doing a Steve Ballmer like thing and fucking over users to try and lock them in.
I'm personally quite glad that Linux is finally getting good to go. I'm beginning to think that Adobe could port its software to Linux and that they might even make enogh sales from people who are just too pissed off with the Redmond and Cupertino robber barons and their fanciful whims.
It's people like this who help us idiots who believed that Apple would finally provide timely releases of the JDK after it was no longer the language de jour.
If you actually take a look at the spec, or if you have spent any amount of time programming actionscript in Flash CS3, you will no doubt have noticed that, with some exceptions, such as JS's dynamic properties, ES4 is basically Java, but where the types are defined as such: var x:int, y:string instead of int x and String y.
Thanks for this site, Rob. We come from all sorts of different backgrounds and do all sorts of things, but I like to think that this is one place where we can kind of just be our petulant selves. May you have a lot of sucess in your life.
Where I work, we've switched all our computers to Macs, even our Solidworks user use it on Mac Pros with Windows installed under Bootcamp. I have asked, and I'm not the only one, when Thompson/Solidworks is planning on releasing a Mac version. The rep said they aren't right now, but they are looking at officially recognizing Parallels with its 3D acceleration. However, the more people that ask, the bigger the chances are that they will make a Mac version. There's a whole load of design and engineering agencies that would love to drop Windows but can't because of the toolchain. Do your bit: ask!
An airliner will use that $200 in a tiny amount of time (a minute, a few miutes?) on fuel alone, meaning that if the plane stays in a holding pattern for 5 minutes or has to wait for half an hour to take off, the plane is already deeply into the red. Given that both circumstances, waiting on the tarmac with engines running for a take off slot or flying in a circle in a holding pattern are very common occurrences, it is hard to see how airlines can ever make anything on any flight. My guess is that, as is typical, airlines make a big noise about how little they make based on an absolute worst case.
I fly to South Africa from Europe once a year. I almost always fly Emirates. It's really out of the way and adds on much longer hours, but Emriates:
Has absolutely amazing staff. Friendly, professional, speak the languages of source and destination country, take their time with difficult passengers. Has comfortable, cheap economy seats, with video entertainments systems in each seat back - that work. Provides free drinks and fantastic meals. The best I've ever had on any airline. The major hub, Dubai, is a large, roomy, comfortable airport with every and any convenience. It has friendly, professional staff. The queues are managable. They do not treat their customers like criminals (USA take note), while providing excellent security. They are the cheapest airline to fly the route.
They are not alone in this quality service. Singapore Airlines is just as good, if not better, and other new Arabian Gulf Carriers like Air Qatar and Al Etihad are also competing at this level.
United Airlines is going to lose any business they have on the routes these other airlines fly if they treat their passengers badly and charge them for things that have been normal part of service... on buses!
I preordered OSX 10.5 the day it was announced last week. My company has already switched our file servers over to OSX on X Servers and our mail and calendering will follow as soon as we have tested OSX Server 10.5. We now only support Macs for all but our 5 consultants who use Thinkpads for the simple reason that many of our customers are very conservative and look at anything else but Windows with suspicion and so the consultants who visit them take along Windows laptops for purely image reasons. Our CAD users run Windows and Solidworks on Mac Pro towers and the Samba server on OSX is rock solid.
Supporting our users is a part of my job and it is FAR less hassle than supporting Windows. OSX is extremely solid, and has, as far as I can only one major OS design error: The fact that designers can, and do, often switch off system fonts unknowingly, thereby crashing some apps that need them.
As far as Windows support goes, supporting XP is a pain, but far less of a pain than Vista. We have one (1) Vista user (the boss), who is less than enthusiatic about the awful slowness of Vista and the constant irriation of teh UACs (yes, I know you can turn it off, but the boss doesn't want it turned off. He just uses Office and Explorer and is happy that at least that runs ok, even if nothing else does).
Vista has already aquired an awful reputation. It will, of course, eventually totally replace XP when drivers, apps and support for XP dries out, but only then. Not only that, but Microsoft will have a tough time fixing the broken trust that major buyers have placed in them.
Of course, Microsoft, as big as it is, will not be going away any time soon. We'll just have to live with that.
Apart from all the other platforms, what really utterly blows my mind is that the PS2 is still selling so well. I would love to know the reason why. Is it the huge game library plus the extremely low cost? What is it?
I apologise for the link I gave. I know it wasn't exactly as if Carter himself came up with the proposal, but he did advocate it strongly (he put it to Congress to fund studies on it). I used to subscribe to Time in the late 70s and the article would have been somewhere from 1978 to 1980, in which the Carter administration's advocacy of the SPS was discussed in detail (or as much detail as Time gives anyway). A lot of the article discussed, and there were fancy little diagrammes on how the microwave ground stations would work (IIRC, the stations would be about 5kms on a side and the beam would actually be quite weak locally, so as not to interfere with aircraft, birds etc passing through it).
There was an article here on Slashdot last week on multilungualism, and all the anglo slashdotters were talking about some wonderful "universal" language (which of course, meant english because none of them ever bothered to even try to learn anything else), and then they get seriously confused when they go to another country and discover that, shock, gasp, the local not only speak another language, but they also use another script entirely, and this, especially in countries with big populations where there are enough resources to have there own digital script systems, such as Chinese, Japanese, Hindi, Arabic or Cyrillic means that the previously imperious "universal language" advocate is suddenly up shit street without a paddle.
