There is one problem with the internet download idea, if the computer is NOT connected to the internet at all then it is total worthless. (Yes, there still are some computers that are not connected. I own one of them). Also I kind of feel scared about my bios reflashing its self every so often. I kind of don't even like flashing it my self. I just wouldn't feel safe with it re-writing its self. Also, I don't really like the whole idea of wasting bandwith with a 53K modem for some add, when I can put it to better use. The motherboard should be free and come with a coupon for half off the chip if that is the case. Remember you're paying for the download time each time it does it.
TNT and most other cable stations do that with all there major movies and TV shows. They only have one direct broadcast signal and no affiliates, unlike NBC,ABC, and CBS. They want the movie to show at a good time in all US Time Zones. So showing it at 8EST and then again when its 8PST makes some sense. (I lost an hour somewhere didn't I?) Local affliates usally will hold a show on tape so it shows at the correct time for the local time zone, which is why a lot of the "Live Brodacasts" of award shows are actually on 3 hour tape delay when they are shown on the West coast.
I with a little of the above. On #3 at least I think he means that installing to/usr/local/games/CivCTP/ will install to/usr/local/games/CivCTP/CivCTP. It was this way for me. It was annoying, but not really all that serious. All it meant was moving the files down one directory. I also don't think OSS drivers are strictly required to run the game. I have a ES1471 card, which is supported under the kernel but not under the OSS driver set. The sound runs fine. I think all the game is looking for is/dev/dsp or/dev/audio and pipes all the sound through there. I had some trouble with the symlinks as well (probibly because I moved the files, and that could of been his case as well), but I just removed them and went on my merry way. Granted the install producedure is not like installing a Win32 game, but being such a new beast, a shrink wrapped Linux game I was thinking there would be some minor problems. The install stuff was par for the course. Otherwise I haven't had a problem with it and its run really, really great. I haven't even seen those crashes yet. Guess that's my luck.
Migrating for Apache to IIS is rather difficult anyway (from IIS to Apache is a nightmare). IIS does a lot of silly stuff like making the directory default documents default.asp and default.htm instead of index.html, index.htm, and index.shtml. (Granted this can be changed in IIS, but it just under what menu option is always the difficult part.) Even if you get by that there are other annoyances, like making sure all the *.shtml get properly processed. IIS also locks down files at the System level, which makes updating files next to impossible without restarting the server (or in one case I had to reboot the machine), unless you use either FrontPage98 or Interdev 6.0. Funny how they can work but the file manager won't. It also has the annoyance of suddenly stopping without reason. But NT does this as well. Better not to use IIS anyway, especally if your already using apache. The community really ought to work on making the IIS to Apache transistion easier, so more people will use Apache, which is much better than IIS.
I think the problem isn't that they are underused, it is the fact they are used, way too much for everything. Windows everywhere it seems. I really don't like the whole Windows NT line including 2000. I think they'll try to put it in everything. There are already 4 version of it, and 3 more will be on they way with the 64 bit version and then there is the personal that will come along in 2-3 years, and then Windows 2000 CE...you get the picture. Microsoft wants to give you choices, just make sure they are all Microsoft.
Even better than that. Some FAA computers don't even use transistors. They have a lot of very old coumputers than run on vacuum tubes. Which isn't so bad. They work great for them, they are perfectly reliable and do their air traffic control functions beautifully, but sadly they are slowly being replaced with new spangled microprossor based computers becuase is it just too difficult to get good vacuum tubes these days. They just couldn't keep up the supply through there old supplier, junkyards. They are now using the ones that are taken out of servie to get parts for other old ones still in service.
If we can get more and more game publishers to put out thier games on the Linux platform, the end results can only be better for linux. The game industry is really what is driving the hardware industry at this point, if more and more games are being released for linux then the number of hardware vendors who will create drivers (both open source and binary only) for the platform will increase as well as well as the acceptance of the platform among mainstream consumer buyers (the idea of seeing another operating system installed on a CompUSA computer other than Windows 98 would be great.) It is also a cycle that as more hardware would get supported, more games and general applications like Word, Quicken, etc would get ported as well. It would mean more choices for everyone.
They did release all the code, that was the initial Mozilla release. It contained all the code for Communictor that belonged solely to Netscape. The old code should just be bug fixed. The rendering engine on the 4.x series is just too slow and large.
I can't speak for the person above, but I've found that even the most technical people will chose an operating system only for looks. That is why we use NT Server at work. Not because it is better, but because my boss likes the way it looks. Others in my office refuse to use Linux becuase they would have to use command lines to edit text files instead of using a "cool tool" like MMC or IIS Web based management. They are very techincal people and have been programmers for a while, but the refuse to switch over because they like the use and configurablity Windows. They've gotten attached to the window's way and refuse to really change. And now that all the systems are NT, they don't really want to learn something new. They hate Command Line interfaces and think they should be removed and replaced with all graphic tools. They've even "connected" with the quirks of IE enhanced File Manager and don't want to learn something new. Gnome or KDE has no interest for them, becuase its NOT Windows.
