How many calories you excrete e.g. how much is left in the feces.
This is a really good point. There are some individuals on the other end of the spectrum (eat a lot yet still suffer from malnourishment) because of intestinal uptake issues.
Executive summary: It's possible to be thin and still have weight-related life-threatening conditions.
And anything that may get the average S. Korean to take computer security seriously and not roll their eyes dismissively when you make secure practice recommendations, is a plus in my book.
Hey now, let's be fair here. The South Koreans can't all take a monopoly on ignorant users.
I'm pretty sure the average user in the US is far more ignorant! Hell, at least in S. Korea, you get people rolling their eyes. Over here, you might be lucky if the person in question has a glazed-over look while drooling slightly.
I agree with most of what you said, and you raise very good points. That's a rare thing these days!
Condemnation of Iran's actions and punishment of Nokia and Siemens for sanction violations makes sense. Iran is using this technology to directly curb free expression. None of the U.S. government entities mentioned in this discussion do that. They may listen in, but they aren't turning around and cracking skulls as a follow up. Saying that the NSA and FBI are somehow equivalent to Iran's government and militia is ridiculous.
I'd like to add that the reason some folks are inflamed over the senators' positioning against Nokia and Siemens has more to do with the fact that these are the very people (perhaps not Schumer and Graham personally but Congress as a whole) who have effectively written laws requiring the implementation of these monitoring systems. And then they turn around and condemn these same companies for implementing the monitoring hardware that they were required to by law! Schumer and Graham are politicians, and make no mistake about it: their positioning on this issue is more for the purposes of re-election than for any goodwill they have to the people of Iran.
It is as bad, and I'm not going near it while the current bunch of idiots is running the show.
I disagree. I actually rather like some of the improvements they've made. I will agree that it's unstable.
They don't want users, they don't want me, because I'm a user first and a contributor second, and their hedging bullshit regarding "well, contributors aren't users" is unacceptable.
I think you're a little touchy here. There's a lot of (successful) open source projects that are like this, not just KDE. It's no excuse, granted, but unless there's a significant ideological change in F/OSS as a whole, this will remain an issue.
I've written in previous comments why I'm growing fond of KDE 4. I won't rehash them here.
KDE used to be my preferred desktop. It was fairly good-looking (although, and I hate to say it, Vista makes 3.5.x look really crap and 4.x not much better), and was relatively pleasant to use. It was obvious that people actually put some thought into HCI, even if their conclusions were not always right. Then KDE4 happened, and made me start wishing a bus to hit Aaron Seigo. 4.x is a departure of what KDE is as far as I'm concerned, and the cavalier attitude of their developers toward their users will prevent me from going back to it.
KDE 4 really isn't as bad as you're making it out to be. There are some changes I don't necessarily agree with, but all things considered I'm pleased with the direction it's taking and look forward to when the release a feature-complete version (4.2 is getting close, though!).
Your last sentence is kind of comical. Have you ever _read_ the Gnome mailing lists? If you want condescending, disdainful discourse, that's a great place to start.
The suggestion of WINE for anything is preposterous. While WINE is quite an impressive project (and has delived good results), it simply should not be needed. If you're pimping Linux as an alternative to Windows, you'd better have all the applications people want (and that includes games as well as Photoshop--I'd say Office, but I won't be that unreasonable).
You're being unfairly idealistic here. In a development community that consists largely of volunteers, you cannot reasonably expect to have every need fulfilled by someone with a couple hours' worth of free time every evening for a few months. There simply isn't enough manpower. That's where Wine comes in.
Wine fulfills a need: Commercial enterprises are simply not going to redesign and release applications for Linux- or *BSD-based systems because the market isn't large enough to be profitable. Wine offers a reasonable compromise: If the developers aren't going to release a native version, write a compatibility layer to allow that application to run well under an environment it wasn't intended for. Problem solved (sort of).
For the record, Wine runs a half dozen older apps and games I have sitting around better than Windows (read: Windows doesn't run them at all). 'Course, Microsoft can get away with casting away legacy support every couple of versions and no one will say a word.
Having said that, I do agree with the remainder of your points. I'm not of the opinion that Linux is really suitable for the average desktop user for these reasons and others. This is perhaps one area where free and open is its own worst enemy: If there's a split in the community, they fork. Then there's two projects with similar goals fragmenting an already tiny market. The biggest problem with F/OSS is that there's too much duplication, reinventing the wheel, and too little cooperation. Choices are good and working together is better. As long as politics and egos remain in the way, I can't see a free and open platform supplanting Windows. Ever.
