I've been checking out mozilla for about the past year. (Or, since my sense of time is horrible, let's say from M12) It was barely useable (slow, crashy, ugly) as of the beginning of that time, at least on my underpowered machine. Even installing it seemed like trouble!
Now, as I've gotten better boxes to run it on, and as builds keep coming, the situation is different. M17 was nearly OK, M18 pretty good, but I'm (for instance) on the latest nightly right now and it has been beautiful... not to say that it won't (like M18) eventually start to clog my memory, but so far I'm drunk on it. (Niggle: I wish it had more themes, and I'd like to change my throbber picture to be whatever I want it to be, but hey.)
The distinctions between nightlies and milestones I think is troublesome though -- when I think of a "milestone" I expect a place to rest, a moment of stability, perhaps certainty. Instead, as some other people have said, it often seems like the *nightlies* are the place to find the nicest behavior, which to me is pretty counterintuitive.
Ah well. As to being made by MS vs. platform availability, well, I find the nature of the code important too, but heck, no reason that MS couldn't make a great open-source browser (or anything else)! They're just some guys in Washington State, after all.
On a machine that has only Netscape and IE (that is, of course, a Windows machine) I have lately switched from using Netscape as my first choice to using IE. Partly this is curiosity -- for a long time, many people have been telling me how wonderful IE is compared to anything else, and I used it so little that I could do little but 'hmmm' at this claim. The other part is that netscape (at least 4.XX varieties) are ugly. What I don't like about IE (and which actually keeps me swapping between them, when I use a Windows machine) is the way it scrolls, and they way it renders certain pages oddly for me. The scrolling has a strange delay to it which is really off-putting.
However, all this aside, there's a good two-part reason that I don't actually use IE that much: a) it's not available for Linux or BSD, and b) Mozilla rocks!
Anyone who hasn't tried it should check out the latest nightly builds... (that's what I'm posting from). Mozilla with the Modern theme is pleasing to look at, scrolls nicely, and generally rocks.
I disagree with Michael that MS has won the browser war.
tried it out, works acceptably. It's no Eterm, and it's not ssh as you say, but it's there.
I have some issues with the MS UI folks though, with the whole "run" dialogue thing... it's something I've never really caught onto very well. Different strokes, all that.
the one thing I have windows on this machine for, practically speaking,* is to use my Merlin modem.
However, the software for the Merlin, though it is in fact "compatible" with W2k, does not work quite as the included directions imply. When I installed it, the modem refused to connect, citing a "rasdial error 668" or similarly informative, user-friendly, somethin'-to-go on message.
I repeated the directions several times (hey, waiting on hold for first Verizon and then Novatel is plenty of time to write a novel or three), thinking I was doing something wrong... turns out there is just a subtle breakage. (The guy on the phone heard my error message and instantly said "You're using windows 2000, aren't you?") The software works, you simply have to alias the launching program and put it on your desktop, now it works fine. OK. I think this falls into your category of kludgey UI apps andd drivers;)
So, Yes, I am a non-intuitive computer user in general, point taken. But without more than an hour in total hold time to tech support (and not at a busy time of day, either) I would have no clue how to make this (actually, but awkwardly) compatible software work with my win2k install.
Could one make the same complaint about software distribution (and about font installation) under Linux? Yup. I think those are easily it's weakest points for certain categories of current / potential users. (students/artists / casual householders...) Which is why I'm interested in Helix, Eazel and others who are actually paying attention to such folks.
timothy
*Unpractically speaking, the machine also came with a DVD drive and software.
I'd be happy to be wrong about this. As I've said, I'm no Windows expert. But if there's an included telnet client, I haven't noticed it (pokes about)... Ah. I find something called HyperTerminal, which seems like a telnet app. Cool, thanks for the info.
wrt the rest, well, I dunno. What else am I "wrong or lying about"?:) Am I (hopefully) also missing an included ssh client, since that's what I'm actually after anyhow?
"Clearly your problems are laptop related. Poorly supported crappy components, I'd wager..."
Well, yes, clearly laptop-related. True -- this *is* a laptop! And I can't easily replace it with a large tower system strapped to my back. But poorly supported crappy components? I doubt it. This is a pretty high-end laptop in general (ok, high medium-end maybe), and HP is not too shabby in general. (At least the OmniBooks) It even has a cute little sticker that says it's "Designed for MS Windows 2000 Professional / Windows 98"...
"Why bother writing anti-Microsoft FUD focusing on the fact that Windows runs poorly on that system and then, at the end, barely mention in passing that Linux also runs pretty poorly?"
Hey, that's not what I said!:) Actually, Linux has always seemed to run pretty well, and Windows 2000 seems like the nicest Windows version I've used so far. It's been a pain to re-install but in everyday use not that bad, at least for several weeks. (Computer software is measured on the scale "horrible" to "almost acceptable" and "not that bad" is I think a positive statement.)
What I did say is that the *combination* somehow screws things up; perhaps loading Linux on here in a dual-boot config screws up Windows somehow, but it's not yet been the Linux install which has failed to start. I'm open to explanations of whatever variety.
