Really, this sort of behavior boils down to tribalism. People have a need to identify themselves as part of a group and what better way to do that then to contrast yourselves with those who are outside of your group. This is why some people glom onto fanatacisim for professional sports teams or fall victim to fashion trends. It's all about establishing your group identity. You've neatly summed up the conflict in Iraq as well. Sunis, Shiites and Kurds don't hate each other because of differences in religious doctrine, they hate each other because they identify themselves as part of a group that collectively hates the other groups. It just happens that they've adopted religious labels, which causes great confusion over here where we're not used to religious labels being used in this way.
Religious labels being applied to groups that do obnoxious things is why so many people think religion is bad.
Sorry if I wasn't clear: I was looking for a software eject button, not just an option to eject through software. What I want is for pressing the eject button on the drive to make the OS unmount it.
In case a "clueless user" yanks it "without unmounting properly?" Excuse me, but I don't think that's a matter of the user being clueless. If I have a removable drive, I don't think it's unreasonable to be able to remove it at any time--the OS should expect that. If the OS is still writing data to the drive and there's some kind of window open to that effect, then I'm stupid for disconnecting it in the middle of the process. If I "finished" copying three minutes ago, I don't think it's unreasonable for me to be able to disconnect the drive. Yes, you're a clueless user. You don't feel clueless, because so many other users are similarly clueless; your expectation seems reasonable to you because most other users share it. It's much more efficient for operating systems to cache disk access; when I'm working on typing a document and hit "save", I want to be able to continue working immediately, not sit there waiting while my word processor finishes writing every byte of the file. With caching, I don't have to wait. In fact, I only have to wait once: when I unmount the filesystem, I wait for the OS to tell me that it's finished with whatever it was doing before I eject or unplug. It's worked this way for DECADES on just about every OS except Microsoft's.
This is why Linux is a great OS for a server but not so hot for the desktop. Write-caching for a USB drive might make sense on a server, but not so much on the desktop. Write-caching for a USB drive makes perfect sense when users understand that they always need to unmount a filesystem when they're finished using it.
However, for other removable media, I've always been a big fan of software eject buttons. Most Macs since about 1999 or so have an eject button on the keyboard that unmounts and ejects the internal CD-ROM. I've heard that the Apple Lisa had a software eject button on the floppy drive. Windows, I think, intercepts the eject button on CD-ROM drives and won't let the drive eject if it's in the middle of reading something (sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't, maybe it's just my imagination). The eject button on Zip drives worked similarly. Linux doesn't use the eject button on CD-ROM and Zip drives the way I think it should, which is to unmount the filesystem and then eject the disk (please correct me if this functionality is available as an option; the default behavior is to lock it so pressing the button does nothing until the filesystem is unmounted manually). Of course Macs were long criticized for not having an eject button on their floppy drives at all; while I think a Lisa-style software eject button would have been nice, the only real problem was a few Mac models that put the power button near where people expected an eject button to be. Bad.
Sorry for rambling a bit there, it's late. None of that pertains to USB or FireWire devices that can be unplugged. Still, just because you may be in the majority doesn't make you any less clueless! I don't want my computer to do things slower just because I might be as incompetent as you are.
Funny. Seems to me that defense is one of the top priorities, according to the constitution. I didn't see anything about education in that document so that is supposed to be left up to the states. Sure, defense was one of the top priorities of the federal government, but that was when everything else was handled by the states. If the federal government had the kind of budget that it did when the constitution was written, then devoting such a large percentage of it to defense would be absolutely fine.
You may not get an A record, but I don't think you can register a domain without listing at least two authoritative nameservers, so you should get at least some NS records from a GTLD server.
However, command-line whois (or web-based whois from somebody who isn't sleazy) should work, without any registrar ever knowing about your query. The Verisign registry will know... but they'll know anyway, if they monitor queries to the GTLD servers. Since Verisign no longer operates a registrar, they should have no interest in this, unless they've partnered with a registrar which I'm quite sure would land them in a heap of trouble.
Slashdot is generally pretty great for my daily fill of tech news. But man oh man, when it comes to Microsoft, any front of being unbiased is quickly cast off. You must be new here. There's never been any such front.