Shuttleworth does come close, but I think the community needs a "god like" figure who can 1) do no wrong, 2) listen to the users, and 3) encourage developers to do the Right Thing. Maybe someone Jobs-like in the respect of "That UI is crap, what are you thinking?" would be good. However, it wouldn't work. The project would fork. Over egos.;)
They are using their affiliates like pawns, while taking very little risk themselves. It may not be illegal, but it sure as fuck doesn't fall into the 'right thing to do' category.
And if they successfully lobbied, everyone would be screaming about how Amazon bought off the politicians and is a Big Online Retailer and thus inherently evil.
I think you should be directing your anger to the NC legislature...
And yes, you have my full permission to build a nuclear plant in my back yard!
Chernobyl is also partially to blame for the media spreading anti-nuclear power propaganda. Never mind the fact that our designs are much safer. As you pointed out, Three Mile Island was actually a containment success.
I wouldn't be surprised if Cap and Trade turned into a slaughterfest of the environmental movement. As soon as people see their energy bills increase by 100-200%, it's going to be a big setback for the environmentalists. "Oh, snap! Those guys are making me pay how much for my electric bill, my gas, my food, my water service..."
We need more sources of energy. Killing this legislation doesn't make that need go away.
Killing it will continue to provide affordable energy to those of us who live in areas serviced by small electric cooperatives. As soon as this bill passes, we're expecting our monthly energy costs to increase by 200%.
Pushing this sort of bill in the economic clime we're in right now is a disaster. If the environmentalists had anything between their ears besides a sequestration of anti-CO2 thoughts they'd realize that now is not the time.
I guess there is one benefit in their eyes: Destroy the economy and you don't have any emissions. Maybe that's the intent all along?
#6 Headphones and "elevator music" are great for interruptions. I listen to music without lyrics or the lyrics are "integrated" better with the music when coding. I like listening to rock/progressive metal, but not when coding. Find the "slow" songs from bands you like. (Ascension and Human Shields by Fear Factory for example. They are not really like the rest of the songs they do. It's more mellow, atmospheric music... stuff that I think you'd hear in space if it had a soundtrack... and if sound traveled in space.) People tend to leave you alone and see that you are busy. When I say "elevator music" I don't mean literally! Get stuff you can listen to.
Oddly, I find that I can do really well at tough problems by listening to Disturbed or some variety of vocal trance--maybe some Rammstein, too. I've also discovered that my ability to "tune out" music doesn't depend as much on the genre as much as it does with how often I've listened to that particular track. If it's a relatively new song, I can't focus on my work because my attention is too busily shifting to the music.
Also, putting a song on repeat indefinitely helps tremendously. Changing songs, tempos, singers, genres and what have you in the middle of a codefest is just asking for a break in your concentration. There have been times where I've listened to the same song over the course of a week or longer. Familiarity breeds complacency--put that to good work.
Wine is nice, but adding layers of abstraction adds a speed penalty, too, along with the question of "will it work, I don't know, let's spend a week testing it...", which has costs of its own.
I'm not so sure I agree with this. Wine has made some pretty significant improvements, but I suppose it does depend on what you're using it for. Office apps--don't even think about it.
However, some years back, I did play World of Warcraft under Wine for over a year (well before the 1.0 release) and my frame rates were roughly on par with Windows. The difference could be explained by Blizzard's OpenGL support which is slightly slower than D3D even under Windows (which makes no sense, though I attribute it to something Blizzard has done). Also, load times were significantly reduced under Wine. Perhaps that was due to the file system.
Oh, and for compatibility... I can dig up old games of mine (even some old generic apps), install them under Wine, and they play or run great. Can't do the same in Windows--even XP--for that matter.
So no, Wine isn't just "layers of abstraction" that make a slow work-alike. For some things, it's actually quite impressive. For most very recent software, I wouldn't bother trying it, and that's where the Windows lock-in occurs. Maybe there'd be a secondary market for running old Windows apps that no longer run under new versions of Windows under Wine? Doubtful--but you never know!
If the company was withholding information that is considered material to the value of the business then it should be disclosed. Like it or not, his privacy has limits.
I'll believe that when the courts rule medical information as vital to shareholder interests. Thusfar, I'm not aware of case law that indicates your position is even remotely correct. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)
I respectfully disagree that one's privacy should have limits. As another poster mentioned in an earlier thread, Jobs (or any other CEO) could die at any time. Everyone is replaceable--that's life. If corporate laws were changed here in the US in league with your line of thought, then any corporate CEO who suffers from any ailment that could be life-threatening would have to have that information divulged to shareholders and the company in general.