I'd be happy to get rid of Windows altogether, as soon as I can get Merlin to work with it; I know this is possible, I just haven't figured it out yet for myself. It sure would be nice if companies like Novatel said "Heck, we don't care if you run CP/M on it -- here's a driver, now buy our modem!"...
(sort of like various distros of Linux with subtle incompatibilities because of differently located libraries etc.;) ) Hope the LSB will keep hammering those differences so everyone can be happily compatible...
I didn't mean to distort the point of that sentence; the review I think is a little glib in accepting that a list of compatibilies for tons of applications will work correctly in all cases it covers.
It sounds like for many applications (perhaps even all but a handful, but I dunno which ones or how important they are) the built-in database should be sufficient (is it built in? is it internet-available and constantly updated? not clear from article...) to make them run on Whistler. However, how complete this database is (MS likes to talk about how many thousand Windows apps there are; are they all included in there?) is yet to be seen, and whether the apps that it won't help -- as the article points out -- will require upgrades on the part of Whistler users is also uncertain.
All versioning does this (at least potentially), but the larger the leap the greater the risk... Win2k I think is so far the best-acting Windows variant I've seen, and if whistler is similar than it will probably be a hit. (Free software users should watch their back for this upstart, renegade OS called Windows!)
wonder if it would violate anyone's patent to use it in Gnome, KDE, etc.
The whole "task bar" thing in general drives me a little buggy... I usually end up with a lot of tiny rectangles at the bottom of my screen that say "mozi" "mozi" "mozi" etc. because that's as much room as they have space for text. Which removes all the alleged helpfulness of having those taskbar buttons at all. (I must admit I like them better than I used to, though... when there are just a few windows open, they work ok.)
If I had open windows subcategorized by application, that would definitely be a plus.
Thinking broadly , this also seems very similar to what MacOS has done for years (you click on the application menu and get to a list of all the running apps; while it doesn't distinguish between windows of the same application, it also doens't clutter the screen with a list of them). But then, I've been a Mac user for far longer, so maybe it seems "nicer" to me simply for its familiarity...
I'm using a laptop which dual-boots Windows 2000 and Linux Mandrake. It's an HP OmniBook 4150, with 128MB of RAM and a 650MHz PIII (ridiculously overpowered, in other words). [Overall, btw, I like it -- better keyboard than most laptops, decent screen, dual pointers, not *too* heavy... free plug, HP, now send me my free laserjet;) ]
I've had it now for I think 2.5 months. The machine came with Windows 2000, and almost as soon as the battery was charged, I installed Mandrake 7.1 (thanks Eugene), which went on hitch-free.
Within weeks though, Windows became unusable, first with small glitches, then increasing instability, then crashing at startup. [Aside: I should explain why I have it at all -- because, like Roblimo, I can't get my Merlin wireless modem to work friendly with Linux. Eternal gratitude and a cool T-shirt to anyone successful in giving me a dummy-level walkthrough which *works* to get it going -- I've had some of the smartest people in the world try and fail thus far;)]
So I re-installed, from scratch, using the included "recovery disks." Like most people, I imagine, I did not backup any more than the few files I'd managed to get on a floppy when the system started to go flakey. (C'mon now, show of hands, how many people have reliable backups of the contents of their laptop?) I found that the recovery disks barely qualify for that name, since they certainly don't allow you to recover much of your sanity. The likeable IRC client I'd finally managed to find (not as good as Xchat, but passable), putty (since MS does not include any SSH client, nor even a telnet client, Mozilla M18 (downloaded *by modem*!!!) -- all gone.
At that point I had to re-install Linux, too, since the rescue procedure considerately hoses *all* your partitions, not just the ones with the problem-child Windows. In fact, the rescue disk has remarkably few options -- it's Wipe Completely or Cancel and Fume at the Brokeness;)
This Friday it happened again, with even less warning -- screen went crazy, then system refused to so much as *boot* Windows. Linux still came up happily, though. So I was able to rescue some things by openeing the windows partition under Linux, grabbing the files and sticking them on a floppy. So at least I'll be able to get them soon. [Note: MS should bundle Linux with Windows as -- and I've seen it labeled this way at some computer stores -- a "utility program."]
I have not used Windows all that much in my life, but for what it's worth my experience with the particular combination of my laptop, Windows 2000 (and note, Linux as well) has not been happy overall. Maybe Whistler will improve on this, but so far it'd have to, IMO;)
Perhaps I'm doing something funny, but that's the truth. (Of course, I can crash any computer, simply by being near it.)
Please can't somebody help with the merlin?;) All I need is a little page of handy instructions...
We've discovered that people who read both Slashdot and the WSJ are notorious low-spenders (they have no disposable income anyhow) and in fact many of them are itinerant peddlers who can't even afford an ISP account and are locked most of the time in state hospitals for the totally insane.
To that end, we're instituting an access-by-subscription plan. You'll still see ads, but we know you won't read them.
Please remit your payment to:
Timothy Lord
c/o his Pappy
P.O. Box 356
Jefferson City, TN
37760
Frankly, free software could use a lot more skateboard-style marketing (which it does have some of right now) -- stickers in odd places are a good start;), a Halloween distro would be great.
