I could only take Leo in small doses. I understand that he has his fans. And he seems like he's a nice enough guy. But I cringed whenever he got the bit between his teeth and started on one of his kicks.
Having said that - I thought worked well teamed up with Patrick Norton. Patrick delivered the info. And when he was busy searching or otherwise occupied, Leo did a nice job at keeping everyone distracted. And, as you pointed out, Leo had a good feel for how (and when) to get the show moving along.
Now you're starting to get somewhere. But this has relatively little to do with Windows - it's more about DOS. It has everything to do with the commodity hardware market.
Again - credit where it's due... Microsoft helped create this market by its choice of license with IBM.
It's possible someone else could have played the roll... and to some extent, CP/M was in position until they failed to port to the new 8086 platform in a timely fashion. That delay created the itch for QDOS which was to become the basis for PC-DOS / MS-DOS.
IBM's product took off in the market (arguably on brand-name alone). A couple of former Texas Instraments engineers formed a company and reverse-engineered the key to the IBM PC platform - the BIOS. Compaq was able to license MS-DOS from Microsoft. They then had a product that was cheaper than the IBM PC, with superior hardware / performance, and was completely compatible with the IBM PC running PC-DOS.
Again - Windows comes in to the picture years later. That's not to say that Windows doesn't have its spot in history. But it certainly doesn't deserve the weight you seem to want to give it.
The positive things he has done for the industry you ask. Well you may say Windows sucks - but software like windows is what helped bring the non-technical person to the computer - and that brought their money - which helped increase the computer industry to what it is today.
Yep - because there was nobody else out there doing consumer computing products until Microsoft. If it wasn't for Microsoft, nobody else would have ever filled that niche.
Here's something better for you to argue next time. Microsoft's licensing of DOS was a key component (though not the only one) in enabling the "pc clone" market and fostering the commoditization of computing hardware.
1) if you can't learn to forgive people for doing bad things (i didn't say forget) then you are probably in a world of trouble yourself
I'm not saying don't forgive. I'm saying don't forget - which apparently agrees with your sentiment.
You're right that nobody but Bill Gates has insight in to Bill Gate's mind. The best we can go by is what Bill has said or written (and he hasn't been shy about that). So to some extent we are forced to take what any individual, including Bill Gates, says or writes at face value.
I'm not sitting on any high horse myself. I'm also held accountable for the things I say and write. There has been times where I've had to defend my position. And there are times I've had to admit to my mistakes. I don't see anything out of the ordinary to expect the same behavior in someone else.
If Bill Gates states that he's made a mistake and retracts his past statements, I'm willing to forgive (for what that's worth). If he doesn't, then it would be well to remember what those statements were - whether you agree with them or not.
2) lets not forget all the good that Billy has also done. I would list it all, but I don't have a day or two to do all of that research.
What's that got to do with anything? I'm not demonizing Bill Gates. I'm not attacking the man personally. But I am pointing out that he has a certain professional stance that should not be ignored. And that professional stance is specific to his past statements on Linux (and related issues). I don't see the connection to his philanthropy.
How many strictly local projects in their home districts do the Congress Critters add to the budget each year?
From the CAIB Report, Volume I, Chapter 5, page 104:
EARMARKS Pressure on NASAs budget has come not only from the White House, but also from the Congress. In recent years there has been an increasing tendency for the Congress to add "earmarks" - congressional additions to the NASA budget request that reflect targeted Members interests. These earmarks come out of already-appropriated funds, reducing the amounts available for the original tasks. For example, as Congress considered NASAs Fiscal Year 2002 appropriation, the NASA Administrator told the House Appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the NASA budget that the agency was "extremely concerned regarding the magnitude and number of congressional earmarks" in the House and Senate versions of the NASA appropriations bill. He noted "the total number of House and Senate earmarks... is approximately 140 separate items, an increase of nearly 50 percent over FY 2001." These earmarks reflected "an increasing fraction of items that circumvent the peer review process, or involve construction or other objectives that have no relation to NASA mission objectives." The potential Fiscal Year 2002 earmarks represented "a net total of $540 million in reductions to ongoing NASA programs to fund this extremely large number of earmarks."
