I've seen way too many projects (not many games though) where 90% was licensed (components, libraries, content) and 10% was the particular project's code.
There isn't much point on releasing even that 10% since it will probably be shaped to use those libraries, and will have to be rewritten extensively anyway.
Also, as someone else already pointed out, who is going to pay for the *careful* review of the code, to make sure nothing that isn't theirs is released? They are liable for any mistakes, so they can't just screw up and get away with it.
Much like with Earth: Final Conflict, another roddenberry series that started off fantastic, and went downhill. Well, dropped off a cliff, in that case.
Well said - that is exactly how I felt about both series. IMHO, it seems like they are incapable of creating consistent story archs, so they just keep pulling stuff out of nowhere to make the next episode - much like Star Trek's particle of the week. I can still watch Star Trek, except for Enterprise, which isn't worth the time.
I'm surprised no one else seems to have mentioned DriveCrypt from http://www.securstar.com/ . Their "Invisible Containers" feature works pretty much like you described. You use two keys, one decrypts the outer disk, and the other the invisible disk.
They also have a Hidden OS option in the Plus version. (Both versions are Windows only)
BTW, I'm not associated with them and I never used their products, except for Scramdisk several years ago. Drivecrypt just seemed really cool when I read their page.
There was an extension much earlier than that, but since 1.0RC1 there is an option to open on a new window, a new tab on the latest window or the current tab.
No, World Wind has tons of black&white 1 meter coverage through USGS, and a few select urban areas at.25 meter, color.
I've used both, and Keyhole has fairly better US coverage and tools, but had very poor coverage on most of the world - usually just the Blue Marble NASA texture (not even landsat).
World Wind's Landsat server is still off after an earlier slashdotting but there is some cache files and proxy servers around (info available on their forum). The program is already open source and available at CVS on https://sourceforge.net/projects/nasa-exp/
A copy of the source is also included in the NASA regular download.
Actually, the tool required to see the code would be a hex editor, not a regular text editor like Notepad.
Have you actually tried it? I just did, and it opens up fine with Notepad and you can easily read "2000-04-06 IENG Deepz0ne ISFT Sound Forge 4.5" at the end of the file.
However, it rarely makes much of a difference in regular benchmarks. If you are running a heavy process in the background, with HT you still get a good response time using other applications, when without HT they get slow and incredibly annoying to use.
I also use a Tungsten E, replacing a Palm III for e-book reading.
As you say, the screen is great, and 32MB (the main reason I got it) can fit a whole lot of books.
The battery though, is a bad joke... I really wish they'd go back to AAAs! I constantly read complaints about them - even for regular use.
I also had an iPaq some time ago - it was pretty good, but after the second time the battery stopped working (the first time it only had a few months of use, the second about a year) I ended up giving up on it...
I don't know if there is an alternate version of the format, but I've bought a lot of Palm Reader encrypted (secure) books from www.fictionwise.com, and they are not tied to a specific Palm. The encryption is based on my name and a hash of the credit card used to buy the e-book.
When I switched from my old Palm IIIe to a Tungsten-E, all I had to do was enter my name and credit card once and all old Palm Reader books worked fine.
Your main point remains valid - if it can't use other e-book formats I certainly won't buy it.
Otherwise, I'm very interested - the Tungsten-e's screen is great but it's way too small and the battery only lasts a day or two of e-book use (on my old Palm IIIe a pair of alcalines would last 3 weeks or more).
You wouldn't get bankrupt with AdWords though, it just wouldn't have any effect since AdWords show up in Google in response to keywords, not on your site. Also, it has daily spending limits.
However, you can hardly expect someone which use an user name which is a technology for faster-than-light communication to be *for* the laws of nature:-)
I'd be in a better position to make jokes about it, if I didn't use a much more obscure SF reference as mine, of course...
I've been re-reading these books and I have to agree... Dune is much better than the sequels.
However, the "prequels" to Dune written by Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson are *great*. The Butlerian Jihad, in particular, was excellent. The "Houses" series were very good, too (Dune: House Atreides and Dune: House Harkonnen and Dune: House Corrino).