It should have lots of things kids would like:
o Games
- hangman
- tuxracer!
- Xbill
o Painting things
- GIMP
- Sketch / Killustrator (wish they had better interfaces...)
Also, things parents would like, like Koffice, Gnumeric, etc.
Even (dare I say it) teachers -- like learn-a-language programs, kid-level programming tools like logo, typing tutorials.
Coming up with enough copies sounds hard, but needn't be...
Even if it's a slightly out of date demo, so what? At LWCE in San Jose, we gave away 5,000 boxes of Debian, with O'reilly book in each. Probably there are distributors who will be willing to donate what are to them "the old versions"...
And by halloween next year (I hope!;) ) that will also mean the 2.4 kernel etc... with a CD burner and the cost of blanks, it could be cheaper than giving out Hershey bars. (Well, the regular size ones, anyhow.)
Someone could make a logo with a nice spooky tux, and / or a jack-o-tux, and / or the usual tux shape but draped over by a sheet with eyeholes...
And companies could all contribute nicely -- most companies have an all-GPL, one-disk edition anyhow. They could share a common logo / package scheme, just with a note that identifies the specific distro on the disk.
Something like:
"Halloween 2001: A New Era!
All treats are tricky.
this disc featuring
Linux Mandrake 7.4,
with kernel 2.4.12
All software on this disk
is distributed under the
terms of the GNU GPL.
For More information
check out www.tux.org!"
"
A small pamphlet with some FSF information, maybe, too...
This is one of the greatest ideas I've heard in a while. I mean, there is a cultural precedent one night a year of giving away things like at a trade show, but to kids;)
I knew from the badRAM website that it was discussed on kt (and so read that earlier today), but I hadn't noticed it there when it first appeared -- sometimes I'm too interested in other topics, sometimes I don't read it all the way through, whatever. There's a lot of information in the world. I'm glad that someone sent in the link and explained it a bit (so I was intrigued and looked through it), which is what this site is about.
But how many people saw it on kt? For purely selfish reasons, I'd like to see a lot more people know about this project, because I find it very interesting and useful-looking. Plus, I think it's just a neat hack in general, and I'd like to point it out.
If it's too old for you, then... don't read it or waste your own time commenting:) There are a lot of projects out there that have been laboring quietly which may have spectacular results at any time -- do you not want them discussed because they're "old news"? The in-progress Tux2 filesystem was no secret, for instance, (that, too, was discussed on kt), but how many people had heard of it before ALS? Not nearly as many as would have been interested, I warrant, and the comments on the slashdot story about it indicate that.
I like the idea of a 3-way deathmatch between the BSD vigilantes;) -- when I said that there wasn't as much in the way of interesting wackiness, I just was fielding an explanation of why there aren't more Slashdot submissions about the various BSDs... because IBM isn't porting BSD to a wristwatch, say! [Note that this is a point of some confusion to me; I'm surprised that the companies which have suddenly gone "Open Source" (as opposed to, as in "not necessarily," Free) have largely and famously done so with Linux rather than BSD, which would seem to me the more tempting from their perspective...]
People with different bents will of course find different things exciting -- I think OpenBSD is one of the coolest projects around. Theo I've heard various impressions of, but since I don't know him, they're all hearsay to me. His project and its results, though are pretty obvious -- Bastille Linux I think is influenced hugely by it, even if not directly.
Re: Pat, Chris DiBona, VA and BSD on their machines -- you obviously know more about that than I do.:) I think VA would be smart to get more OS agnostic; on the other hand, they have limited resources and are (as I understand it) selling all the servers they can eat at the moment, so they're probably just trying to handle that for now. If the company is still around (I'm optimistic, but anything can happen) in 3 years, say, I bet they'll be a lot broader in their pre-loaded OS choices. (If they aren't, others will be -- there are other hardware vendors who've decided that they'd rather not be at MS's mercy!)
I've not heard any VA people scoff at BSD, but then in any large group of people there are bound to be various opinions. I've eaten and chatted with Pat, who is obviously a big fan of BSD, and with the other folks from Slashdot I certainly haven't heard complaints about BSD... (other than the one I told you about -- the BSD section isn't active enough;) ).
Contrast this with say, Dell, the only other computer company I've have some experience with a few mgrs and engineers -- people there as of 2 yrs ago on the business side had for the most part not really heard of Linux. Some, yes, but even then they were pretty vague about it. At VA, given its background, I know that people there have at least a good background knowledge to draw on when they build their OS preferences. It might not be yours / mine / anyone else's in particular, but I've been impressed with the reasoning of the relatively few folks I'm familiar with.