It's none of their damn business.
He has voluntarily given some of it up in becoming a corporate officer. Failure to disclose can be a huge deal, especially if insiders sold stock during the time when this was not common knowledge.
Should he give up the basic rights of a US citizen, too? Of course you lose privacy the instant you become a public figure, but I personally believe there are certain lines that should not be crossed. This is one of them.
It will be the courts. I have little doubt that the class-action lawyers are already all over this issue. If they smell blood (or easy money) then they will pursue a case. At that point it will be up to the legal system.
I agree, and I can only hope that the courts do not side with you. It is inappropriate for private health-related data to be released to the general public, shareholders or otherwise. (And you know damn well shareholders would release any such information if they came upon it.) If the courts were to decide in agreement with your argument, then they will have reversed all progress made since and including HIPPA.
As an aside, common sense--and nature, for that matter--dictates that people die. (No joke.) Some people are healthier than others. Being privy to certain health care information isn't going to aid the corporation or the shareholders. Hell, there are some individuals who have had multiple bypass surgeries and are still plugging away just fine (Dick Cheney's heart-related ailments come to mind). Likewise, and I realize I'm repeating myself here, healthy people die, too.
I think this entire debate is absurd and disgusting. What benefits do you honestly see in releasing this information? None. That's right. Zero.
Oh, and to answer further points related to insider trading and that knowledge of a CEO's health is important in preventing it, I would argue that the converse is also true. Apple's stock wouldn't have been hurt as long as no one knew about Jobs' transplant. See how that works? Keeping it private can potentially help just as much as any argument to the contrary. Plus, if someone releases privileged information, you could sue them for attempting to "medically short" a company's stock.:)
I don't think I agree with this, or at least I don't agree with it anymore. Just looking at the new KDE, the thought and labor that went into the interface has been incredible. It's not just coders doing this stuff for themselves anymore. Take a look at the credits. [kde.org] That's a hell of a lot of people.
Oddly, I agree with your disagreement. I didn't specifically mention how pleased I am with the direction of KDE 4, but it's a refreshing change! In general, however, I do maintain what I said: Not everyone likes UI design, and in general F/OSS projects are sorely lacking in that regard. KDE 4 is a rare--but hopefully changing--exception to this rule.
Ironically, my first impression when I tried KDE 4.2 under FreeBSD some months back was that it looked incredibly good. It reminded me of a sort of open source Mac OS-alike. The design was clean, consistent, and impressive. There are a few expected sharp edges here and there, but I look forward to using it once it stabilizes. For now, I expect to stick (impatiently) with KDE 3.5. I still can't stand Gnome. I don't see that changing in the future...
As a midwesterner, I had to smile at this. Well said:)
Thank you! I could rant about this for several dozen pages, but for the sake of brevity, I'll simply say this: I'm admittedly pretty annoyed by the colloquial use of "cowboy" in urban centers as a derogatory term. I thought once upon a time that this was isolated to Europe and the likes, but I have some relatives overseas who are quite fond of the no-nonsense attitude, slow-talkin', polite, and generally mild-mannered demeanor of contemporary cowboys. (They were over here visiting some years back and had the fortune of meeting local ranchers--good people. Perhaps that changed their mind.)
If someone called me a "cowboy," I suspect I'd smile, nod in affirmation, and thank them for the compliment.;)
Only you can answer that for you, but I personally find that the largest files I have are DVD-images (i.e. iso-files), recorded movies from my videocamera and certain large software-packages (such as eclipse). I never ever make *changes* to any of those files though, and I guess that's true for many of us.
I see where you're coming from, but it's not applicable to me, personally (hence why I emphasized your particular verbiage here). As I was replying to the (now grand-) parent and his suggestion of TrueCrypt, I was intending to give the poster additional reasons beyond his own suggestions why TrueCrypt wouldn't be an optimal solution. Perhaps your choice of phrase in the last paragraph was merely a poor one? I apologize if I am misunderstanding, and you were intending to reply to me directly. Using TrueCrypt volumes via DropBox is something I have never tried nor would ever intend to try. So...;)
In answer to one of your examples, not all large file edits require changes to the entire file (some are in place), so I would imagine that wouldn't impact the container. Unless, of course, TrueCrypt happens to rewrite the entire portion of the volume that the file happens to occupy whenever changes are made. That part I have no idea about.