What this means is that just because all you know is English, doesn't mean that all the others are going to suddenly run to learn your language and kiss your ass. Those days are over.
I remember, back in 1980 or so, when all the Reagan fans were jumping for joy because the actor was more popular than a naval nuclear engineer (yes; Carter actually knew his shit), Carter had proposed a system of orbital solar power stations. It would have been more or less the same thing as they are proposing today. Those of you who have access to Time magazine's archives will find an article on it.
So, here we are today, some 27 years later, and the same proposal gets floated.
Imagine if laziness hadn't dropped the issue back then. Iran, Iraq and the whole business of 9/11 would have been less critical than they now are.
Someday, you're going to piss off some disgruntled looney a bit too much and when you walk (or waddle in your case) into your next conference, that guy is going to pull out a gun and actually kill you, or try to kill you.
I personally sudder to think of the shit that would come out of those holes, though. Would make a mighty stink.
The US and previously the USSR, now Russia and China, have bene in a perpetual race to build the best fighter for over 50 years now, from the days of the F-86 and Mig-15, the F-4 and Mig-21 and F-15 and Su-27/30. Each time, one side has made a major improvement and then the other side has scrambled to keep up. The Mig-15 was the best until the US cougt up with the F-86, then the Mig-21 proved to be more nimble than the F-4 and along came the F-16. The USSR built the Mach 3 Mig-25 to counter a possible Mach 3 XB-70 US bomber and the US built the F-15 to counter that. The the Soviet built the Su-27 to counter the F-15 and the Mig-29 to counter the F-16. Since the late 80's the US has been working on the F-22, which has been both the most advanced jet fighter ever and also the most expensive. It was so expensive that the actual number pruchased has been reduced by two thirds, costnig about $100 million a piece. It is also so sensitive that it will likely never be exported.
To ctach up in this never ending race, Sukhoi in Russia has been working on a similar stealth aircraft to the F-22, called the PAK FA for many years now, and the first example should be flying next year, and Shenyang and Chengdu in China have been working on similar designs, the J-xx and J-13, but I doubt that any of these weapons will ever be used against any of the other. The Russia and Chinese jets are just as sensitive, security wise, as the F-22 is. There is much more chance that the Indians using the PAK and the Pakistanis, using the J-13/14 will duke it out amongst themselves, if Russia and China ever sell the weapons to them, being as sensitive as they are, than any of those fighting against the F-22.
These aircraft are so expensive that losing just one, be it in combat or to accidents mean that you've just lost some $100 million dollars in the case of the F-22. The fact that they will almost certainly not be used in combat against any foe that a F-16 couldn't cope with means that they, along with incredibly expensive stealth ships, stealth submarines, etc, are mostly expensive white elephants, flying around, doing a lot of impressive flight demos, and then eventually being scrapped in 30 years or so when they reach the end of their service lives.
I personally think that while the Japanese could certainly develop one of these aircraft on their own, and might very well do so in the face of the J-13/xx and the PAK if the US doesn't sell them the F-22, I think that a lot of what the Japanese are doing is simply bargaining to get the US to sell them the F-22. The costs of developing an advanced stealth fighter are not to be laughed at. However, as soon as the Russian PAK and Chinese J-13/xx are in active service, the aura of invincibility of the F-22 will decrease, and then I suppose we'll move on to round 6 of the never ending race to waste people's money and lives.
You know what made me come back to Slashdot some 6 or 7 years ago? It was you. Your basic, down to earth, humorous personality devoid of all the diva tantrums or plain moronity that plague so many in our delightful world. I found your proposal to Kathleen just amazing, and I found it even more amazing that you personally wrote back, thanking me for my congratulation wishes on your wedding. You're a good person, Rob.
Now for my question: Why are you not running for president in 2008?
While many people ask why anyone should want to go to the moon and just as many answer that the moon is a worthy goal because, uhm, yes, uhm, other nations are going there, there are many real benefits to landing on and having a permanent manned presence on the moon.
Firstly, and most importantly, the massive national prestige for any nation that does this can not be emphasised enough. Even if the US were going there with no apparent competitors, the fact that the US can do this would do more for gaining respect, no matter how unwillingly, than any number of curious American foreign policy actions. As it stands today, the international respect for the US is probably at its lowest its been in any time since the US became a superpower after WWII. This is regardless of how competitive the US economy or business are, because, like a weakened body, once the illness gets a foothold, it becomes a fast target for numerous smaller ills, and you have, for example, Europeans rightly pointing out the huge poverty rate in the US, lack of proper healthcare, poor education system etc. You get the Russians reasserting themselves, but in a far smarter way than in Soviet times, with the US's only response a provocation along the lines of missile deployment on Russia's borders. You get the Chinese being able to launch a, up to now, flawless and modern manned space programme (and spare me the comments on how its copied Russian technology. It's not). You get South American machos being able to insult and provoke the US with impunity, and you get Iranian crackpots being able to defy the US because of the bloody mess that the US perpetrated next door.