He missed an even more important step: Electrical power is a simple, homogeneous commodity. IT isn't. You can't run a tube into someone's house and provide them with "IT". IT is more like the hundred of electrical devices we have in our homes than the power that's coming from the wall socket. Electrical power is a simple homogenous commodity, but electricians are a much better example. Yes, I could rewire an light switch myself, but at a business, I'd call an electrician to do it, because my time is valuable, and if it takes me three hours to do something that a professional could do in one for only twice my salary, then hiring the electrician is obviously more cost effective. In a new installation, I could design the new electrical wiring myself and buy all the parts from the local hardware store, but the professional may have better ideas because he's more familiar with what products are on the market and has the experience and training to know what gauge wire is appropriate and how many amps the breaker should be and that sort of thing, and he's already got the parts in his truck. I know, not the best examples, but you get the idea.
What does it mean, Apple's become too powerful, so Sony needs another distribution channel? Yes.
Is Apple driving the prices up? Quite the opposite - Sony wants to drive prices up, and Apple won't let them.
Is Apple restricting Sony to only sell DRM'd music? No, but the most popular portable digital music player won't play DRM'd music from anyone but Apple.
Is Apple incapable of supporting non-DRM formats? Nope, EMI is selling non-DRM'd music through Apple. Apple would love for Sony to do the same.
Does Apple not reach sufficiently worldwide. Not the issue either, although there are a lot of countries Apple doesn't reach.
If you want to sell music through Apple, Apple sets the price. Those are the terms, take it or leave it, and because of Apple's monopoly position, Sony can't afford to leave it. Sony sees this as the only way to break Apple's monopoly.
This is why Apple wouldn't license their FairPlay DRM to competitors. Kudos to Steve Jobs for pulling this off. He's always said from the beginning that DRM is a bad idea.
How will this impact Apple? Sales through the iTunes Store may dwindle a little, but sales of iPods will continue to climb.
It's funny that you, a christian, say there's no extraterrestrial life to find while I, an atheist, say there is no God to believe in.
I guess you can go to church while I welcome our new alien overlords.
"But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD." - Joshua 24:15 (NIV)
Sounds reasonable to me. Believe what you want, and I'll do the same.
because there's no extraterrestrial life to find Care to explain how you reached that conclusion? Care to explain how you reached the conclusion that there is?
It always amazes me when the same people who make fun of Christians for believing in a God we can't see put just as much faith in their belief that extraterrestrial life must exist out there somewhere. At least we have the Bible; what the hell is your belief based on? UFO sightings? The historic account of Eric Cartman's anal probe as revealed in cartoon form? Look, I poke fun at Christians because of stuff like this... No joke. Didn't your high school have some mandatory scienceclasses? BTW, I'm not quite sure which is more credible, the Bible or any given UFO reporting. Yes, I still remember my 7th grade science teacher drilling it into us. And yes, I recognize that SETI is scientific (they're trying to test the hypothesis that intelligent life is out there). However, so far there has been absolutely no evidence whatsoever to support the idea that extraterrestrial life exists at all, unless you're putting stock in the conspiracy theories. I am NOT saying the existence of God is (or can be) scientifically proven, merely that Christianity is at least as plausible as aliens. I have no objection to someone who says they don't believe in God. What I object to is people who believing in aliens they can't see saying that believing in a supernatural power you can't see is stupid. It's hypocrisy. You're entitled to your own beliefs, but when you start saying other people's beliefs are not just wrong, but stupid, you'd better have all your ducks in a row.
Faith is not a requirement to look for answers, and it doesn't obviate the need to either. True, and perhaps I was a little too hard on SETI before, but we are talking about using resources for this project that could be put to more practical use. Folding@Home is trying to better understand Alzheimer's Disease, for example. The extra energy used for distributing computing projects contributes to global warming and our dependence on Middle East oil. Waste heat in the summer is expensive (although this time of year it may not be, for those of us in the northern hemisphere). So the idea that SETI is a waste really isn't absurd at all.
Of all the things in the world that monumental amounts of energy are 'wasted' on each day (powering bin Ladens dialysis machine,lighting the creationism museum,all the power used by all the dictators and oppressors of the world who shouldn't be allowed to LIVE let alone use resources), 'wasting' a few of them LOOKING FOR FUCKING EXTRATERRESTRIAL LIFE doesn't even come CLOSE to being classified as a 'waste'. FUCK! Am I at the wrong site?!! Um, yeah, it's a waste, because there's no extraterrestrial life to find. If all this number-crunching were actually resulting in real scientific discoveries that actually benefited mankind, then I don't care if it also leaves open the possibility of finding aliens, but if the whole thing is useless if no aliens are found, then the whole thing is useless, because aliens won't be found.