Frankly, I find all the "me too, I agree" comments in reply to the parent rather disturbing. Is this the same Slashdot that fiercely "defends" privacy and yet when a corporation publicly states their CEO is suffering from one ailment when it later surfaces that he had a liver transplant, all hell breaks loose and we all demand truth-telling? Honestly, guys, let's be reasonable here: Even CEOs deserve privacy--particularly of medical records. Would you want all of your medical history being released just because you happened to be on the board of a large corporation?
I didn't think so.
Imagine if it were Steve Ballmer. Why, everyone would be rejoicing! Either that or everyone would label him as easily replaceable and it wasn't any of the board's business. (Which I doubt. His chair-throwing prowess is without equal.)
For those of you claiming that Apple was out-right lying, I seriously call into question whether any of you have had or know someone who has suffered from an unusual and difficult to diagnose ailment. Sometimes the symptoms are all the doctors have to go by and for all we know, perhaps it really was a hormonal imbalance! Yes, it was most probably caused by his troubled liver, but there's no silver bullet in medicine for unusual circumstances. Given Jobs' previous battle with cancer, it's certainly no stretch to imagine that his doctor may not have immediately suspected a failing liver until other symptoms began to arise. Hence, what we have received in the past is true. His liver transplant is also true. We have never as a species ever been blessed with perfect knowledge--hell, science is based on what essentially amounts to partial knowledge which is then built upon by subsequent discoveries.
I'm glad people like you aren't in charge of privacy laws in this country. This stuff is seriously none of our business--shareholders or otherwise.
(Disclosure, I'm not an Apple fanboy, and the only Apple device I have ever owned is an iPod. Nevertheless, I feel it is important to defend Jobs' right to privacy.)
I know that one can use TrueCrypt to work around this problem.. but then you need to remember to mount / dismount the TrueCrypt drive anytime you make changes to your documents. Not a very good solution either.
And then there's the issue of binary diffing that Dropbox does which would imply that using TrueCrypt would require uploading the entire file every time a change is made. I'd assume bdiff'ing an encrypted file that looks like random noise might not be such a good solution, but I am not a cryptographer...
And, I'd venture to say that because few developers in open source projects are interested in doing UI design (aside from the amount they NEED to), and fewer still are educated in it, I expect that very few are actually GOOD at it. I know I am not -- I write "functional" UIs that make sense to me, and sometimes not to others.;) I recognize the worth of good design, precisely because it's so hard for most programmers to do well. Just as Blizzard needs artists as well as programmers, large open source projects would likely benefit from encouraging some UI engineers to participate.
I wish someone had mod points to toss your way, because this is a great way to defuse the argument going on over a particular party being insulted that someone would dare suggest some people don't do important work because it's uninteresting.
I agree, though. While I can also make UIs that--err--work it isn't something I do well with. When it comes to fancy and pretty, I'd rather that be something that goes to the artists who do well at that sort of thing! (That's not to say I won't try my hand at it, but I can't guarantee the results will be attractive!)
Funny how interface work is said to not be interesting or challenging by the people who can't do it to save their lives.
Believing that things you can't do are simple is a common executive disease. Maybe The People have something in common with The Corporations after all.
There's the issue that they don't like doing it, too.
Some people have a knack for design work. Others don't. Don't delude yourself into thinking that everyone can accomplish anything they want. There are individuals who have amazing talent for certain things and might find anything outside that scope uninteresting.
Gnome and KDE and MS and Apple have all at some point had to accept that backwards compatibility has too high a price, then swallow hard and offer something which upsets a lot of people (even more than usual ha ha). Anyway there's plenty more to the free desktop than Gnome and KDE so it's not even a notable issue for many.
Which is what I'd argue KDE has done with KDE 4 and look at how much they're being flamed for it.
Sure, they could've done it differently. Perhaps they could've polished it up a bit more. Perhaps they released too soon. My gut feel is that KDE 4 was released when it was for a variety of reasons, one of which being user feedback on interface design choices. I'm sure there's some usable feedback hidden away in the zillions of inflamed comments about how "awful" it is.
In F/OSS, you can't always have access user focus groups and just have to bite the bullet and let the release run the experiment for you. I'm not sure if there's a better option than that. =(
That's probably because only geeks care about the extra desktop-real estate gained by reducing the size of window-decorations... Most people use programs at near full-screen size anyway.
The irony. In desktop environments like Gnome, the default fonts are so stupidly big at native resolutions by default that they require tweaking, too! So much for being designed for the geeky types, right?