Obviously, there will be no post-production editing or enhancing, so you're basically just buying a fancy bootleg, not a CD you'd buy from a store of a live performance. But it shouldn't suck too bad, and it'd sure beat holding up a mini-recorder in the crowd.
Wow, an actual use of "Beowulf cluster" in a post that isn't a stupid joke!
I'm impressed...:-)
I'm not sure you'd get a lot of improvement from the technique though - bots would tend to play well with bots this way, unless you somehow managed to get a fitness function that reflected playing with humans. You could also invite a lot of human beta testers and evolve them based on survival rates.
Some algorithm that noticed patterns in actual gameplay would probably induce cooler behaviour - something in the lines of:
- Noticing any hots spots for damage taken in a certain map and trying to find alternate routes (thus avoiding points where the bot is sniped), or increasing speed and strafing while crossing these areas.
- Remembering spots where a player was sniping from frequently and trying to compute a route that allowed the bot to shoot without crossing the player's potential POV.
These are both things real players do, and it'd help them avoid falling in the same traps every time.
I agree. I've only used Microsoft Natural Keyboards for years now, and I've used a couple of their mouses (including my current optical mouse) and they are both great.
Then everybody could get GPL code, do just as ICQ did (every version has been a beta, for years! Well, at least they are not lying - it is so buggy it deserves the title of beta), and never release code...
This was a very important study in its time and in fact, I haven't heard of any other serious research done in this subject since it was released.
The actual rate (at least in the study I know, maybe you are referring to another) was 5 to 1. There is probably a good reason people didn't do this again - the author (Colin Messitt) concluded the experiment cost him 17K is lost sales.
You can read it here , among other places on the net.
Slashdot Mirror
I've seen way too many projects (not many games though) where 90% was licensed (components, libraries, content) and 10% was the particular project's code.
There isn't much point on releasing even that 10% since it will probably be shaped to use those libraries, and will have to be rewritten extensively anyway.
Also, as someone else already pointed out, who is going to pay for the *careful* review of the code, to make sure nothing that isn't theirs is released? They are liable for any mistakes, so they can't just screw up and get away with it.
Well said - that is exactly how I felt about both series. IMHO, it seems like they are incapable of creating consistent story archs, so they just keep pulling stuff out of nowhere to make the next episode - much like Star Trek's particle of the week. I can still watch Star Trek, except for Enterprise, which isn't worth the time.
I'm surprised no one else seems to have mentioned DriveCrypt from http://www.securstar.com/ . Their "Invisible Containers" feature works pretty much like you described. You use two keys, one decrypts the outer disk, and the other the invisible disk.
They also have a Hidden OS option in the Plus version. (Both versions are Windows only)
BTW, I'm not associated with them and I never used their products, except for Scramdisk several years ago. Drivecrypt just seemed really cool when I read their page.
There was an extension much earlier than that, but since 1.0RC1 there is an option to open on a new window, a new tab on the latest window or the current tab.
No, World Wind has tons of black&white 1 meter coverage through USGS, and a few select urban areas at .25 meter, color.
I've used both, and Keyhole has fairly better US coverage and tools, but had very poor coverage on most of the world - usually just the Blue Marble NASA texture (not even landsat).
World Wind's Landsat server is still off after an earlier slashdotting but there is some cache files and proxy servers around (info available on their forum). The program is already open source and available at CVS on https://sourceforge.net/projects/nasa-exp/
A copy of the source is also included in the NASA regular download.
Have you actually tried it? I just did, and it opens up fine with Notepad and you can easily read "2000-04-06 IENG Deepz0ne ISFT Sound Forge 4.5" at the end of the file.
IMHO, Hyperthreading is awesome in Windows XP.
However, it rarely makes much of a difference in regular benchmarks. If you are running a heavy process in the background, with HT you still get a good response time using other applications, when without HT they get slow and incredibly annoying to use.
I also use a Tungsten E, replacing a Palm III for e-book reading.
