The article doesn't mention or theorize why these symptoms are occuring. We don't know that LCDs are necessarily a solution to the problem, even if they're generally better on the eyes.
Mental symptoms such as lethargy, anxiety and "reluctance to go to work," as well as sleep-related problems including insomnia and fatigue, were most common among workers who spent more than 5 hours a day glued to their computer screen.
Maybe it's just from staring at a fixed object without moving for long periods of time? Staring at a textbook for five hours would probably give me those symptoms as well in the short term.
Well, scrapping X would automatically exclude all non-Qt applications, namely anything GTK. There are reasons to not use X, but usually it has to do with embedding (such as Qt Embedded, although there's no KDE Embedded.)
And having it run in kernel-land... there are so many reasons not to do that. For one, KDE crashes on me occasionally. I don't think running on top of the kernel provides enough benefits in a desktop (non-embedded) system to warrant integration.
Well, I think the problem is in the political system, since big business will always be trying to bribe officials anyway.
In the US, busy voters with short attention spans can be influenced by political ads. Sure, political ideology decides also, but the two major parties drown out third parties with the ads. And members of both parties accept legal bribes.
Even with resources like OpenSecrets.org, people don't seem to have the time to look into campaign contributions, and even when one candidate decides to brand an opposing candidate as corrupt, it doesn't always make that big of a difference.
I'm guessing that some people wouldn't even know what the incumbents did in office without watching ads. At least our government makes the info available.
I'm hoping that things like Campaign Finance reform will help, although I suspect new loopholes will be found. In my opinion, the government should pay for political campaigns and not allow
outside money. This would probably lead to an separate orgization calling itself something like "Big Business coalition to elect Greed E. Prez." I'm not sure what to predict after that. Anyway, third parties would benefit from uniform federal funding, and hopefully they have a more humble non-politico agenda.
Microsoft is definately a monopoly. Any company that can significantly influence prices is a monopoly. Actually, Microsoft is more like two or three monopolies since controlling 1/3 of the market is monopolistic.
Microsoft just happens to be a company that's abusing its monopoly. It also happens to be establishing new monopolies in other markets.
It's true that it takes vision and determination to go up against Microsoft. The problem is, vision and determination don't stand a chance against Microsoft's illegal practices. If you were in a fist-fight with a big guy but had better technique, but then the big guy takes out a knife and stabs you, you'd probably want the police to know that.
And even if you think that the government should be entirely laissez-faire in regulating monopolies, the law exists and Microsoft is violating it. Microsoft will probably bribe Congress to nullify the Sherman anti-trust act so that they'll never have to deal with another trial ever again, but until then, they're still breaking the law.
Actually, I think it's already 95 years if made for a corporation (as in, author signs over rights). But it's 95 years from the date of creation, not the author's death.
Lessig's closing rebuttal notes that according to whatever economic formula, usually only 0.2% of the value of the work is realized after 70 years anyways. Of course, I'm not so sure that's true for really popular works like Disney's.
On Linux/UNIX, vncserver is a daemon. When I start vncserver, it becomes available as localhost:1. X-clients such as xterm, kde, etc, connect to vncserver, and vncserver sends the pixels via VNC's vfb protocol to VNC clients.
The confusing thing when talking about X is that the whole client-server system may seem backwards depending on your point of view. A more appropriate term might be "display server" (for X server) and "application" (for X client). To make matters worse, VNC seems like the opposite (client displays graphics, server sends graphics to client)
I would think that you could mirror a Windows display to X (client = Windows application, remote X-server = viewing screen), by copying bitmaps to a remote X server in the same way as VNC (but with explicitly defined windows and maybe even extensions like OpenGL rendering). It's probably not worth it unless there were an easier way to do this. By the way, there's a program called kvfb which mirrors a KDE desktop (running on a real X server) to VNC.
So I think X could be used like a more powerful version of VNC with accomodations like distinguishing individual windows. If VNC sent its bitmaps with window boundries as well, wouldn't it be essentially a simpler form of X? So I think the main advantage for VNC is a practical one (namely being cleaner and easier to implement).
A downside to X would be for non-window-oriented paradigms especially for embedded stuff, but it sounds like QNX's Photon doesn't mind (disclaimer: I have never used Photon remotely).
The VNC server is an X-server with no monitor that redirects the pixels written to it to a VNC client. Using X directly has an advantage over VNC in that the X display knows where the windows are. Some commercial X-servers for Windows have a local windowmanager that makes the remote UNIX app windows look like local Windows windows.
X-Window servers exist on Windows (mostly non-free for Win), Mac OS X, Java, and the various unices. X-Windows can communicate over TCP/IP. I believe there's a project trying to redirect Windows GDI calls into X client calls. If this could intercept all GDI calls, Windows could display windows on a UNIX machine or any other machine with an X-server.
If VNC became window-oriented, wouldn't it be essentially the same thing as a stripped-down X (minus the features and bloat)?
Our local high school computer club holds quarterly LAN parties, supervised by the IT coordinator. Since they are held at night and don't affect the teachers, the school doesn't mind. Students must bring their own computers; our club provides a 100 megabit switch, tables, monitors (previously, we placed the student's computers next to the school computers). Games are typically Counter-strike and Starcraft. We do require a signed permission form and our advertisement flyers are friendly (no pictures of Counter-Strike, esp. since the first LAN party was a couple months after Sept 11. and the screenshots looked like Afganistan) consisting mainly of Nintendo characters.
Last time there were 30 people. Only students at our high school can attend. With the exception of the first time we posted flyers, the school has been fairly pleased with our LAN parties.
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Well, scrapping X would automatically exclude all non-Qt applications, namely anything GTK. There are reasons to not use X, but usually it has to do with embedding (such as Qt Embedded, although there's no KDE Embedded.)