Windows lacks this type of thing because its popular, not because it is flawed.
No. Windows lacks this type of thing because it operates in a completely different culture. The Windows world is dominated by a culture of control and marketing.
First off there is the issue of proprietary software. Even when things are "free" as in "no fee", there is often some degree of control reserved for the distribution and even use of said software. That alone puts a damper on the "hundred thousand entries" you're expecting. But it goes further than that.
While something may be available because of the functionality - it is also likely to be there because of marketing or sales strategies. That covers your dig at Microsoft's recent trouble over multimedia. But also includes finding Yahoo Search installed with Adobe's Acrobat reader.
That's not to say that all of the above is "bad". It's simply a different environment. And it runs by a different common culture.
And that's not to say that Linux is imune to this culture either. You're not likely to find UT2004 available after your next "apt-get update". And if you do install Adobe Acrobat Reader 7 for Linux, you're going to find it comes with Yahoo. But then, I can "apt-get install evince" and have a nice PDF reader for a ~1.7M download vs. the ~98M that I need to pull for Adobe's version.
So you're prefectly fine with paying for in-game items with time but think paying for them with money is a mortal sin..? Is it by any chance because you have more time than money?
Interesting question. Do I want to see other's I'm playing with / against to play the game, or buy their way? Hmm.
Then why do the games struggle so much to provide realism?
If I wanted to experience my real life, I could do it without firing up a virtual interface to it.
We're wired to respond to conflict and struggle. We want that challenge. One can provide some very interesting challenges by emulating various aspects of "real life". That doesn't mean there needs to be a direct link between real life and the game.
And that's just the beginning. Imagine the ramifications of bugs. Is Sony liable for exploitable bugs that enable players to steal items? What happens when a bug or crash takes out my valuable inventory? Do I get compensated for the ultra-rare item that I had picked up just before the last roll-back?
Games are one thing. The entire game changes when real money is involved. Just ask any bank / financial institution or casino.
Here's another angle. Many readers should already be familiar with the CAIB Report. And those readers may even be familiar with the Report's dismay concerning the over-use of Powerpoint at NASA:
At many points during its investigation, the Board was sur- prised to receive similar presentation slides from NASA offi- cials in place of technical reports. The Board views the endemic use of PowerPoint briefing slides instead of technical papers as an illustration of the problematic methods of technical com- munication at NASA.
The point is that not every tool is well suited for every situation. And, in fact, there are times when trying to do this has ultimately dire consequences.
...the CEO of a big multinational needs to communicate with important folks in many other countries. But he doesn't invest 3-4 years becoming proficient in each language he might have occasion to use. That's a crazy waste of his time. Instead the company hires a few top-notch translators, permanently or on a contract basis, and they plug them in as needed.
That's just crazy. You're telling me you expect a CEO to have to deal with the intricacies of culture? And then have to hire expensive translators? Just to talk to another person? Bah. This language thing just isn't going to get anywhere until linguists get together and create a uniform language that can be understood by all speakers while being fluid enough to be modified by each individual speaker.
Some things are just a bit more complex than you seem to imply. I appreciate the idea - and there's some nice goals in there. But some things are simply complex. Everything isn't a toaster.
Once again we have the automobile analogy. Here's another angle. Early automobiles were very difficult to operate. They broke down constantly. They were difficult to operate (imagine life without an electric starter). They were expensive. Yet they've become imbiquious in society and a common analogy of ease-of-use. No wonder. The modern automobile has little resemblance to the early technology. But is it really simplified?