No, really. Compare how much more space is taken up by the application list in Gnome versus the taskbar in Windows until you drop the font sizes down a couple of points. It's annoying--especially to people like me who tend to have most apps windowed so it's easier to see multiple things at once.
Then, Microsoft comes along and "copies from F/OSS software again" and makes the taskbar ridiculously huge (by default) in Windows 7!
UI and workflow design and project management aren't glamorous or interesting so they don't get done.
You don't say anything about not attracting the right people, instead your words suggest that the work that needs to be done is not actually considered important or worthwhile by the people who should be doing it. I can't see how anyone could get anything else from those words
Wampus has probably already left this thread of discussion because you seem to keen on reading into what he's writing.
Let me help.
When he said that "UI and workflow design and project management aren't glamorous or interesting" they "don't get done," he's right. It isn't about important work not being done. It's being done because it's necessary, but since developers aren't often also designers, they're not always fond of what they see as unnecessary grunt work. UI design is something that requires very special talent--and not everyone has it. Most programmers I know find a specific subset of problems interesting and while they'll try their hand at nearly everything, there are some things (like visual/UI design) that they do only when they're required to.
Here's a shorter version: Not everyone likes to do design. F/OSS tends to attract people who like to work on the backend--more interesting and challenging things, that is--than to work on the user interface. They'll do the latter, usually because no one else will, but it's not necessarily something they're going to enjoy.
Plus, when it comes to project management, I'm sure most developers have a disdain of anything "management" simply because they tend to be reminded of past or current managers they don't like... I'm sure I don't have to connect the dots for you on this one.;)
So really, you're interpreting something into a relatively benign phrase that isn't even remotely there. It's not insulting. It's truthful.
It's like saying the Linux kernel is "crummy software" then arguing that "crummy software" is just a term meaning that it's developed using a distributed version control system. When you say someone's a cowboy coder it just sounds like you're dissing them, and that's really all there is to it.
I'm insulted by your suggestion of being insulted! I live in the southwest. Out here, being called a "cowboy" is a compliment.
I suspect you're probably from either the left or right coast. Only stuffy Urbanites would find "cowboy" derogatory.;)
I think you might need cultural sensitivity training. Just a thought!
Slashdot Mirror
This is a really good point. There are some individuals on the other end of the spectrum (eat a lot yet still suffer from malnourishment) because of intestinal uptake issues.
Executive summary: It's possible to be thin and still have weight-related life-threatening conditions.
While I'm sure you were jesting (though someone is liable to believe you!), wireless keyboards aren't safe either.
Hey now, let's be fair here. The South Koreans can't all take a monopoly on ignorant users.
I'm pretty sure the average user in the US is far more ignorant! Hell, at least in S. Korea, you get people rolling their eyes. Over here, you might be lucky if the person in question has a glazed-over look while drooling slightly.
I agree with most of what you said, and you raise very good points. That's a rare thing these days!
I'd like to add that the reason some folks are inflamed over the senators' positioning against Nokia and Siemens has more to do with the fact that these are the very people (perhaps not Schumer and Graham personally but Congress as a whole) who have effectively written laws requiring the implementation of these monitoring systems. And then they turn around and condemn these same companies for implementing the monitoring hardware that they were required to by law! Schumer and Graham are politicians, and make no mistake about it: their positioning on this issue is more for the purposes of re-election than for any goodwill they have to the people of Iran.
And that's a bad thing? ;)
*cue Beowulf cluster jokes*
I disagree. I actually rather like some of the improvements they've made. I will agree that it's unstable.
I think you're a little touchy here. There's a lot of (successful) open source projects that are like this, not just KDE. It's no excuse, granted, but unless there's a significant ideological change in F/OSS as a whole, this will remain an issue.
I've written in previous comments why I'm growing fond of KDE 4. I won't rehash them here.
People throw their old hardware away?
Sheesh. I still have a couple of 300 meg drives sitting around for posterity.
KDE 4 really isn't as bad as you're making it out to be. There are some changes I don't necessarily agree with, but all things considered I'm pleased with the direction it's taking and look forward to when the release a feature-complete version (4.2 is getting close, though!).
Your last sentence is kind of comical. Have you ever _read_ the Gnome mailing lists? If you want condescending, disdainful discourse, that's a great place to start.
You're being unfairly idealistic here. In a development community that consists largely of volunteers, you cannot reasonably expect to have every need fulfilled by someone with a couple hours' worth of free time every evening for a few months. There simply isn't enough manpower. That's where Wine comes in.