... there are so many reasons not to do that. For one, KDE crashes on me occasionally. I don't think running on top of the kernel provides enough benefits in a desktop (non-embedded) system to warrant integration.
And having it run in kernel-land
Well, I think the problem is in the political system, since big business will always be trying to bribe officials anyway.
In the US, busy voters with short attention spans can be influenced by political ads. Sure, political ideology decides also, but the two major parties drown out third parties with the ads. And members of both parties accept legal bribes.
Even with resources like OpenSecrets.org, people don't seem to have the time to look into campaign contributions, and even when one candidate decides to brand an opposing candidate as corrupt, it doesn't always make that big of a difference.
I'm guessing that some people wouldn't even know what the incumbents did in office without watching ads. At least our government makes the info available.
I'm hoping that things like Campaign Finance reform will help, although I suspect new loopholes will be found. In my opinion, the government should pay for political campaigns and not allow outside money. This would probably lead to an separate orgization calling itself something like "Big Business coalition to elect Greed E. Prez." I'm not sure what to predict after that. Anyway, third parties would benefit from uniform federal funding, and hopefully they have a more humble non-politico agenda.
Hmmm.... might want to customize it to not include all those games (for the classroom) :P
Microsoft is definately a monopoly. Any company that can significantly influence prices is a monopoly. Actually, Microsoft is more like two or three monopolies since controlling 1/3 of the market is monopolistic.
Microsoft just happens to be a company that's abusing its monopoly. It also happens to be establishing new monopolies in other markets.
It's true that it takes vision and determination to go up against Microsoft. The problem is, vision and determination don't stand a chance against Microsoft's illegal practices. If you were in a fist-fight with a big guy but had better technique, but then the big guy takes out a knife and stabs you, you'd probably want the police to know that.
And even if you think that the government should be entirely laissez-faire in regulating monopolies, the law exists and Microsoft is violating it.
Microsoft will probably bribe Congress to nullify the Sherman anti-trust act so that they'll never have to deal with another trial ever again, but until then, they're still breaking the law.
Actually, I think it's already 95 years if made for a corporation (as in, author signs over rights). But it's 95 years from the date of creation, not the author's death.
Lessig's closing rebuttal notes that according to whatever economic formula, usually only 0.2% of the value of the work is realized after 70 years anyways. Of course, I'm not so sure that's true for really popular works like Disney's.
Hey, I guess no waiting music over a tech-support-line-hastily-hacked-to-support-VoIP.
... But will it survive if it doesn't gain mass-market appeal?
Try xrfb (X11) or krfb (easy-to-use setup for KDE3) ... VNC servers that forward the input/screen to/from a real X server.
Correction (I should preview before posting!): It's krfb, not kvfb. VFB is virtual frame buffers, not the underling VNC protocol (RFB). Sorry.
On Linux/UNIX, vncserver is a daemon. When I start vncserver, it becomes available as localhost:1. X-clients such as xterm, kde, etc, connect to vncserver, and vncserver sends the pixels via VNC's vfb protocol to VNC clients.
The confusing thing when talking about X is that the whole client-server system may seem backwards depending on your point of view. A more appropriate term might be "display server" (for X server) and "application" (for X client). To make matters worse, VNC seems like the opposite (client displays graphics, server sends graphics to client)
I would think that you could mirror a Windows display to X (client = Windows application, remote X-server = viewing screen), by copying bitmaps to a remote X server in the same way as VNC (but with explicitly defined windows and maybe even extensions like OpenGL rendering). It's probably not worth it unless there were an easier way to do this. By the way, there's a program called kvfb which mirrors a KDE desktop (running on a real X server) to VNC.
So I think X could be used like a more powerful version of VNC with accomodations like distinguishing individual windows. If VNC sent its bitmaps with window boundries as well, wouldn't it be essentially a simpler form of X? So I think the main advantage for VNC is a practical one (namely being cleaner and easier to implement).
A downside to X would be for non-window-oriented paradigms especially for embedded stuff, but it sounds like QNX's Photon doesn't mind (disclaimer: I have never used Photon remotely).
The VNC server is an X-server with no monitor that redirects the pixels written to it to a VNC client. Using X directly has an advantage over VNC in that the X display knows where the windows are. Some commercial X-servers for Windows have a local windowmanager that makes the remote UNIX app windows look like local Windows windows.
X-Window servers exist on Windows (mostly non-free for Win), Mac OS X, Java, and the various unices. X-Windows can communicate over TCP/IP. I believe there's a project trying to redirect Windows GDI calls into X client calls. If this could intercept all GDI calls, Windows could display windows on a UNIX machine or any other machine with an X-server.
If VNC became window-oriented, wouldn't it be essentially the same thing as a stripped-down X (minus the features and bloat)?
It would make sense that Apple is using a (reverse-)proxy. Considering the ammount of traffic, a proxy server would speed things up.
Did you notice in the Page Info that Mozilla renders in "Quirks mode"? My guess is that Mozilla is breaking (some) standards to render broken pages.
Hrm, from reading the web page, it doesn't sound like it will work with IE 5 or 6.
Our local high school computer club holds quarterly LAN parties, supervised by the IT coordinator. Since they are held at night and don't affect the teachers, the school doesn't mind. Students must bring their own computers; our club provides a 100 megabit switch, tables, monitors (previously, we placed the student's computers next to the school computers). Games are typically Counter-strike and Starcraft. We do require a signed permission form and our advertisement flyers are friendly (no pictures of Counter-Strike, esp. since the first LAN party was a couple months after Sept 11. and the screenshots looked like Afganistan) consisting mainly of Nintendo characters.
Last time there were 30 people. Only students at our high school can attend. With the exception of the first time we posted flyers, the school has been fairly pleased with our LAN parties.