A manned permanent US presence on the moo would do an enormous amount for American self confidence. Bragging rights should not be discounted so easily.
However, the same goes for any other nation that has the moon as a goal. The main reason that other nations are setting goals for a manned presence on the moon behind that of the US is because they're know what the whole operation costs. There is a very good reason why the Europeans, in the form of ESA, has no manned space launch vehicles. They did build a module on the ISS, which despite the derision that the ISS gets here on slashdot, gave them valuable experience in building long term manned space vehicles, and they have the ATV, which gives them experience in powered automated space transport. They have been world market leaders in commercial satellite launches for quite a while now, although that may of course change in the future, but they scrapped plans for the Hermes mini shuttle a long time ago, because: It was seen as costly goal with no commercial return.
The European space effort is funded by European member countries and has far better financial oversight than NASA does, as no member country will be able to set up huge and costly goals in the face of middle class European tax payer opposition. This is why the Europeans do things in tiny, agonisingly slow steps, and, where possible, in partnership with other space faring nations. Opposition from member countries recently stalled the European goal of launching a manned Mars mission in 2030.
BUT, the fact that the US Orion is only for Americans and American companies has forced the Europeans into finally starting their own manned programme in partnership with the Russians. The future CSTS seems to becoming a hybrid of the European ATV as powered service module, a bigger re-engineered Russian Soyuz rentry vehicle, and European habitation vehicle based on the Columbus ISS module.
But no one has said anything about landing on the moon yet. The reason is because, apart from the US no one has actually been there or has any experience in lunar landing engineering. The Russians, with enough money, could probably be in Lunar orbit in a year. They certainly have the technology. But the current Russian politicians under Putin are no fools and they will in no way spend uncounted billions on Lunar landing technology in a mad race to the moon like the Soviets
You think German is the same as Swiss German? You think an Afrikaans person can understand spoken Dutch (They can read it, but I can also read Swedish)?
Apart from which, in your heroic AC post, along with the somewhat stupid "==", I detect a hint of envy in your post.
How many languages do you speak?
Or are you still waiting for your imaginary universal language.
I don't own an iPhone and wouldn't really want one, but I wouldn't be surprised if Apple wouldn't be planning one of its coups by waiting until next year and then releasing, along with the rumoured Netwon II an official SDK for all three touchscreen devices.
Several things that have gone down in the general outcry about the iPhone being closed to development (escorted by a truly monumental amount of FUD, such as the claim, last night that Apple still had not released the Intel kernel sources, even though its been a year or so since they did) point to this, such as:
1.Apple almost never comments in public about controversies over its devices. They won't start now. Apple's biggest trump card is its ability to avoid the bleeding wound scenario that plagues companies when there is some new device in the works or some controversy where it would simply be better to weather it out than make a public fool of oneself. 2.The iPhone uses some elements of the OSX 10.5 SDK, which are not yet out in Public. If Apple ever do open the iPhone to development, they'll do it after that, not before. 3.The rumoured Newton II (aka iPad or whatever), will be an open platform, running a version of OSX, very similar to the one in the iPhone and iPod touch. 4.Apple has quietly been hiring gaming developers.
Apple might be at a point where they will also start to compete with mobile gaming devices. It would add another sales point to the line of touchpad devices.
The article on the first release of OSX on Intel id from FUCKING 2006, you dumbass bastards. Apple released the source to the kernal fucking ages ago. God, I swear, I read fucking hystericatl snotnose OSS crapshit like this anymore and I will begin to understand why everyone hates you unwashed brainless OSS trolls and your constant fucking whining.
There, I hope I got your attention there: I really just wanted to add a few points here about languages, their uses and development.
Firstly, I speak 5 languages fluently (English, Afrikaans, Dutch, German, Swiss-German and French) and can get by in two more (Spanish and Turkish). I'm a South African, my girlfriend is Afrikaans, I've lived in Switzerland for some 17 years now, and in Germany and Spain before that and in Turkey for a year as well. My father was French speaking. I'm not reciting all this to brag. The knowledge of different languages has been of vital use to me in my life and has actually saved my life on a number of occasions, literally.
When I first got to Europe 21 years ago, I could only really speak English and Afrikaans. I knew a smattering of French from my dad, but I only really learned from my French girlfriend at the time. I worked in what was then West Berlin for the US Airforce, but before that, for my first year, I survived by doing odd jobs and basically pestering people to let me stay somewhere, and I learned German really quickly, because in those days, not many Germans could or wanted to speak English. The USAF people I knew, on the other hand, lived in American bases, went to American shops and watched American movies, and almost none of them understood a word of German. They had no need, but they had plenty of problems when out in the city doing shopping etc.
When I worked in Turkey, as usual, I made the effort to communicate with the locals, who surprise surprise, generally only spoke Turkish and perhaps enough German to sell stuff to tourists. Knowing Turkish made me friends and made my life that much more pleasant, and cheaper, since I could order in Turkish I paid the prices that locals paid for drinks and food which is considerably less than tourists pay.
A tidbit of info is that the Turkic languages are so closely related that knowledge of Turkish will enable you to make yourself understood from Turkey to Kazakhstan, including parts of Russia where Tartar is spoken, which is quite a span of territory. Not that I ever plan on visiting that part of the world, but if I ever do get the chance to see the Altai mountains, I'll be able to get around without too much trouble.