As far as the license wars go, well... just know that not everyone is a license zealot. I like Free software but I don't particularly want to quibble over which software deserves a capital "F" and which software should be called "Open Source" -- bleaach. I tend to prefer the BSD license overall, but the GPL is perfect as the GPL! I don't find a huge conflict, moral or otherwise. Both are cool, neither is perfect, and there are all kinds of others which fall somewhere between them or extend to strange new corners. What I don't like is software licensed such that to morally use it I must pay more than I want to, even if it's otherwise a great thing. (For instance, I'd like to play with PhotoShop, but I can't justify the pricetag, or using a copy which violates -- as I see it -- the producer's right to determine the disposition of his own work.) If I one day see all black and white, no grey, I'll have to go in and have the contrast adjusted, though;)
The implication seems to be that VA Linux, of which OSDN (nee Andover.Net, long may it wave) is a part, would discourage discussion of the various BSDs, in order to push instead its own Linux-based systems. (Am I wrong with that summary?)
However, the reality is a little different. I've met a few folks from VA Linux proper -- hard to avoid meeting some people from VA even if you don't work there, just by going to any Linux event;)-- but I doubt that anybody who doesn't work for Slashdot even has my phone number.
I have never (*ever*) been asked not to run a particular story by VA, and if I were, I would laugh at the suggestion. I also would never not run a story simply because it was possibly embarrassing to VA - why the heck should I? A tainted news source just doesn't make sense. I may have poor judgement at times, but I try not to compound it with other people's poor judgement!:)
Additionally, on the topic of BSD... well, VA Linux sells some nice Linux boxes, even though a little pricey. I bet that none of them would have any trouble running any of the BSDs, since the hardware is pretty standard stuff (feel free to correct if that's wrong, I have never owned a VA machine to confirm). I bet they'd be happy to sell you a machine on which you can yourself install whatever OS you want. They don't sell BSD boxes now (or possibly ever, given the name), but I get the strong impression that Free software is great by them in general, not just some particular version of their modified RedHat distro.
Additionally, Open Magazine (on what, the 3rd issue now?) has a BSD section, and columns from BSD and networking maven Pat Lynch. Now Open only started after the purchase of Andover by VA -- does it sound like VA is really trying to stifle VA? Not to me:) but then, you can consider the source as much as you want.
Truth is, we'd like to get a lot more submissions dealing with BSD -- right now (and for the past few years) Linux has generated a larger buzz because of its more (anarchic / robust, however you want to see it) dev. process. The BSDs are great and have their well-known emphases and strengths, but there isn't as much in the way of interesting wackiness. Maybe because they're already so mature, eh?
ok, so remember, I work for VA (indirectly), and you may choose the lump of salt you want to take with my words, but they are sincere.
I know all analogies have breaking points, and I'm about to step over this one's;)
Which would you rather have as a pet?
Mutts tend to be better behaved, healthier and smarter than the blue-bloods, at least when it comes to dogs.
Yeah, he's got a barb about Linux / Free software being unable to be "best of breed" ok, but it depends on what your context is to determine what "best" means. If your requirements include future flexibility and lack of royalties etc, then it could easily be the best.
I didn't read this article as anti-Linux in any way. What's anti-Linux, or anti-Free software, about it?
More the opposite -- yes, he makes the claim (I disagree) that Linux "isn't ready for the desktop," but it appears to be because he is expecting some pretty great things out of Linux, not because he dislikes it in any way -- but on the whole, he makes the argument that Free software is often / usually the best thing *overall* even if there's some place for non-Free.
Windows doesn't have the same sort of freedom to radiate.
I'd like to see more TV commericals for Linux (not that I watch TV often, but still...)
that scenario you named would be hiliarious. Imagine 15 seconds of that followed by a quick, funny blurb on Red Hat (or VA or anyone else with the money to make TV commericals... heh, how about MS-backed Corel?);)...
gentle humor is a good tactic. Portray the particuloar kind of Windows-centric IT bureaucrat who's autocratic, stuck in the past and narrow-minded, and contrast the open minded, creative, dynamic Linux guy. (There are both types in both camps, actually, but the perception I have is certainly the other way...)
MS has lots of people in marketing, remember. If companies like Red Hat and VA are to survive, they have to at least defuse the MS marketing bomb...
but we (at least I) had never heard of it until your post:(
ISWC happened to work out well because I was already going to be in Atlanta -- I would love to go to ISAR sometime as well. (Or maybe those two conferences could nicely merge, since there certainly seems to be a lot of overlap, and they were held within a few weeks of each other!)
I haven't met her, and so far she doesn't sound like my type, nor I hers. Who knows? She does have the ability to submit her slashdot comments in columns, which is neat, but other than that I'm not sure we'd have much to talk about.
(Besides, Anne Marie may be fictional, married, gay, asexual, or simply not like me... and I may be fictional, married, gay, asexual or simply not like her. Actually, you can rule some of these out, but you get what I mean.)
Slashdot Mirror
I've been checking out mozilla for about the past year. (Or, since my sense of time is horrible, let's say from M12) It was barely useable (slow, crashy, ugly) as of the beginning of that time, at least on my underpowered machine. Even installing it seemed like trouble!
... not to say that it won't (like M18) eventually start to clog my memory, but so far I'm drunk on it. (Niggle: I wish it had more themes, and I'd like to change my throbber picture to be whatever I want it to be, but hey.)