Wine fulfills a need: Commercial enterprises are simply not going to redesign and release applications for Linux- or *BSD-based systems because the market isn't large enough to be profitable. Wine offers a reasonable compromise: If the developers aren't going to release a native version, write a compatibility layer to allow that application to run well under an environment it wasn't intended for. Problem solved (sort of).
For the record, Wine runs a half dozen older apps and games I have sitting around better than Windows (read: Windows doesn't run them at all). 'Course, Microsoft can get away with casting away legacy support every couple of versions and no one will say a word.
Having said that, I do agree with the remainder of your points. I'm not of the opinion that Linux is really suitable for the average desktop user for these reasons and others. This is perhaps one area where free and open is its own worst enemy: If there's a split in the community, they fork. Then there's two projects with similar goals fragmenting an already tiny market. The biggest problem with F/OSS is that there's too much duplication, reinventing the wheel, and too little cooperation. Choices are good and working together is better. As long as politics and egos remain in the way, I can't see a free and open platform supplanting Windows. Ever.
Shuttleworth does come close, but I think the community needs a "god like" figure who can 1) do no wrong, 2) listen to the users, and 3) encourage developers to do the Right Thing. Maybe someone Jobs-like in the respect of "That UI is crap, what are you thinking?" would be good. However, it wouldn't work. The project would fork. Over egos. ;)
And if they successfully lobbied, everyone would be screaming about how Amazon bought off the politicians and is a Big Online Retailer and thus inherently evil.
I think you should be directing your anger to the NC legislature...
Chernobyl is also partially to blame for the media spreading anti-nuclear power propaganda. Never mind the fact that our designs are much safer. As you pointed out, Three Mile Island was actually a containment success.
I wouldn't be surprised if Cap and Trade turned into a slaughterfest of the environmental movement. As soon as people see their energy bills increase by 100-200%, it's going to be a big setback for the environmentalists. "Oh, snap! Those guys are making me pay how much for my electric bill, my gas, my food, my water service..."
There's a lesson in it all: Never trust a politician to tell you the truth no matter how sweet his pep talks. ;)
Killing it will continue to provide affordable energy to those of us who live in areas serviced by small electric cooperatives. As soon as this bill passes, we're expecting our monthly energy costs to increase by 200%.
Pushing this sort of bill in the economic clime we're in right now is a disaster. If the environmentalists had anything between their ears besides a sequestration of anti-CO2 thoughts they'd realize that now is not the time.
I guess there is one benefit in their eyes: Destroy the economy and you don't have any emissions. Maybe that's the intent all along?
Oddly, I find that I can do really well at tough problems by listening to Disturbed or some variety of vocal trance--maybe some Rammstein, too. I've also discovered that my ability to "tune out" music doesn't depend as much on the genre as much as it does with how often I've listened to that particular track. If it's a relatively new song, I can't focus on my work because my attention is too busily shifting to the music.
Also, putting a song on repeat indefinitely helps tremendously. Changing songs, tempos, singers, genres and what have you in the middle of a codefest is just asking for a break in your concentration. There have been times where I've listened to the same song over the course of a week or longer. Familiarity breeds complacency--put that to good work.
I'm not so sure I agree with this. Wine has made some pretty significant improvements, but I suppose it does depend on what you're using it for. Office apps--don't even think about it.
However, some years back, I did play World of Warcraft under Wine for over a year (well before the 1.0 release) and my frame rates were roughly on par with Windows. The difference could be explained by Blizzard's OpenGL support which is slightly slower than D3D even under Windows (which makes no sense, though I attribute it to something Blizzard has done). Also, load times were significantly reduced under Wine. Perhaps that was due to the file system.
Oh, and for compatibility... I can dig up old games of mine (even some old generic apps), install them under Wine, and they play or run great. Can't do the same in Windows--even XP--for that matter.
So no, Wine isn't just "layers of abstraction" that make a slow work-alike. For some things, it's actually quite impressive. For most very recent software, I wouldn't bother trying it, and that's where the Windows lock-in occurs. Maybe there'd be a secondary market for running old Windows apps that no longer run under new versions of Windows under Wine? Doubtful--but you never know!