Another tidbit of info is that Turkic grammar gives you a head start if you ever need to learn Hungarian, Finnish or want to chat up a blond Estonian beauty. They all work the same way.
Another one is traveling in France. The French are also somewhat monolingual, like most English speakers, and I know a lot of Americans having a bad time in France because they find the French resentful of having to speak English. The joke is that the French generally don't mind if you don't speak French, but they really appreciate it if you just try a few words.
Switzerland is another special case. Swiss German is a dialect of Alemannic that is unintelligible to most Germans from the North of Germany, with some subdialects that are incomprehensible to almost all Germans. It is the most spoken language in Switzerland, but it is not a written language. The written language of Switzerland is German. You can get by perfectly with standard German in Switzerland, but knowledge of the spoken language is what will make you friends or get you business contacts with the locals. There is even a local language that is endangered, called Rumantsch, which is a direct descendant of the vulgar latin the Romans soke here 2000 years ago. It is kept alive by the Swiss not for its practical value, since all of its speakers are also fluent in German, but for its cultural heritage. It adds colour to the landscape, so to speak.
I'm telling all these stories in an attempt to show that just because you think English is a universal language doesn't make it so. In Zurich, where I work, everyone in my company speaks English to some degree, but the one guy who only spoke English at work constantly had to fight against the language barrier. I don't think he was very happy. It's often the same in large parts of
I am usually highly skeptical of the USA, but this "Americans r dum" business is simply wrong,and ignores the complexity of the problem.
Firstly, American universities are usually regarded as the world's best. They are expensive and are funded to a degree with fees paid by students and to a degree by government and public grants for research. As far as I understand it, a lot of American students thus take loans to get through University with the goal of using that degree to earn a good salary and make a decent living afterwards. The system tends to discourage students studying purely for the love of learning, I would think, at the best universities at any rate. The universities, dependent as they are on student fees and government grants, will therefore tend to be very competitive in order to raise their standing in oder to attract the best students to produce the best results in both exams and research. I might be somewhat off here - I don't really know - but judging by the way universities are ranked (Nobel and other prizes and research papers published), this setting seems to support that kind of setup.
The result, however, of this system seems to be that fewer American students will study for advanced degrees in fields which offer a lower financial return afterwards, since the cost is so high to get to an advanced degree. Foreign students, mainly from somewhat less well off countries like China and India, see the advanced fields exactly the same way as their American counterparts do, but the degree of perceived wealth is different for them, as earning 40% less than a Lawyer or Doctor is still extremely wealthy for them and worth the burden of having to go highly into debt to pay off their studies. In addition to this, a lot of foreign students will want to study in English which is the current lingua franca or international language.
This contrasts with the general European (which is changing towards the American system, btw) which tends to favour free or cheap higher education. Firstly, the level of competitiveness amongst uiversities obviously drops off in this system which can be seen in their rankings, coming nowhere near American universities. However, the system encourages more young people to study, and, more young people to study in fields which are less financially rewarding. (Note that this is an utter generalisation, and should be treated as such). So, in general, the European system might favour the mean level of education and the US system seems to favour the most competitive (this is of course, totally ignoring all the state universities and colleges in the US). Not only that, but the fact that most Europeans universities do not teach in English means that Indian or Chinese students will probabaly be less inclined to study there, and, since tuittion is not free for foreigners, they get more value for their money at a major US university than they do in a European model one.
If these terms are not challenged (and they make Microsoft's EULAs seem tame by comparison), then you Americans will finally have sold yourselves into corporate slavery. I imagine that the ToS was written by some lawyer who believes that the law is not worth more than using as toiletpaper to wipe his ass with. He must know that the ToS would not stand up in court, but they wouldn't have written them unless they were pretty sure that they could buy the courts or at least extort them.
My guess is that AT&T is using their cooperation with Bush's wiretapping by the NSA to be able to write their own laws, as long as they don't challenge anything the Cheney machine says. Anytime there's a legal problem, they simply point the courts and lawyers to their agreement with the NSA.
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I own 3 Macs, 1 Powerbook, 1 Macbook,1 intel Mac Mini. I have not and definitely won't be installing OS-We-Gave-The-Graphic-Designers-Free-Reign-X on any of my machines. I own and make my money from, amongst other things, Adobe CS3 apps and Java. Both do not work completely or properly with OSX 10.5. Adobe will be bringing out an upgrade for Acrobat sometime in 2008 (yay), and Apple might honestly, never actually update Java to 1.6 on OS X. There is an open source JDK 1.6 available now, from scratch to RC1 faster than Apple took to withdraw their horribly broken 1.6 RC. And this is what is making me seriously think of moving to Linux and Windows.
I like OSX, since it's (was, at least in 10.4) very robust. But Apple has one big problem on their hands that goes hand in hand with Steve Jobs and his ego: Whatever SJ thinks is cool and perfect (and trendy for n00bs) goes in (Leopard comes with Ruby on Rails, yay), whatever he thinks is no longer cool (even though literally millions of coders make their money with Java on the server and especially on handies, Google mail, maps and calendar all run just fine in Java on my 2 year old Sony-Ericsson) goes out. This leaves many people frustrated as hell, since it makes work like sitting on a violently rocking boat which might overturn at any time.