Now, as I've gotten better boxes to run it on, and as builds keep coming, the situation is different. M17 was nearly OK, M18 pretty good, but I'm (for instance) on the latest nightly right now and it has been beautiful
The distinctions between nightlies and milestones I think is troublesome though -- when I think of a "milestone" I expect a place to rest, a moment of stability, perhaps certainty. Instead, as some other people have said, it often seems like the *nightlies* are the place to find the nicest behavior, which to me is pretty counterintuitive.
Ah well. As to being made by MS vs. platform availability, well, I find the nature of the code important too, but heck, no reason that MS couldn't make a great open-source browser (or anything else)! They're just some guys in Washington State, after all.
timothy
On a machine that has only Netscape and IE (that is, of course, a Windows machine) I have lately switched from using Netscape as my first choice to using IE. Partly this is curiosity -- for a long time, many people have been telling me how wonderful IE is compared to anything else, and I used it so little that I could do little but 'hmmm' at this claim. The other part is that netscape (at least 4.XX varieties) are ugly. What I don't like about IE (and which actually keeps me swapping between them, when I use a Windows machine) is the way it scrolls, and they way it renders certain pages oddly for me. The scrolling has a strange delay to it which is really off-putting.
... (that's what I'm posting from). Mozilla with the Modern theme is pleasing to look at, scrolls nicely, and generally rocks.
However, all this aside, there's a good two-part reason that I don't actually use IE that much: a) it's not available for Linux or BSD, and b) Mozilla rocks!
Anyone who hasn't tried it should check out the latest nightly builds
I disagree with Michael that MS has won the browser war.
timothy
I tried this link repeatedly (the poster originally provided that one, and I made the change -- any fault is mine, not his).
But when I tried that link, I always got the "sorry, could not find this page" message. So I changed it.
Dunno what the problem is / was, but that's why I didn't link directly.
timothy
Ah. I got M18 over the phone line in my motel 6 in Atlanta. Ethernet would not have helped;)
timothy
tried it out, works acceptably. It's no Eterm, and it's not ssh as you say, but it's there.
... it's something I've never really caught onto very well. Different strokes, all that.
I have some issues with the MS UI folks though, with the whole "run" dialogue thing
Thanks for the info.
timothy
the one thing I have windows on this machine for, practically speaking,* is to use my Merlin modem.
... turns out there is just a subtle breakage. (The guy on the phone heard my error message and instantly said "You're using windows 2000, aren't you?") The software works, you simply have to alias the launching program and put it on your desktop, now it works fine. OK. I think this falls into your category of kludgey UI apps andd drivers;)
/artists / casual householders ...) Which is why I'm interested in Helix, Eazel and others who are actually paying attention to such folks.
However, the software for the Merlin, though it is in fact "compatible" with W2k, does not work quite as the included directions imply. When I installed it, the modem refused to connect, citing a "rasdial error 668" or similarly informative, user-friendly, somethin'-to-go on message.
I repeated the directions several times (hey, waiting on hold for first Verizon and then Novatel is plenty of time to write a novel or three), thinking I was doing something wrong
So, Yes, I am a non-intuitive computer user in general, point taken. But without more than an hour in total hold time to tech support (and not at a busy time of day, either) I would have no clue how to make this (actually, but awkwardly) compatible software work with my win2k install.
Could one make the same complaint about software distribution (and about font installation) under Linux? Yup. I think those are easily it's weakest points for certain categories of current / potential users. (students
timothy
*Unpractically speaking, the machine also came with a DVD drive and software.
I'd be happy to be wrong about this. As I've said, I'm no Windows expert. But if there's an included telnet client, I haven't noticed it (pokes about) ... Ah. I find something called HyperTerminal, which seems like a telnet app. Cool, thanks for the info.
:) Am I (hopefully) also missing an included ssh client, since that's what I'm actually after anyhow?
wrt the rest, well, I dunno. What else am I "wrong or lying about"?
timothy
g_mcbay wrote:
...
:) Actually, Linux has always seemed to run pretty well, and Windows 2000 seems like the nicest Windows version I've used so far. It's been a pain to re-install but in everyday use not that bad, at least for several weeks. (Computer software is measured on the scale "horrible" to "almost acceptable" and "not that bad" is I think a positive statement.)
...
"Clearly your problems are laptop related. Poorly supported crappy components, I'd wager..."
Well, yes, clearly laptop-related. True -- this *is* a laptop! And I can't easily replace it with a large tower system strapped to my back. But poorly supported crappy components? I doubt it. This is a pretty high-end laptop in general (ok, high medium-end maybe), and HP is not too shabby in general. (At least the OmniBooks) It even has a cute little sticker that says it's "Designed for MS Windows 2000 Professional / Windows 98"
"Why bother writing anti-Microsoft FUD focusing on the fact that Windows runs poorly on that system and then, at the end, barely mention in passing that Linux also runs pretty poorly?"
Hey, that's not what I said!
What I did say is that the *combination* somehow screws things up; perhaps loading Linux on here in a dual-boot config screws up Windows somehow, but it's not yet been the Linux install which has failed to start. I'm open to explanations of whatever variety.
