Objectively, though, he's right. There's not much value in this handheld beyond the initial cool factor. Who wants to try to grep from the prompt with a stylus? You've been able to telnet, run Apache, and all that on Windows PDAs for years. Besides, the hardware in this thing's not "hackable" anyway, so I guess you'll have to wait for a little while longer to find your match in PDAs.
References? I could post MS email addresses, but I don't think those guys would be too happy w/me for/.ing their work accounts. I know at least 10 MCS (Microsoft Consulting Services) developers in the NYC/NJ metro area. I've met (briefly) members of the COM+ and ADO product teams. I've worked side-by-side with Microsoft developers for over a year at a stretch. My boss at my last job was a former MS developer. They're great guys, every one of 'em. That's the biggest argument against bashing MS code. Their developers are genuinely nice people who work hard to solve problems. Ex:
Windows has existed in its present forms for about five years.
I presume you are judging the OS by the GUI. Windows NT version 3.1 was released on July 17, 1993. The GUI was different, but the architecure was there, care of David Cutler.
Maybe he was judging by NT 3.5, or maybe he was just wrong by 4 years. Either way, 8 or 9 years isn't long for an OS to be on the market before it gains such widespread use.
OO Architecture? Um, I think you'll find Gnome and KDE are riddled with OO
Obviously, you've never written with COM. Even die-hard Linux fans have to admit: Windows has better object support than any other platform, thanks to COM. And that's all the way to the core system, not just the GUI. Windows gets programmed, Linux just gets scripted or configured. Check out msdn.microsoft.com for details, if you can stand to stop lashing out for 0.5 sec.
Greater variety of hardware? NT had x86, Alpha, MIPS, even PowerPC, but they're all unsupported now. The free OS's easily wipe microsoft's peachy behind with their portability and the number of actual ports. All of those above plus loads more.
Maybe, all together, but there aren't many free OS distros that run on POS terminals, handhelds, cell phones, desktops, servers, and minicomputers. Just the kernel doesn't count.
There wasn't a real desktop market before this. They didn't take that from anyone.
So, you're saying that either Apple and IBM never released a microcomputer OS, which means that Microsoft _invented_ the desktop and everyone else (Linus T. included) is merely emulating MS, or that there wasn't enough users to make the desktop market "real". If it's the latter, doesn't that mean Linux isn't a "real" OS yet either? You might want to rethink that.
No, they just keep re-releasing the same code with new bells and whistles. The bulk of the code has been made by other companies, later bought up by MS.
Who told you that bedtime story? Microsoft's programmers don't work 14-hour days for nothing. Those guys are the best coders I've ever met, hands down. Some of them have PHDs in CS! Can you say that? In fact, none of them are even posting to this thread. Probably because they're too busy producing production code that people actually buy.
There are some products Microsoft bought:
SQL Server (from Sybase)
FoxPro (from Fox Software, I think)
Visio
Not enough to say they never wrote ANYTHING.
My point: whenever you put your head down and charge at anything, you're blinding yourself a little. Less zeal, more research.
If your main point was that the USA is abusing its power and wealth, then I think I addressed that. The USA isn't abusing anything, any more than a car owner abuses his car by driving it. We are USING our wealth to make the internet profitable, and actually work.
I think we're in agreeance: money DOES make the world go 'round. My problem with what you said is that it makes the US out to be some kind of villians, throwing their weight around to make the lives of Europeans harder. Hey, we're not doing it on purpose, it just works out that way. Maybe if Europe did a little more about its technical presence other than sending people to stand at booths at Internet World (in NY, NY of course) every year, this wouldn't be such a big problem.
quote:
Internet is becoming a life necessity and I don't think it should every be fully commercially controlled. I understand that it makes sense for a business to not really care about 80% of planet's population because they don't have enough financial power, but as a person I do not accept that.
Oh, yeah, life necessities shouldn't be commercially controlled. Like gasoline (petrol to you), or phone service maybe? How about electricity, health care, or food? It's all commercially controlled, last time I checked. You don't have to accept it, but you wake up every morning in it up to your neck.
quote:
I understand that it makes sense for a business to not really care about 80% of planet's population because they don't have enough financial power
Coming from a continent that never cared about 80% of the world's population because they were one thing or another (Jewish, Asian, not from Europe), that really means a lot. I got your point: using money to control the Internet is bad. You never got mine: it's only bad if you don't live where the money is.
I have a hard time believing that these guys are clearing six figures a year on these scams. For the following reasons:
Why would anyone keep a diary of their days, which could be used as evidence to send them to jail, and sell it for a measly USD250? If these guys are really pulling down USD100K+, this would be chump change.
Where's all the cash? Laptops and Playstations are nice toys, but you can't trade them for food or rent. The only cash actually mentioned is the USD250 that the boys were paid to keep track of their crimes
All of these scams are pretty short-lived once you get to the point of actually receiving hard merch for your efforts. I don't know who the friend is that he keeps sending stolen stuff to, but that kid's an idiot. Once someone checks their credit card bill, and traces it back to this "friend", it's all over.
Although it wasn't mentioned, I get the feeling these dudes live with their parents. Not exactly high rollers, eh?
This is not flame-bait, I swear.
Happy the Net exists? Thank your yankee buddies across the pond. Were it not for our money (power), there'd be no commercial Internet. Period. Not only have US dollars built the infrastructure, we've supplied 99% of any content worth a spit. Including/. and posts to/. (minus yours). We don't speak your language, and we don't have to. We can get by with ASCII and you can't, but you'll still have to use ISO Latin until we let you do otherwise.
This is the harsh reality that the rest of Europe learned to except soon after the beginning of World War I: capitalism and democracy are a rolling freight train.