I'll believe that when the courts rule medical information as vital to shareholder interests. Thusfar, I'm not aware of case law that indicates your position is even remotely correct. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)
I respectfully disagree that one's privacy should have limits. As another poster mentioned in an earlier thread, Jobs (or any other CEO) could die at any time. Everyone is replaceable--that's life. If corporate laws were changed here in the US in league with your line of thought, then any corporate CEO who suffers from any ailment that could be life-threatening would have to have that information divulged to shareholders and the company in general.
It's none of their damn business.
Should he give up the basic rights of a US citizen, too? Of course you lose privacy the instant you become a public figure, but I personally believe there are certain lines that should not be crossed. This is one of them.
I agree, and I can only hope that the courts do not side with you. It is inappropriate for private health-related data to be released to the general public, shareholders or otherwise. (And you know damn well shareholders would release any such information if they came upon it.) If the courts were to decide in agreement with your argument, then they will have reversed all progress made since and including HIPPA.
As an aside, common sense--and nature, for that matter--dictates that people die. (No joke.) Some people are healthier than others. Being privy to certain health care information isn't going to aid the corporation or the shareholders. Hell, there are some individuals who have had multiple bypass surgeries and are still plugging away just fine (Dick Cheney's heart-related ailments come to mind). Likewise, and I realize I'm repeating myself here, healthy people die, too.
I think this entire debate is absurd and disgusting. What benefits do you honestly see in releasing this information? None. That's right. Zero.
Oh, and to answer further points related to insider trading and that knowledge of a CEO's health is important in preventing it, I would argue that the converse is also true. Apple's stock wouldn't have been hurt as long as no one knew about Jobs' transplant. See how that works? Keeping it private can potentially help just as much as any argument to the contrary. Plus, if someone releases privileged information, you could sue them for attempting to "medically short" a company's stock. :)
Oddly, I agree with your disagreement. I didn't specifically mention how pleased I am with the direction of KDE 4, but it's a refreshing change! In general, however, I do maintain what I said: Not everyone likes UI design, and in general F/OSS projects are sorely lacking in that regard. KDE 4 is a rare--but hopefully changing--exception to this rule.
Ironically, my first impression when I tried KDE 4.2 under FreeBSD some months back was that it looked incredibly good. It reminded me of a sort of open source Mac OS-alike. The design was clean, consistent, and impressive. There are a few expected sharp edges here and there, but I look forward to using it once it stabilizes. For now, I expect to stick (impatiently) with KDE 3.5. I still can't stand Gnome. I don't see that changing in the future...
Thank you! I could rant about this for several dozen pages, but for the sake of brevity, I'll simply say this: I'm admittedly pretty annoyed by the colloquial use of "cowboy" in urban centers as a derogatory term. I thought once upon a time that this was isolated to Europe and the likes, but I have some relatives overseas who are quite fond of the no-nonsense attitude, slow-talkin', polite, and generally mild-mannered demeanor of contemporary cowboys. (They were over here visiting some years back and had the fortune of meeting local ranchers--good people. Perhaps that changed their mind.)
If someone called me a "cowboy," I suspect I'd smile, nod in affirmation, and thank them for the compliment. ;)
I see where you're coming from, but it's not applicable to me, personally (hence why I emphasized your particular verbiage here). As I was replying to the (now grand-) parent and his suggestion of TrueCrypt, I was intending to give the poster additional reasons beyond his own suggestions why TrueCrypt wouldn't be an optimal solution. Perhaps your choice of phrase in the last paragraph was merely a poor one? I apologize if I am misunderstanding, and you were intending to reply to me directly. Using TrueCrypt volumes via DropBox is something I have never tried nor would ever intend to try. So... ;)
In answer to one of your examples, not all large file edits require changes to the entire file (some are in place), so I would imagine that wouldn't impact the container. Unless, of course, TrueCrypt happens to rewrite the entire portion of the volume that the file happens to occupy whenever changes are made. That part I have no idea about.
Frankly, I find all the "me too, I agree" comments in reply to the parent rather disturbing. Is this the same Slashdot that fiercely "defends" privacy and yet when a corporation publicly states their CEO is suffering from one ailment when it later surfaces that he had a liver transplant, all hell breaks loose and we all demand truth-telling? Honestly, guys, let's be reasonable here: Even CEOs deserve privacy--particularly of medical records. Would you want all of your medical history being released just because you happened to be on the board of a large corporation?
I didn't think so.
Imagine if it were Steve Ballmer. Why, everyone would be rejoicing! Either that or everyone would label him as easily replaceable and it wasn't any of the board's business. (Which I doubt. His chair-throwing prowess is without equal.)