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There is one problem with the internet download idea, if the computer is NOT connected to the internet at all then it is total worthless. (Yes, there still are some computers that are not connected. I own one of them). Also I kind of feel scared about my bios reflashing its self every so often. I kind of don't even like flashing it my self. I just wouldn't feel safe with it re-writing its self. Also, I don't really like the whole idea of wasting bandwith with a 53K modem for some add, when I can put it to better use. The motherboard should be free and come with a coupon for half off the chip if that is the case. Remember you're paying for the download time each time it does it.
TNT and most other cable stations do that with all there major movies and TV shows. They only have one direct broadcast signal and no affiliates, unlike NBC,ABC, and CBS. They want the movie to show at a good time in all US Time Zones. So showing it at 8EST and then again when its 8PST makes some sense. (I lost an hour somewhere didn't I?) Local affliates usally will hold a show on tape so it shows at the correct time for the local time zone, which is why a lot of the "Live Brodacasts" of award shows are actually on 3 hour tape delay when they are shown on the West coast.
If we were really lucky it would of wiped out all the code for Windows 2000, Office 2000, and the like. But I doubt we were that lucky.
I with a little of the above. On #3 at least I think he means that installing to /usr/local/games/CivCTP/ will install to /usr/local/games/CivCTP/CivCTP. It was this way for me. It was annoying, but not really all that serious. All it meant was moving the files down one directory. I also don't think OSS drivers are strictly required to run the game. I have a ES1471 card, which is supported under the kernel but not under the OSS driver set. The sound runs fine. I think all the game is looking for is /dev/dsp or /dev/audio and pipes all the sound through there. I had some trouble with the symlinks as well (probibly because I moved the files, and that could of been his case as well), but I just removed them and went on my merry way. Granted the install producedure is not like installing a Win32 game, but being such a new beast, a shrink wrapped Linux game I was thinking there would be some minor problems. The install stuff was par for the course. Otherwise I haven't had a problem with it and its run really, really great. I haven't even seen those crashes yet. Guess that's my luck.
Migrating for Apache to IIS is rather difficult anyway (from IIS to Apache is a nightmare). IIS does a lot of silly stuff like making the directory default documents default.asp and default.htm instead of index.html, index.htm, and index.shtml. (Granted this can be changed in IIS, but it just under what menu option is always the difficult part.) Even if you get by that there are other annoyances, like making sure all the *.shtml get properly processed. IIS also locks down files at the System level, which makes updating files next to impossible without restarting the server (or in one case I had to reboot the machine), unless you use either FrontPage98 or Interdev 6.0. Funny how they can work but the file manager won't. It also has the annoyance of suddenly stopping without reason. But NT does this as well. Better not to use IIS anyway, especally if your already using apache. The community really ought to work on making the IIS to Apache transistion easier, so more people will use Apache, which is much better than IIS.
I think the problem isn't that they are underused, it is the fact they are used, way too much for everything. Windows everywhere it seems. I really don't like the whole Windows NT line including 2000. I think they'll try to put it in everything. There are already 4 version of it, and 3 more will be on they way with the 64 bit version and then there is the personal that will come along in 2-3 years, and then Windows 2000 CE...you get the picture. Microsoft wants to give you choices, just make sure they are all Microsoft.
Even better than that. Some FAA computers don't even use transistors. They have a lot of very old coumputers than run on vacuum tubes. Which isn't so bad. They work great for them, they are perfectly reliable and do their air traffic control functions beautifully, but sadly they are slowly being replaced with new spangled microprossor based computers becuase is it just too difficult to get good vacuum tubes these days. They just couldn't keep up the supply through there old supplier, junkyards. They are now using the ones that are taken out of servie to get parts for other old ones still in service.
If we can get more and more game publishers to put out thier games on the Linux platform, the end results can only be better for linux. The game industry is really what is driving the hardware industry at this point, if more and more games are being released for linux then the number of hardware vendors who will create drivers (both open source and binary only) for the platform will increase as well as well as the acceptance of the platform among mainstream consumer buyers (the idea of seeing another operating system installed on a CompUSA computer other than Windows 98 would be great.) It is also a cycle that as more hardware would get supported, more games and general applications like Word, Quicken, etc would get ported as well. It would mean more choices for everyone.
They did release all the code, that was the initial Mozilla release. It contained all the code for Communictor that belonged solely to Netscape. The old code should just be bug fixed. The rendering engine on the 4.x series is just too slow and large.
I can't speak for the person above, but I've found that even the most technical people will chose an operating system only for looks. That is why we use NT Server at work. Not because it is better, but because my boss likes the way it looks. Others in my office refuse to use Linux becuase they would have to use command lines to edit text files instead of using a "cool tool" like MMC or IIS Web based management. They are very techincal people and have been programmers for a while, but the refuse to switch over because they like the use and configurablity Windows. They've gotten attached to the window's way and refuse to really change. And now that all the systems are NT, they don't really want to learn something new. They hate Command Line interfaces and think they should be removed and replaced with all graphic tools. They've even "connected" with the quirks of IE enhanced File Manager and don't want to learn something new. Gnome or KDE has no interest for them, becuase its NOT Windows.