I'd be happy to get rid of Windows altogether, as soon as I can get Merlin to work with it; I know this is possible, I just haven't figured it out yet for myself. It sure would be nice if companies like Novatel said "Heck, we don't care if you run CP/M on it -- here's a driver, now buy our modem!"
timothy
(sort of like various distros of Linux with subtle incompatibilities because of differently located libraries etc.
I didn't mean to distort the point of that sentence; the review I think is a little glib in accepting that a list of compatibilies for tons of applications will work correctly in all cases it covers.
It sounds like for many applications (perhaps even all but a handful, but I dunno which ones or how important they are) the built-in database should be sufficient (is it built in? is it internet-available and constantly updated? not clear from article
All versioning does this (at least potentially), but the larger the leap the greater the risk
timothy
I have one of these (a combo 10/100 & 56K modem). It works fine, under both Windows and Linux.
wrt what do you make that suggestion?
timothy
wonder if it would violate anyone's patent to use it in Gnome, KDE, etc.
... I usually end up with a lot of tiny rectangles at the bottom of my screen that say "mozi" "mozi" "mozi" etc. because that's as much room as they have space for text. Which removes all the alleged helpfulness of having those taskbar buttons at all. (I must admit I like them better than I used to, though ... when there are just a few windows open, they work ok.)
...
The whole "task bar" thing in general drives me a little buggy
If I had open windows subcategorized by application, that would definitely be a plus.
Thinking broadly , this also seems very similar to what MacOS has done for years (you click on the application menu and get to a list of all the running apps; while it doesn't distinguish between windows of the same application, it also doens't clutter the screen with a list of them). But then, I've been a Mac user for far longer, so maybe it seems "nicer" to me simply for its familiarity
timothy
I'm using a laptop which dual-boots Windows 2000 and Linux Mandrake. It's an HP OmniBook 4150, with 128MB of RAM and a 650MHz PIII (ridiculously overpowered, in other words). [Overall, btw, I like it -- better keyboard than most laptops, decent screen, dual pointers, not *too* heavy ... free plug, HP, now send me my free laserjet;) ]
;) All I need is a little page of handy instructions ...
I've had it now for I think 2.5 months. The machine came with Windows 2000, and almost as soon as the battery was charged, I installed Mandrake 7.1 (thanks Eugene), which went on hitch-free.
Within weeks though, Windows became unusable, first with small glitches, then increasing instability, then crashing at startup. [Aside: I should explain why I have it at all -- because, like Roblimo, I can't get my Merlin wireless modem to work friendly with Linux. Eternal gratitude and a cool T-shirt to anyone successful in giving me a dummy-level walkthrough which *works* to get it going -- I've had some of the smartest people in the world try and fail thus far;)]
So I re-installed, from scratch, using the included "recovery disks." Like most people, I imagine, I did not backup any more than the few files I'd managed to get on a floppy when the system started to go flakey. (C'mon now, show of hands, how many people have reliable backups of the contents of their laptop?) I found that the recovery disks barely qualify for that name, since they certainly don't allow you to recover much of your sanity. The likeable IRC client I'd finally managed to find (not as good as Xchat, but passable), putty (since MS does not include any SSH client, nor even a telnet client, Mozilla M18 (downloaded *by modem*!!!) -- all gone.
At that point I had to re-install Linux, too, since the rescue procedure considerately hoses *all* your partitions, not just the ones with the problem-child Windows. In fact, the rescue disk has remarkably few options -- it's Wipe Completely or Cancel and Fume at the Brokeness;)
This Friday it happened again, with even less warning -- screen went crazy, then system refused to so much as *boot* Windows. Linux still came up happily, though. So I was able to rescue some things by openeing the windows partition under Linux, grabbing the files and sticking them on a floppy. So at least I'll be able to get them soon. [Note: MS should bundle Linux with Windows as -- and I've seen it labeled this way at some computer stores -- a "utility program."]
I have not used Windows all that much in my life, but for what it's worth my experience with the particular combination of my laptop, Windows 2000 (and note, Linux as well) has not been happy overall. Maybe Whistler will improve on this, but so far it'd have to, IMO;)
Perhaps I'm doing something funny, but that's the truth. (Of course, I can crash any computer, simply by being near it.)
Please can't somebody help with the merlin?
timothy
We've discovered that people who read both Slashdot and the WSJ are notorious low-spenders (they have no disposable income anyhow) and in fact many of them are itinerant peddlers who can't even afford an ISP account and are locked most of the time in state hospitals for the totally insane.
To that end, we're instituting an access-by-subscription plan. You'll still see ads, but we know you won't read them.
Please remit your payment to:
Timothy Lord
c/o his Pappy
P.O. Box 356
Jefferson City, TN
37760
Thanks!
timothy
Frankly, free software could use a lot more skateboard-style marketing (which it does have some of right now) -- stickers in odd places are a good start;), a Halloween distro would be great.
...)
...
...
;) ) that will also mean the 2.4 kernel etc ... with a CD burner and the cost of blanks, it could be cheaper than giving out Hershey bars. (Well, the regular size ones, anyhow.)