For those of you claiming that Apple was out-right lying, I seriously call into question whether any of you have had or know someone who has suffered from an unusual and difficult to diagnose ailment. Sometimes the symptoms are all the doctors have to go by and for all we know, perhaps it really was a hormonal imbalance! Yes, it was most probably caused by his troubled liver, but there's no silver bullet in medicine for unusual circumstances. Given Jobs' previous battle with cancer, it's certainly no stretch to imagine that his doctor may not have immediately suspected a failing liver until other symptoms began to arise. Hence, what we have received in the past is true. His liver transplant is also true. We have never as a species ever been blessed with perfect knowledge--hell, science is based on what essentially amounts to partial knowledge which is then built upon by subsequent discoveries.
I'm glad people like you aren't in charge of privacy laws in this country. This stuff is seriously none of our business--shareholders or otherwise.
(Disclosure, I'm not an Apple fanboy, and the only Apple device I have ever owned is an iPod. Nevertheless, I feel it is important to defend Jobs' right to privacy.)
And then there's the issue of binary diffing that Dropbox does which would imply that using TrueCrypt would require uploading the entire file every time a change is made. I'd assume bdiff'ing an encrypted file that looks like random noise might not be such a good solution, but I am not a cryptographer...
I wish someone had mod points to toss your way, because this is a great way to defuse the argument going on over a particular party being insulted that someone would dare suggest some people don't do important work because it's uninteresting.
I agree, though. While I can also make UIs that--err--work it isn't something I do well with. When it comes to fancy and pretty, I'd rather that be something that goes to the artists who do well at that sort of thing! (That's not to say I won't try my hand at it, but I can't guarantee the results will be attractive!)
There's the issue that they don't like doing it, too.
Some people have a knack for design work. Others don't. Don't delude yourself into thinking that everyone can accomplish anything they want. There are individuals who have amazing talent for certain things and might find anything outside that scope uninteresting.
I love it. Especially since it thinks it knows better about how to configure your network than you do...
I suppose that has its uses for people who don't want or care to know, but damnit--for the rest of us it's a nuisance. >:(
Which is what I'd argue KDE has done with KDE 4 and look at how much they're being flamed for it.
Sure, they could've done it differently. Perhaps they could've polished it up a bit more. Perhaps they released too soon. My gut feel is that KDE 4 was released when it was for a variety of reasons, one of which being user feedback on interface design choices. I'm sure there's some usable feedback hidden away in the zillions of inflamed comments about how "awful" it is.
In F/OSS, you can't always have access user focus groups and just have to bite the bullet and let the release run the experiment for you. I'm not sure if there's a better option than that. =(
The irony. In desktop environments like Gnome, the default fonts are so stupidly big at native resolutions by default that they require tweaking, too! So much for being designed for the geeky types, right?
No, really. Compare how much more space is taken up by the application list in Gnome versus the taskbar in Windows until you drop the font sizes down a couple of points. It's annoying--especially to people like me who tend to have most apps windowed so it's easier to see multiple things at once.
Then, Microsoft comes along and "copies from F/OSS software again" and makes the taskbar ridiculously huge (by default) in Windows 7!
*sigh* I can't win without tweaks, can I?
Wampus has probably already left this thread of discussion because you seem to keen on reading into what he's writing.
Let me help.
When he said that "UI and workflow design and project management aren't glamorous or interesting" they "don't get done," he's right. It isn't about important work not being done. It's being done because it's necessary, but since developers aren't often also designers, they're not always fond of what they see as unnecessary grunt work. UI design is something that requires very special talent--and not everyone has it. Most programmers I know find a specific subset of problems interesting and while they'll try their hand at nearly everything, there are some things (like visual/UI design) that they do only when they're required to.
Here's a shorter version: Not everyone likes to do design. F/OSS tends to attract people who like to work on the backend--more interesting and challenging things, that is--than to work on the user interface. They'll do the latter, usually because no one else will, but it's not necessarily something they're going to enjoy.
Plus, when it comes to project management, I'm sure most developers have a disdain of anything "management" simply because they tend to be reminded of past or current managers they don't like... I'm sure I don't have to connect the dots for you on this one. ;)
So really, you're interpreting something into a relatively benign phrase that isn't even remotely there. It's not insulting. It's truthful.
I'm insulted by your suggestion of being insulted! I live in the southwest. Out here, being called a "cowboy" is a compliment.
I suspect you're probably from either the left or right coast. Only stuffy Urbanites would find "cowboy" derogatory. ;)
I think you might need cultural sensitivity training. Just a thought!