Modern automobiles are mechanically complex; so much that the term "shade tree mechanic" has become an anachronism. Few people even know how to change their oil - some don't even understand the importance of doing so. Automobile controls are a wide selection of buttons and leavers of varying importance in any given situation - all of them potential distractions. And distractions are dangerous. The infrastructure to support automobiles is increadably more advanced but involve a complex set of rules. Those rules only further adds to the increased demands of today's driving conditions that involve considerably more traffic at much, much faster speeds.
In short, today's automobile is a vast improvement over early technology. The new technology allows for considerably more capability. But is this common icon of simple technology really all that simple?
And this is a technology that has, for the most part, a single purpose.
Many years ago, there was a new line of relatively inexpensive gadgets that were easy to network and plug together. Slashdot ran numerous stories about the cool little gadgets being made available by this company and Slashdot posters often referred to various cool projects and uses for them. The company name was pretty much synonymous with cool tech.
The company was X10. At the mention of that name... do you think "cool tech" or did you think "annoying advertising"?
Shortly after X10 hit the market in earnest, they started their infamous pop-up / under advertising campaign. The X10 name was plastered over all manner of web annoyances. And from that point forward, the only time the X10 name appeared on Slashdot was during rants about web annoyances.
X10 went from being a positive name in a community that was eagerly buying and espousing their products to a bad name without any direct association with their actual product line.
And Welte said he wasn't happy with the response to the letters he delivered to company representatives at CeBit.
"Most of them failed to create any form of reaction on behalf of the companies. It's very sad to see that in most cases nobody would even start to listen to you unless you sent it via a lawyer," Welte said.
BRIAN: Look. You've got it all wrong. You don't need to follow me. You don't need to follow anybody! You've got to think for yourselves. You're all individuals!
They are making the honest effort of manually reproducing the source code from the binary as best they can.
No they're not. They're attempting to figure out how the binary behaves under all applicaple conditions, and then produce their own code that mimics that behavior. What you're describing is decompiling.
This is nothing more or less than an end-run around copyright. It may be legal, but it's not honorable.
Again - no it's not. Copyright has nothing to do with actual functionality. You're confusing copyright with patents.
If you have a problem with the morality of this process, you may want to take a hard look at the IT industry. Reverse engineering has played a key role in the advancement of technology. Numerous times.
Seems as if they're trading on the principle of 'comparative' advantage, something that makes perfect sense. Software in India, hardware in China.
I'm sure it'll be all nice and cozy right up to the point that they start trying to grab for each other's niche.
US firms fell over their own feet trying to cozy up to China. Then they were shocked and upset when China decided to take the offered information and go it alone - often producing duplicate versions of the "partner" company's products.
It's rather facinating that the article quotes some rather infamous sources. Mi2g's security analysis has been constantly criticized. Laura Didio's analysis of OS issues, and even the legality of code in the SCO case has also been under constant question. Google around; criticism isn't hard to find. It's not that the opinions of these analysists are unpopular; they're simply suspect.
It must be very convenient for them to have a few zealots around to distract from the question of the quality of their work.
Slashdot Mirror
I could only take Leo in small doses. I understand that he has his fans. And he seems like he's a nice enough guy. But I cringed whenever he got the bit between his teeth and started on one of his kicks.
Having said that - I thought worked well teamed up with Patrick Norton. Patrick delivered the info. And when he was busy searching or otherwise occupied, Leo did a nice job at keeping everyone distracted. And, as you pointed out, Leo had a good feel for how (and when) to get the show moving along.
Fnord.
Now you're starting to get somewhere. But this has relatively little to do with Windows - it's more about DOS. It has everything to do with the commodity hardware market.
Again - credit where it's due... Microsoft helped create this market by its choice of license with IBM.
It's possible someone else could have played the roll... and to some extent, CP/M was in position until they failed to port to the new 8086 platform in a timely fashion. That delay created the itch for QDOS which was to become the basis for PC-DOS / MS-DOS.