On top of this, Apple, in a very Microsoft-like move, killed off a perfectly working Bootcamp on OSX 10.4, forcing all the thousands of poor morons who have Windows in dual boot on their machines upgrade to Vistard and make Apple some extra cash. In addition, installing Windows on Vistard 10.5 Bootcamp is tricky, because if you delete the Vistard created partition and create your own with the Windows installer, the 10.5 Bootcamp no longer sees it. This wasn't the case with the Bootcamp in 10.4, so it must be a Steve Jobs doing a Steve Ballmer like thing and fucking over users to try and lock them in.
I'm personally quite glad that Linux is finally getting good to go. I'm beginning to think that Adobe could port its software to Linux and that they might even make enogh sales from people who are just too pissed off with the Redmond and Cupertino robber barons and their fanciful whims.
It's people like this who help us idiots who believed that Apple would finally provide timely releases of the JDK after it was no longer the language de jour.
If you actually take a look at the spec, or if you have spent any amount of time programming actionscript in Flash CS3, you will no doubt have noticed that, with some exceptions, such as JS's dynamic properties, ES4 is basically Java, but where the types are defined as such: var x:int, y:string instead of int x and String y.
Thanks for this site, Rob. We come from all sorts of different backgrounds and do all sorts of things, but I like to think that this is one place where we can kind of just be our petulant selves. May you have a lot of sucess in your life.
Where I work, we've switched all our computers to Macs, even our Solidworks user use it on Mac Pros with Windows installed under Bootcamp. I have asked, and I'm not the only one, when Thompson/Solidworks is planning on releasing a Mac version. The rep said they aren't right now, but they are looking at officially recognizing Parallels with its 3D acceleration. However, the more people that ask, the bigger the chances are that they will make a Mac version. There's a whole load of design and engineering agencies that would love to drop Windows but can't because of the toolchain. Do your bit: ask!
3000 people die and a nation of 300 million goes belly up?
I really wish that more people would have asked that question after 2001.
An airliner will use that $200 in a tiny amount of time (a minute, a few miutes?) on fuel alone, meaning that if the plane stays in a holding pattern for 5 minutes or has to wait for half an hour to take off, the plane is already deeply into the red. Given that both circumstances, waiting on the tarmac with engines running for a take off slot or flying in a circle in a holding pattern are very common occurrences, it is hard to see how airlines can ever make anything on any flight. My guess is that, as is typical, airlines make a big noise about how little they make based on an absolute worst case.
I fly to South Africa from Europe once a year. I almost always fly Emirates. It's really out of the way and adds on much longer hours, but Emriates:
Has absolutely amazing staff. Friendly, professional, speak the languages of source and destination country, take their time with difficult passengers.
Has comfortable, cheap economy seats, with video entertainments systems in each seat back - that work.
Provides free drinks and fantastic meals. The best I've ever had on any airline.
The major hub, Dubai, is a large, roomy, comfortable airport with every and any convenience. It has friendly, professional staff. The queues are managable.
They do not treat their customers like criminals (USA take note), while providing excellent security.
They are the cheapest airline to fly the route.
They are not alone in this quality service. Singapore Airlines is just as good, if not better, and other new Arabian Gulf Carriers like Air Qatar and Al Etihad are also competing at this level.
United Airlines is going to lose any business they have on the routes these other airlines fly if they treat their passengers badly and charge them for things that have been normal part of service... on buses!
I preordered OSX 10.5 the day it was announced last week. My company has already switched our file servers over to OSX on X Servers and our mail and calendering will follow as soon as we have tested OSX Server 10.5. We now only support Macs for all but our 5 consultants who use Thinkpads for the simple reason that many of our customers are very conservative and look at anything else but Windows with suspicion and so the consultants who visit them take along Windows laptops for purely image reasons. Our CAD users run Windows and Solidworks on Mac Pro towers and the Samba server on OSX is rock solid.
Supporting our users is a part of my job and it is FAR less hassle than supporting Windows. OSX is extremely solid, and has, as far as I can only one major OS design error: The fact that designers can, and do, often switch off system fonts unknowingly, thereby crashing some apps that need them.
As far as Windows support goes, supporting XP is a pain, but far less of a pain than Vista. We have one (1) Vista user (the boss), who is less than enthusiatic about the awful slowness of Vista and the constant irriation of teh UACs (yes, I know you can turn it off, but the boss doesn't want it turned off. He just uses Office and Explorer and is happy that at least that runs ok, even if nothing else does).
Vista has already aquired an awful reputation. It will, of course, eventually totally replace XP when drivers, apps and support for XP dries out, but only then. Not only that, but Microsoft will have a tough time fixing the broken trust that major buyers have placed in them.
Of course, Microsoft, as big as it is, will not be going away any time soon. We'll just have to live with that.
Apart from all the other platforms, what really utterly blows my mind is that the PS2 is still selling so well. I would love to know the reason why. Is it the huge game library plus the extremely low cost? What is it?