As you say, the screen is great, and 32MB (the main reason I got it) can fit a whole lot of books.
The battery though, is a bad joke... I really wish they'd go back to AAAs! I constantly read complaints about them - even for regular use.
I also had an iPaq some time ago - it was pretty good, but after the second time the battery stopped working (the first time it only had a few months of use, the second about a year) I ended up giving up on it...
I don't know if there is an alternate version of the format, but I've bought a lot of Palm Reader encrypted (secure) books from www.fictionwise.com, and they are not tied to a specific Palm. The encryption is based on my name and a hash of the credit card used to buy the e-book.
When I switched from my old Palm IIIe to a Tungsten-E, all I had to do was enter my name and credit card once and all old Palm Reader books worked fine.
Your main point remains valid - if it can't use other e-book formats I certainly won't buy it.
Otherwise, I'm very interested - the Tungsten-e's screen is great but it's way too small and the battery only lasts a day or two of e-book use (on my old Palm IIIe a pair of alcalines would last 3 weeks or more).
Yes, he was probably thinking of Adsense
You wouldn't get bankrupt with AdWords though, it just wouldn't have any effect since AdWords show up in Google in response to keywords, not on your site. Also, it has daily spending limits.
ROFL!
Really great post, reminds me of Futurama (probably mostly due to the "what if machine" episode with the videogame segment)...
Some years ago, a friend drove over his Toshiba notebook. Except for a few dead pixel columns, it worked fine for quite some time...
However, you can hardly expect someone which use an user name which is a technology for faster-than-light communication to be *for* the laws of nature :-)
I'd be in a better position to make jokes about it, if I didn't use a much more obscure SF reference as mine, of course...
I've been re-reading these books and I have to agree... Dune is much better than the sequels.
However, the "prequels" to Dune written by Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson are *great*. The Butlerian Jihad, in particular, was excellent. The "Houses" series were very good, too (Dune: House Atreides and Dune: House Harkonnen and Dune: House Corrino).
Maybe, but why would you want to? :-)
Yes, but most hardware companies don't sell their products at a loss like MS does on Xbox...
Yes, a /. run by word-of-mouth instead of on computers and the net would be a great start!
It might take a while for the news to reach you, though...
This is pretty obvious. But it does make recording live concerts (when this feature is/was not available) look more legit.
I guess that in the Linux version, any technology you did research would be Open Source and automatically shared with all other players...
Wow, an actual use of "Beowulf cluster" in a post that isn't a stupid joke!
:-)
I'm impressed...
I'm not sure you'd get a lot of improvement from the technique though - bots would tend to play well with bots this way, unless you somehow managed to get a fitness function that reflected playing with humans. You could also invite a lot of human beta testers and evolve them based on survival rates.
Some algorithm that noticed patterns in actual gameplay would probably induce cooler behaviour - something in the lines of:
- Noticing any hots spots for damage taken in a certain map and trying to find alternate routes (thus avoiding points where the bot is sniped), or increasing speed and strafing while crossing these areas.
- Remembering spots where a player was sniping from frequently and trying to compute a route that allowed the bot to shoot without crossing the player's potential POV.
These are both things real players do, and it'd help them avoid falling in the same traps every time.
Is one guy using them a proof of success?
A lot of people used ZIP drives too...
(including me, a few years ago)
Then CD burners and media got real cheap and they just disappeared.
I agree. I've only used Microsoft Natural Keyboards for years now, and I've used a couple of their mouses (including my current optical mouse) and they are both great.
Wow! That would be great.
Then everybody could get GPL code, do just as ICQ did (every version has been a beta, for years! Well, at least they are not lying - it is so buggy it deserves the title of beta), and never release code...
This was a very important study in its time and in fact, I haven't heard of any other serious research done in this subject since it was released.
The actual rate (at least in the study I know, maybe you are referring to another) was 5 to 1. There is probably a good reason people didn't do this again - the author (Colin Messitt) concluded the experiment cost him 17K is lost sales.
You can read it here , among other places on the net.