...
...
;)
It should have lots of things kids would like:
o Games
- hangman
- tuxracer!
- Xbill
o Painting things
- GIMP
- Sketch / Killustrator (wish they had better interfaces
Also, things parents would like, like Koffice, Gnumeric, etc.
Even (dare I say it) teachers -- like learn-a-language programs, kid-level programming tools like logo, typing tutorials.
Coming up with enough copies sounds hard, but needn't be
Even if it's a slightly out of date demo, so what? At LWCE in San Jose, we gave away 5,000 boxes of Debian, with O'reilly book in each. Probably there are distributors who will be willing to donate what are to them "the old versions"
And by halloween next year (I hope!
Someone could make a logo with a nice spooky tux, and / or a jack-o-tux, and / or the usual tux shape but draped over by a sheet with eyeholes
And companies could all contribute nicely -- most companies have an all-GPL, one-disk edition anyhow. They could share a common logo / package scheme, just with a note that identifies the specific distro on the disk.
Something like:
"Halloween 2001: A New Era!
All treats are tricky.
this disc featuring
Linux Mandrake 7.4,
with kernel 2.4.12
All software on this disk
is distributed under the
terms of the GNU GPL.
For More information
check out www.tux.org!"
"
A small pamphlet with some FSF information, maybe, too
This is one of the greatest ideas I've heard in a while. I mean, there is a cultural precedent one night a year of giving away things like at a trade show, but to kids
Let's do it!
timothy
I knew from the badRAM website that it was discussed on kt (and so read that earlier today), but I hadn't noticed it there when it first appeared -- sometimes I'm too interested in other topics, sometimes I don't read it all the way through, whatever. There's a lot of information in the world. I'm glad that someone sent in the link and explained it a bit (so I was intrigued and looked through it), which is what this site is about.
... don't read it or waste your own time commenting :) There are a lot of projects out there that have been laboring quietly which may have spectacular results at any time -- do you not want them discussed because they're "old news"? The in-progress Tux2 filesystem was no secret, for instance, (that, too, was discussed on kt), but how many people had heard of it before ALS? Not nearly as many as would have been interested, I warrant, and the comments on the slashdot story about it indicate that.
But how many people saw it on kt? For purely selfish reasons, I'd like to see a lot more people know about this project, because I find it very interesting and useful-looking. Plus, I think it's just a neat hack in general, and I'd like to point it out.
If it's too old for you, then
YMMV, whaddya do?
OK.
timothy
thanks for the reply, mr.
... because IBM isn't porting BSD to a wristwatch, say! [Note that this is a point of some confusion to me; I'm surprised that the companies which have suddenly gone "Open Source" (as opposed to, as in "not necessarily," Free) have largely and famously done so with Linux rather than BSD, which would seem to me the more tempting from their perspective ...]
:) I think VA would be smart to get more OS agnostic; on the other hand, they have limited resources and are (as I understand it) selling all the servers they can eat at the moment, so they're probably just trying to handle that for now. If the company is still around (I'm optimistic, but anything can happen) in 3 years, say, I bet they'll be a lot broader in their pre-loaded OS choices. (If they aren't, others will be -- there are other hardware vendors who've decided that they'd rather not be at MS's mercy!)
... (other than the one I told you about -- the BSD section isn't active enough;) ).
... just know that not everyone is a license zealot. I like Free software but I don't particularly want to quibble over which software deserves a capital "F" and which software should be called "Open Source" -- bleaach. I tend to prefer the BSD license overall, but the GPL is perfect as the GPL! I don't find a huge conflict, moral or otherwise. Both are cool, neither is perfect, and there are all kinds of others which fall somewhere between them or extend to strange new corners. What I don't like is software licensed such that to morally use it I must pay more than I want to, even if it's otherwise a great thing. (For instance, I'd like to play with PhotoShop, but I can't justify the pricetag, or using a copy which violates -- as I see it -- the producer's right to determine the disposition of his own work.) If I one day see all black and white, no grey, I'll have to go in and have the contrast adjusted, though;)
I like the idea of a 3-way deathmatch between the BSD vigilantes;) -- when I said that there wasn't as much in the way of interesting wackiness, I just was fielding an explanation of why there aren't more Slashdot submissions about the various BSDs
People with different bents will of course find different things exciting -- I think OpenBSD is one of the coolest projects around. Theo I've heard various impressions of, but since I don't know him, they're all hearsay to me. His project and its results, though are pretty obvious -- Bastille Linux I think is influenced hugely by it, even if not directly.
Re: Pat, Chris DiBona, VA and BSD on their machines -- you obviously know more about that than I do.
I've not heard any VA people scoff at BSD, but then in any large group of people there are bound to be various opinions. I've eaten and chatted with Pat, who is obviously a big fan of BSD, and with the other folks from Slashdot I certainly haven't heard complaints about BSD
Contrast this with say, Dell, the only other computer company I've have some experience with a few mgrs and engineers -- people there as of 2 yrs ago on the business side had for the most part not really heard of Linux. Some, yes, but even then they were pretty vague about it. At VA, given its background, I know that people there have at least a good background knowledge to draw on when they build their OS preferences. It might not be yours / mine / anyone else's in particular, but I've been impressed with the reasoning of the relatively few folks I'm familiar with.