IBM's product took off in the market (arguably on brand-name alone). A couple of former Texas Instraments engineers formed a company and reverse-engineered the key to the IBM PC platform - the BIOS. Compaq was able to license MS-DOS from Microsoft. They then had a product that was cheaper than the IBM PC, with superior hardware / performance, and was completely compatible with the IBM PC running PC-DOS.
Again - Windows comes in to the picture years later. That's not to say that Windows doesn't have its spot in history. But it certainly doesn't deserve the weight you seem to want to give it.
Yep - because there was nobody else out there doing consumer computing products until Microsoft. If it wasn't for Microsoft, nobody else would have ever filled that niche.
Here's something better for you to argue next time. Microsoft's licensing of DOS was a key component (though not the only one) in enabling the "pc clone" market and fostering the commoditization of computing hardware.
Give credit where it's due.
I'm not saying don't forgive. I'm saying don't forget - which apparently agrees with your sentiment.
You're right that nobody but Bill Gates has insight in to Bill Gate's mind. The best we can go by is what Bill has said or written (and he hasn't been shy about that). So to some extent we are forced to take what any individual, including Bill Gates, says or writes at face value.
I'm not sitting on any high horse myself. I'm also held accountable for the things I say and write. There has been times where I've had to defend my position. And there are times I've had to admit to my mistakes. I don't see anything out of the ordinary to expect the same behavior in someone else.
If Bill Gates states that he's made a mistake and retracts his past statements, I'm willing to forgive (for what that's worth). If he doesn't, then it would be well to remember what those statements were - whether you agree with them or not.
What's that got to do with anything? I'm not demonizing Bill Gates. I'm not attacking the man personally. But I am pointing out that he has a certain professional stance that should not be ignored. And that professional stance is specific to his past statements on Linux (and related issues). I don't see the connection to his philanthropy.
From the CAIB Report, Volume I, Chapter 5, page 104:
Yes - by all means... let's ignore what Bill Gates has said or written in the past.
No. Windows lacks this type of thing because it operates in a completely different culture. The Windows world is dominated by a culture of control and marketing.
First off there is the issue of proprietary software. Even when things are "free" as in "no fee", there is often some degree of control reserved for the distribution and even use of said software. That alone puts a damper on the "hundred thousand entries" you're expecting. But it goes further than that.
While something may be available because of the functionality - it is also likely to be there because of marketing or sales strategies. That covers your dig at Microsoft's recent trouble over multimedia. But also includes finding Yahoo Search installed with Adobe's Acrobat reader.
That's not to say that all of the above is "bad". It's simply a different environment. And it runs by a different common culture.
And that's not to say that Linux is imune to this culture either. You're not likely to find UT2004 available after your next "apt-get update". And if you do install Adobe Acrobat Reader 7 for Linux, you're going to find it comes with Yahoo. But then, I can "apt-get install evince" and have a nice PDF reader for a ~1.7M download vs. the ~98M that I need to pull for Adobe's version.
It would be interesting to see how the TOS would stack up against property law.
Interesting question. Do I want to see other's I'm playing with / against to play the game, or buy their way? Hmm.
If I wanted to experience my real life, I could do it without firing up a virtual interface to it.
We're wired to respond to conflict and struggle. We want that challenge. One can provide some very interesting challenges by emulating various aspects of "real life". That doesn't mean there needs to be a direct link between real life and the game.
And that's just the beginning. Imagine the ramifications of bugs. Is Sony liable for exploitable bugs that enable players to steal items? What happens when a bug or crash takes out my valuable inventory? Do I get compensated for the ultra-rare item that I had picked up just before the last roll-back?
Games are one thing. The entire game changes when real money is involved. Just ask any bank / financial institution or casino.
Here's another angle. Many readers should already be familiar with the CAIB Report. And those readers may even be familiar with the Report's dismay concerning the over-use of Powerpoint at NASA:
The point is that not every tool is well suited for every situation. And, in fact, there are times when trying to do this has ultimately dire consequences.