Why should US companies spend a fortune researching and developing solutions to cater to people that can't stand the sight of our flag?
What is "fair"? For us to bring the rest of the world kicking and screaming into the 21st century on our dime? Where was Europe when the first set of standards was being created? That's right, busy worrying about their CURRENCY. See, even in Europe, money makes the world go 'round. That's why your post was in English ASCII, dude.
By listening to any submissions to the approved list, they could screen out any duplicate posts of NSYNC, but would the music-illiterate staffers hired to listen to mp3s all day know Shellac, or June of 44 if they heard it? Probably not. This means that smaller artists are going to be pirated much more frequently. Good for morally bankrupt indie rock fans, bad for indie rock.
Slashdot Mirror
Objectively, though, he's right. There's not much value in this handheld beyond the initial cool factor. Who wants to try to grep from the prompt with a stylus? You've been able to telnet, run Apache, and all that on Windows PDAs for years. Besides, the hardware in this thing's not "hackable" anyway, so I guess you'll have to wait for a little while longer to find your match in PDAs.
And the list goes on...
Maybe he was judging by NT 3.5, or maybe he was just wrong by 4 years. Either way, 8 or 9 years isn't long for an OS to be on the market before it gains such widespread use.
OO Architecture? Um, I think you'll find Gnome and KDE are riddled with OO
Obviously, you've never written with COM. Even die-hard Linux fans have to admit: Windows has better object support than any other platform, thanks to COM. And that's all the way to the core system, not just the GUI. Windows gets programmed, Linux just gets scripted or configured. Check out msdn.microsoft.com for details, if you can stand to stop lashing out for 0.5 sec.
Greater variety of hardware? NT had x86, Alpha, MIPS, even PowerPC, but they're all unsupported now. The free OS's easily wipe microsoft's peachy behind with their portability and the number of actual ports. All of those above plus loads more.
Maybe, all together, but there aren't many free OS distros that run on POS terminals, handhelds, cell phones, desktops, servers, and minicomputers. Just the kernel doesn't count.
There wasn't a real desktop market before this. They didn't take that from anyone.
So, you're saying that either Apple and IBM never released a microcomputer OS, which means that Microsoft _invented_ the desktop and everyone else (Linus T. included) is merely emulating MS, or that there wasn't enough users to make the desktop market "real". If it's the latter, doesn't that mean Linux isn't a "real" OS yet either? You might want to rethink that.
No, they just keep re-releasing the same code with new bells and whistles. The bulk of the code has been made by other companies, later bought up by MS.
Who told you that bedtime story? Microsoft's programmers don't work 14-hour days for nothing. Those guys are the best coders I've ever met, hands down. Some of them have PHDs in CS! Can you say that? In fact, none of them are even posting to this thread. Probably because they're too busy producing production code that people actually buy.
There are some products Microsoft bought:
- SQL Server (from Sybase)
- FoxPro (from Fox Software, I think)
- Visio
Not enough to say they never wrote ANYTHING.My point: whenever you put your head down and charge at anything, you're blinding yourself a little. Less zeal, more research.
(shudder)...
Sorry, just thinking about what might happen if Burlington Coat Factory and parts of the Mexican government lead the way.
If your main point was that the USA is abusing its power and wealth, then I think I addressed that. The USA isn't abusing anything, any more than a car owner abuses his car by driving it. We are USING our wealth to make the internet profitable, and actually work.
I think we're in agreeance: money DOES make the world go 'round. My problem with what you said is that it makes the US out to be some kind of villians, throwing their weight around to make the lives of Europeans harder. Hey, we're not doing it on purpose, it just works out that way. Maybe if Europe did a little more about its technical presence other than sending people to stand at booths at Internet World (in NY, NY of course) every year, this wouldn't be such a big problem.
quote:
Oh, yeah, life necessities shouldn't be commercially controlled. Like gasoline (petrol to you), or phone service maybe? How about electricity, health care, or food? It's all commercially controlled, last time I checked. You don't have to accept it, but you wake up every morning in it up to your neck.
quote:
Coming from a continent that never cared about 80% of the world's population because they were one thing or another (Jewish, Asian, not from Europe), that really means a lot. I got your point: using money to control the Internet is bad. You never got mine: it's only bad if you don't live where the money is.
Sorry. In the time it took me to type my reply, all of my points had been brought up already. Just wanted to let you know that I know that you know.
This is not flame-bait, I swear. /. and posts to /. (minus yours). We don't speak your language, and we don't have to. We can get by with ASCII and you can't, but you'll still have to use ISO Latin until we let you do otherwise.
Happy the Net exists? Thank your yankee buddies across the pond. Were it not for our money (power), there'd be no commercial Internet. Period. Not only have US dollars built the infrastructure, we've supplied 99% of any content worth a spit. Including
This is the harsh reality that the rest of Europe learned to except soon after the beginning of World War I: capitalism and democracy are a rolling freight train.
Why should US companies spend a fortune researching and developing solutions to cater to people that can't stand the sight of our flag?
What is "fair"? For us to bring the rest of the world kicking and screaming into the 21st century on our dime? Where was Europe when the first set of standards was being created? That's right, busy worrying about their CURRENCY. See, even in Europe, money makes the world go 'round. That's why your post was in English ASCII, dude.
By listening to any submissions to the approved list, they could screen out any duplicate posts of NSYNC, but would the music-illiterate staffers hired to listen to mp3s all day know Shellac, or June of 44 if they heard it? Probably not. This means that smaller artists are going to be pirated much more frequently. Good for morally bankrupt indie rock fans, bad for indie rock.