I apologise for the link I gave. I know it wasn't exactly as if Carter himself came up with the proposal, but he did advocate it strongly (he put it to Congress to fund studies on it). I used to subscribe to Time in the late 70s and the article would have been somewhere from 1978 to 1980, in which the Carter administration's advocacy of the SPS was discussed in detail (or as much detail as Time gives anyway). A lot of the article discussed, and there were fancy little diagrammes on how the microwave ground stations would work (IIRC, the stations would be about 5kms on a side and the beam would actually be quite weak locally, so as not to interfere with aircraft, birds etc passing through it).
There was an article here on Slashdot last week on multilungualism, and all the anglo slashdotters were talking about some wonderful "universal" language (which of course, meant english because none of them ever bothered to even try to learn anything else), and then they get seriously confused when they go to another country and discover that, shock, gasp, the local not only speak another language, but they also use another script entirely, and this, especially in countries with big populations where there are enough resources to have there own digital script systems, such as Chinese, Japanese, Hindi, Arabic or Cyrillic means that the previously imperious "universal language" advocate is suddenly up shit street without a paddle.
What this means is that just because all you know is English, doesn't mean that all the others are going to suddenly run to learn your language and kiss your ass. Those days are over.
I remember, back in 1980 or so, when all the Reagan fans were jumping for joy because the actor was more popular than a naval nuclear engineer (yes; Carter actually knew his shit), Carter had proposed a system of orbital solar power stations. It would have been more or less the same thing as they are proposing today. Those of you who have access to Time magazine's archives will find an article on it.
So, here we are today, some 27 years later, and the same proposal gets floated.
Imagine if laziness hadn't dropped the issue back then. Iran, Iraq and the whole business of 9/11 would have been less critical than they now are.
Someday, you're going to piss off some disgruntled looney a bit too much and when you walk (or waddle in your case) into your next conference, that guy is going to pull out a gun and actually kill you, or try to kill you.
I personally sudder to think of the shit that would come out of those holes, though. Would make a mighty stink.
The US and previously the USSR, now Russia and China, have bene in a perpetual race to build the best fighter for over 50 years now, from the days of the F-86 and Mig-15, the F-4 and Mig-21 and F-15 and Su-27/30. Each time, one side has made a major improvement and then the other side has scrambled to keep up. The Mig-15 was the best until the US cougt up with the F-86, then the Mig-21 proved to be more nimble than the F-4 and along came the F-16. The USSR built the Mach 3 Mig-25 to counter a possible Mach 3 XB-70 US bomber and the US built the F-15 to counter that. The the Soviet built the Su-27 to counter the F-15 and the Mig-29 to counter the F-16. Since the late 80's the US has been working on the F-22, which has been both the most advanced jet fighter ever and also the most expensive. It was so expensive that the actual number pruchased has been reduced by two thirds, costnig about $100 million a piece. It is also so sensitive that it will likely never be exported.
To ctach up in this never ending race, Sukhoi in Russia has been working on a similar stealth aircraft to the F-22, called the PAK FA for many years now, and the first example should be flying next year, and Shenyang and Chengdu in China have been working on similar designs, the J-xx and J-13, but I doubt that any of these weapons will ever be used against any of the other. The Russia and Chinese jets are just as sensitive, security wise, as the F-22 is. There is much more chance that the Indians using the PAK and the Pakistanis, using the J-13/14 will duke it out amongst themselves, if Russia and China ever sell the weapons to them, being as sensitive as they are, than any of those fighting against the F-22.
These aircraft are so expensive that losing just one, be it in combat or to accidents mean that you've just lost some $100 million dollars in the case of the F-22. The fact that they will almost certainly not be used in combat against any foe that a F-16 couldn't cope with means that they, along with incredibly expensive stealth ships, stealth submarines, etc, are mostly expensive white elephants, flying around, doing a lot of impressive flight demos, and then eventually being scrapped in 30 years or so when they reach the end of their service lives.
I personally think that while the Japanese could certainly develop one of these aircraft on their own, and might very well do so in the face of the J-13/xx and the PAK if the US doesn't sell them the F-22, I think that a lot of what the Japanese are doing is simply bargaining to get the US to sell them the F-22. The costs of developing an advanced stealth fighter are not to be laughed at. However, as soon as the Russian PAK and Chinese J-13/xx are in active service, the aura of invincibility of the F-22 will decrease, and then I suppose we'll move on to round 6 of the never ending race to waste people's money and lives.
You know what made me come back to Slashdot some 6 or 7 years ago? It was you. Your basic, down to earth, humorous personality devoid of all the diva tantrums or plain moronity that plague so many in our delightful world. I found your proposal to Kathleen just amazing, and I found it even more amazing that you personally wrote back, thanking me for my congratulation wishes on your wedding. You're a good person, Rob.
Now for my question: Why are you not running for president in 2008?
taco4prez!
While many people ask why anyone should want to go to the moon and just as many answer that the moon is a worthy goal because, uhm, yes, uhm, other nations are going there, there are many real benefits to landing on and having a permanent manned presence on the moon.