As far as the license wars go, well
anyhow,
timothy
The implication seems to be that VA Linux, of which OSDN (nee Andover.Net, long may it wave) is a part, would discourage discussion of the various BSDs, in order to push instead its own Linux-based systems. (Am I wrong with that summary?)
:)
... well, VA Linux sells some nice Linux boxes, even though a little pricey. I bet that none of them would have any trouble running any of the BSDs, since the hardware is pretty standard stuff (feel free to correct if that's wrong, I have never owned a VA machine to confirm). I bet they'd be happy to sell you a machine on which you can yourself install whatever OS you want. They don't sell BSD boxes now (or possibly ever, given the name), but I get the strong impression that Free software is great by them in general, not just some particular version of their modified RedHat distro.
:) but then, you can consider the source as much as you want.
However, the reality is a little different. I've met a few folks from VA Linux proper -- hard to avoid meeting some people from VA even if you don't work there, just by going to any Linux event;)-- but I doubt that anybody who doesn't work for Slashdot even has my phone number.
I have never (*ever*) been asked not to run a particular story by VA, and if I were, I would laugh at the suggestion. I also would never not run a story simply because it was possibly embarrassing to VA - why the heck should I? A tainted news source just doesn't make sense. I may have poor judgement at times, but I try not to compound it with other people's poor judgement!
Additionally, on the topic of BSD
Additionally, Open Magazine (on what, the 3rd issue now?) has a BSD section, and columns from BSD and networking maven Pat Lynch. Now Open only started after the purchase of Andover by VA -- does it sound like VA is really trying to stifle VA? Not to me
Truth is, we'd like to get a lot more submissions dealing with BSD -- right now (and for the past few years) Linux has generated a larger buzz because of its more (anarchic / robust, however you want to see it) dev. process. The BSDs are great and have their well-known emphases and strengths, but there isn't as much in the way of interesting wackiness. Maybe because they're already so mature, eh?
ok, so remember, I work for VA (indirectly), and you may choose the lump of salt you want to take with my words, but they are sincere.
timothy
Hmmm.
I know all analogies have breaking points, and I'm about to step over this one's ;)
Which would you rather have as a pet?
Mutts tend to be better behaved, healthier and smarter than the blue-bloods, at least when it comes to dogs.
Yeah, he's got a barb about Linux / Free software being unable to be "best of breed" ok, but it depends on what your context is to determine what "best" means. If your requirements include future flexibility and lack of royalties etc, then it could easily be the best.
timothy
I didn't read this article as anti-Linux in any way. What's anti-Linux, or anti-Free software, about it?
More the opposite -- yes, he makes the claim (I disagree) that Linux "isn't ready for the desktop," but it appears to be because he is expecting some pretty great things out of Linux, not because he dislikes it in any way -- but on the whole, he makes the argument that Free software is often / usually the best thing *overall* even if there's some place for non-Free.
Windows doesn't have the same sort of freedom to radiate.
I guess we read this totally different ways.
timothy
I'd like to see more TV commericals for Linux (not that I watch TV often, but still ...)
... heh, how about MS-backed Corel?);) ...
...)
...
that scenario you named would be hiliarious. Imagine 15 seconds of that followed by a quick, funny blurb on Red Hat (or VA or anyone else with the money to make TV commericals
gentle humor is a good tactic. Portray the particuloar kind of Windows-centric IT bureaucrat who's autocratic, stuck in the past and narrow-minded, and contrast the open minded, creative, dynamic Linux guy. (There are both types in both camps, actually, but the perception I have is certainly the other way
MS has lots of people in marketing, remember. If companies like Red Hat and VA are to survive, they have to at least defuse the MS marketing bomb
timothy
Do they make a Linux distro?
Are they some sort of upstart?
How come I've never heard of them?
timothy
You can make maps for tux racer simply, using the directions found on their site.
I know it's not 3d building stuff with guns and explosions, but it's still cool when games come with built-in extensibility.
Here is the page:
http://www.tuxracer.com/faq.html#newcourses
timothy
but we (at least I) had never heard of it until your post :(
ISWC happened to work out well because I was already going to be in Atlanta -- I would love to go to ISAR sometime as well. (Or maybe those two conferences could nicely merge, since there certainly seems to be a lot of overlap, and they were held within a few weeks of each other!)
timothy
here are some thoughts on alternative power sources, coincidentally from Charmed's Thad Starner.:)
i one/starner.html
timothy
http://www.research.ibm.com/journal/sj/mit/sect
I haven't met her, and so far she doesn't sound like my type, nor I hers. Who knows? She does have the ability to submit her slashdot comments in columns, which is neat, but other than that I'm not sure we'd have much to talk about.
... and I may be fictional, married, gay, asexual or simply not like her. Actually, you can rule some of these out, but you get what I mean.)
(Besides, Anne Marie may be fictional, married, gay, asexual, or simply not like me
timothy