That's just crazy. You're telling me you expect a CEO to have to deal with the intricacies of culture? And then have to hire expensive translators? Just to talk to another person? Bah. This language thing just isn't going to get anywhere until linguists get together and create a uniform language that can be understood by all speakers while being fluid enough to be modified by each individual speaker.
Some things are just a bit more complex than you seem to imply. I appreciate the idea - and there's some nice goals in there. But some things are simply complex. Everything isn't a toaster.
Once again we have the automobile analogy. Here's another angle. Early automobiles were very difficult to operate. They broke down constantly. They were difficult to operate (imagine life without an electric starter). They were expensive. Yet they've become imbiquious in society and a common analogy of ease-of-use. No wonder. The modern automobile has little resemblance to the early technology. But is it really simplified?
Modern automobiles are mechanically complex; so much that the term "shade tree mechanic" has become an anachronism. Few people even know how to change their oil - some don't even understand the importance of doing so. Automobile controls are a wide selection of buttons and leavers of varying importance in any given situation - all of them potential distractions. And distractions are dangerous. The infrastructure to support automobiles is increadably more advanced but involve a complex set of rules. Those rules only further adds to the increased demands of today's driving conditions that involve considerably more traffic at much, much faster speeds.
In short, today's automobile is a vast improvement over early technology. The new technology allows for considerably more capability. But is this common icon of simple technology really all that simple?
And this is a technology that has, for the most part, a single purpose.
Many years ago, there was a new line of relatively inexpensive gadgets that were easy to network and plug together. Slashdot ran numerous stories about the cool little gadgets being made available by this company and Slashdot posters often referred to various cool projects and uses for them. The company name was pretty much synonymous with cool tech.
The company was X10. At the mention of that name... do you think "cool tech" or did you think "annoying advertising"?
Shortly after X10 hit the market in earnest, they started their infamous pop-up / under advertising campaign. The X10 name was plastered over all manner of web annoyances. And from that point forward, the only time the X10 name appeared on Slashdot was during rants about web annoyances.
X10 went from being a positive name in a community that was eagerly buying and espousing their products to a bad name without any direct association with their actual product line.
Brilliant marketing move.
From the C|Net article:
Huh.
BRIAN:
Look. You've got it all wrong. You don't need to follow me. You don't need to follow anybody! You've got to think for yourselves. You're all individuals!
FOLLOWERS:
Yes, we're all individuals!
BRIAN:
You're all different!
FOLLOWERS:
Yes, we are all different!
DENNIS:
I'm not.
No they're not. They're attempting to figure out how the binary behaves under all applicaple conditions, and then produce their own code that mimics that behavior. What you're describing is decompiling.
Again - no it's not. Copyright has nothing to do with actual functionality. You're confusing copyright with patents.
If you have a problem with the morality of this process, you may want to take a hard look at the IT industry. Reverse engineering has played a key role in the advancement of technology. Numerous times.
Great. Let us know when they stop going after the technology.
I'm sure it'll be all nice and cozy right up to the point that they start trying to grab for each other's niche.
US firms fell over their own feet trying to cozy up to China. Then they were shocked and upset when China decided to take the offered information and go it alone - often producing duplicate versions of the "partner" company's products.
If it works well with the West, why not the East?
I know.
With one name... Lucas has upset the French, Italians, grammer nazis, and possibly even a few fans. Brilliant.
Thanks. You just started a new meme. It may even overcome the "In Soviet Russia..." meme.
It's rather facinating that the article quotes some rather infamous sources. Mi2g's security analysis has been constantly criticized. Laura Didio's analysis of OS issues, and even the legality of code in the SCO case has also been under constant question. Google around; criticism isn't hard to find. It's not that the opinions of these analysists are unpopular; they're simply suspect.
It must be very convenient for them to have a few zealots around to distract from the question of the quality of their work.
And we all know that the best way to deal with an issue is brushing it aside by calling it rude names.