Firstly, and most importantly, the massive national prestige for any nation that does this can not be emphasised enough. Even if the US were going there with no apparent competitors, the fact that the US can do this would do more for gaining respect, no matter how unwillingly, than any number of curious American foreign policy actions. As it stands today, the international respect for the US is probably at its lowest its been in any time since the US became a superpower after WWII. This is regardless of how competitive the US economy or business are, because, like a weakened body, once the illness gets a foothold, it becomes a fast target for numerous smaller ills, and you have, for example, Europeans rightly pointing out the huge poverty rate in the US, lack of proper healthcare, poor education system etc. You get the Russians reasserting themselves, but in a far smarter way than in Soviet times, with the US's only response a provocation along the lines of missile deployment on Russia's borders. You get the Chinese being able to launch a, up to now, flawless and modern manned space programme (and spare me the comments on how its copied Russian technology. It's not). You get South American machos being able to insult and provoke the US with impunity, and you get Iranian crackpots being able to defy the US because of the bloody mess that the US perpetrated next door.
A manned permanent US presence on the moo would do an enormous amount for American self confidence. Bragging rights should not be discounted so easily.
However, the same goes for any other nation that has the moon as a goal. The main reason that other nations are setting goals for a manned presence on the moon behind that of the US is because they're know what the whole operation costs. There is a very good reason why the Europeans, in the form of ESA, has no manned space launch vehicles. They did build a module on the ISS, which despite the derision that the ISS gets here on slashdot, gave them valuable experience in building long term manned space vehicles, and they have the ATV, which gives them experience in powered automated space transport. They have been world market leaders in commercial satellite launches for quite a while now, although that may of course change in the future, but they scrapped plans for the Hermes mini shuttle a long time ago, because: It was seen as costly goal with no commercial return.
The European space effort is funded by European member countries and has far better financial oversight than NASA does, as no member country will be able to set up huge and costly goals in the face of middle class European tax payer opposition. This is why the Europeans do things in tiny, agonisingly slow steps, and, where possible, in partnership with other space faring nations. Opposition from member countries recently stalled the European goal of launching a manned Mars mission in 2030.
BUT, the fact that the US Orion is only for Americans and American companies has forced the Europeans into finally starting their own manned programme in partnership with the Russians. The future CSTS seems to becoming a hybrid of the European ATV as powered service module, a bigger re-engineered Russian Soyuz rentry vehicle, and European habitation vehicle based on the Columbus ISS module.
But no one has said anything about landing on the moon yet. The reason is because, apart from the US no one has actually been there or has any experience in lunar landing engineering. The Russians, with enough money, could probably be in Lunar orbit in a year. They certainly have the technology. But the current Russian politicians under Putin are no fools and they will in no way spend uncounted billions on Lunar landing technology in a mad race to the moon like the Soviets
You think German is the same as Swiss German? You think an Afrikaans person can understand spoken Dutch (They can read it, but I can also read Swedish)?
Apart from which, in your heroic AC post, along with the somewhat stupid "==", I detect a hint of envy in your post.
How many languages do you speak?
Or are you still waiting for your imaginary universal language.
I don't own an iPhone and wouldn't really want one, but I wouldn't be surprised if Apple wouldn't be planning one of its coups by waiting until next year and then releasing, along with the rumoured Netwon II an official SDK for all three touchscreen devices.
Several things that have gone down in the general outcry about the iPhone being closed to development (escorted by a truly monumental amount of FUD, such as the claim, last night that Apple still had not released the Intel kernel sources, even though its been a year or so since they did) point to this, such as:
1.Apple almost never comments in public about controversies over its devices. They won't start now. Apple's biggest trump card is its ability to avoid the bleeding wound scenario that plagues companies when there is some new device in the works or some controversy where it would simply be better to weather it out than make a public fool of oneself.
2.The iPhone uses some elements of the OSX 10.5 SDK, which are not yet out in Public. If Apple ever do open the iPhone to development, they'll do it after that, not before.
3.The rumoured Newton II (aka iPad or whatever), will be an open platform, running a version of OSX, very similar to the one in the iPhone and iPod touch.
4.Apple has quietly been hiring gaming developers.
Apple might be at a point where they will also start to compete with mobile gaming devices. It would add another sales point to the line of touchpad devices.
And if the two bozos in the garden of eden just hadn't taken a bite of that apple....
The article on the first release of OSX on Intel id from FUCKING 2006, you dumbass bastards. Apple released the source to the kernal fucking ages ago. God, I swear, I read fucking hystericatl snotnose OSS crapshit like this anymore and I will begin to understand why everyone hates you unwashed brainless OSS trolls and your constant fucking whining.
There, I hope I got your attention there: I really just wanted to add a few points here about languages, their uses and development.
Firstly, I speak 5 languages fluently (English, Afrikaans, Dutch, German, Swiss-German and French) and can get by in two more (Spanish and Turkish). I'm a South African, my girlfriend is Afrikaans, I've lived in Switzerland for some 17 years now, and in Germany and Spain before that and in Turkey for a year as well. My father was French speaking. I'm not reciting all this to brag. The knowledge of different languages has been of vital use to me in my life and has actually saved my life on a number of occasions, literally.
When I first got to Europe 21 years ago, I could only really speak English and Afrikaans. I knew a smattering of French from my dad, but I only really learned from my French girlfriend at the time. I worked in what was then West Berlin for the US Airforce, but before that, for my first year, I survived by doing odd jobs and basically pestering people to let me stay somewhere, and I learned German really quickly, because in those days, not many Germans could or wanted to speak English. The USAF people I knew, on the other hand, lived in American bases, went to American shops and watched American movies, and almost none of them understood a word of German. They had no need, but they had plenty of problems when out in the city doing shopping etc.
When I worked in Turkey, as usual, I made the effort to communicate with the locals, who surprise surprise, generally only spoke Turkish and perhaps enough German to sell stuff to tourists. Knowing Turkish made me friends and made my life that much more pleasant, and cheaper, since I could order in Turkish I paid the prices that locals paid for drinks and food which is considerably less than tourists pay.
A tidbit of info is that the Turkic languages are so closely related that knowledge of Turkish will enable you to make yourself understood from Turkey to Kazakhstan, including parts of Russia where Tartar is spoken, which is quite a span of territory. Not that I ever plan on visiting that part of the world, but if I ever do get the chance to see the Altai mountains, I'll be able to get around without too much trouble.
Another tidbit of info is that Turkic grammar gives you a head start if you ever need to learn Hungarian, Finnish or want to chat up a blond Estonian beauty. They all work the same way.
Another one is traveling in France. The French are also somewhat monolingual, like most English speakers, and I know a lot of Americans having a bad time in France because they find the French resentful of having to speak English. The joke is that the French generally don't mind if you don't speak French, but they really appreciate it if you just try a few words.
Switzerland is another special case. Swiss German is a dialect of Alemannic that is unintelligible to most Germans from the North of Germany, with some subdialects that are incomprehensible to almost all Germans. It is the most spoken language in Switzerland, but it is not a written language. The written language of Switzerland is German. You can get by perfectly with standard German in Switzerland, but knowledge of the spoken language is what will make you friends or get you business contacts with the locals. There is even a local language that is endangered, called Rumantsch, which is a direct descendant of the vulgar latin the Romans soke here 2000 years ago. It is kept alive by the Swiss not for its practical value, since all of its speakers are also fluent in German, but for its cultural heritage. It adds colour to the landscape, so to speak.
I'm telling all these stories in an attempt to show that just because you think English is a universal language doesn't make it so. In Zurich, where I work, everyone in my company speaks English to some degree, but the one guy who only spoke English at work constantly had to fight against the language barrier. I don't think he was very happy. It's often the same in large parts of
I didn't want to portray European universities as any better or worse, just that the system is different.
I am usually highly skeptical of the USA, but this "Americans r dum" business is simply wrong,and ignores the complexity of the problem.
Firstly, American universities are usually regarded as the world's best. They are expensive and are funded to a degree with fees paid by students and to a degree by government and public grants for research. As far as I understand it, a lot of American students thus take loans to get through University with the goal of using that degree to earn a good salary and make a decent living afterwards. The system tends to discourage students studying purely for the love of learning, I would think, at the best universities at any rate. The universities, dependent as they are on student fees and government grants, will therefore tend to be very competitive in order to raise their standing in oder to attract the best students to produce the best results in both exams and research. I might be somewhat off here - I don't really know - but judging by the way universities are ranked (Nobel and other prizes and research papers published), this setting seems to support that kind of setup.
The result, however, of this system seems to be that fewer American students will study for advanced degrees in fields which offer a lower financial return afterwards, since the cost is so high to get to an advanced degree. Foreign students, mainly from somewhat less well off countries like China and India, see the advanced fields exactly the same way as their American counterparts do, but the degree of perceived wealth is different for them, as earning 40% less than a Lawyer or Doctor is still extremely wealthy for them and worth the burden of having to go highly into debt to pay off their studies. In addition to this, a lot of foreign students will want to study in English which is the current lingua franca or international language.
This contrasts with the general European (which is changing towards the American system, btw) which tends to favour free or cheap higher education. Firstly, the level of competitiveness amongst uiversities obviously drops off in this system which can be seen in their rankings, coming nowhere near American universities. However, the system encourages more young people to study, and, more young people to study in fields which are less financially rewarding. (Note that this is an utter generalisation, and should be treated as such). So, in general, the European system might favour the mean level of education and the US system seems to favour the most competitive (this is of course, totally ignoring all the state universities and colleges in the US). Not only that, but the fact that most Europeans universities do not teach in English means that Indian or Chinese students will probabaly be less inclined to study there, and, since tuittion is not free for foreigners, they get more value for their money at a major US university than they do in a European model one.
If these terms are not challenged (and they make Microsoft's EULAs seem tame by comparison), then you Americans will finally have sold yourselves into corporate slavery. I imagine that the ToS was written by some lawyer who believes that the law is not worth more than using as toiletpaper to wipe his ass with. He must know that the ToS would not stand up in court, but they wouldn't have written them unless they were pretty sure that they could buy the courts or at least extort them.
My guess is that AT&T is using their cooperation with Bush's wiretapping by the NSA to be able to write their own laws, as long as they don't challenge anything the Cheney machine says. Anytime there's a legal problem, they simply point the courts and lawyers to their agreement with the NSA.
So who, exactly, is in charge in the USA?