It always amazes me when the same people who make fun of Christians for believing in a God we can't see put just as much faith in their belief that extraterrestrial life must exist out there somewhere. At least we have the Bible; what the hell is your belief based on? UFO sightings? The historic account of Eric Cartman's anal probe as revealed in cartoon form?
Pseudoephedrine is a pain in the ass to get now in most states, but here in Oregon, they've made it completely illegal without a prescription. Unfortunately, phenylephrine is no more effective than placebo when ingested orally. Apparently it's effective in nasal sprays, but when ingested it doesn't get absorbed into the bloodstream at all.
I live in the UK and that phrase sounds... disturbing. Bwahahahaha, I bet it does.
Here in the US where "nappy" doesn't mean what it does over there, it's a derogatory term for the naturally tightly coiled hair that is common among black people. Which I didn't know until the Don Imus scandal.
I love public radio. During the Don Imus scandal, I believe it was PRI's "Here and Now" that I was listening to when they talked about it. You know what they did an investigative report on?
Nappy hair.
Including interviews with hair stylists in African-American communities discussing exactly what nappy hair is and what makes it different to work with than straight hair, and exploring the linguistic origins of the word "nappy".
If you made more spelling mistakes and invoked Jesus's blessing, I might've mistaken you for an authentic scammer. I thought about going back and introducing them, but was really just too lazy to put in the extra effort. Instead, I settled for a simple disclaimer.
get their money from all those secret accounts that I keep getting emailed about. Well, we would, but you see, there are a lot of legal fees involved in that kind of transaction. It's actually easier just to transfer the money out of the country, to an American bank account, and then transfer it back. If you'd be so kind as to give me your bank account number, I could just send you the money, and then you could send it back to me. Obviously I'd be willing to compensate you quite well for your time, all I need is to borrow about $5,000 from you up front to help offset the legal fees, and then I'll be able to take care of everything and pay you $100,000 for your time. Let me know if I can count on your support!
You misunderstood. Let me clarify:
The only thing missing was machine-assisted voting for those who couldn't read [an optical ballot] or mark an optical ballot. He wasn't talking about illiterates. Blind people can't fill out a Scantron form, but they can use a computer with an audio or Braille interface which can fill out a Scantron sheet for them. He was saying the system he used didn't have this, but it could easily be added, and everything would work great (except that blind people couldn't verify their printed ballots before casting them, but they're a small enough minority that I wouldn't consider this to be a serious problem - not because blind people aren't important, but because a large enough percentage of the general population would be able to verify their ballots that any systemic problems would surely be caught.
My thoughts exactly. Isn't rehabilitation one of the purposes of prison? Sex-related crimes (such as public urination) are basically getting mandatory life sentences now - a couple years in prison, then the rest of your life shunned by society with no opportunity to turn over a new leaf. If we were just talking about repeat-offending child molesters and rapists here, the situation would be different, but we're not.
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"Going to church no more makes you a Christian than standing in a garage makes you a car." - Garrison Keillor
Religious labels being applied to groups that do obnoxious things is why so many people think religion is bad.
Wireless Extension Cords
OMG, Ponies!!!
Good, that's exactly the behavior I was looking for. Any idea what specific bit of software makes that work?
Sorry if I wasn't clear: I was looking for a software eject button, not just an option to eject through software. What I want is for pressing the eject button on the drive to make the OS unmount it.
However, for other removable media, I've always been a big fan of software eject buttons. Most Macs since about 1999 or so have an eject button on the keyboard that unmounts and ejects the internal CD-ROM. I've heard that the Apple Lisa had a software eject button on the floppy drive. Windows, I think, intercepts the eject button on CD-ROM drives and won't let the drive eject if it's in the middle of reading something (sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn't, maybe it's just my imagination). The eject button on Zip drives worked similarly. Linux doesn't use the eject button on CD-ROM and Zip drives the way I think it should, which is to unmount the filesystem and then eject the disk (please correct me if this functionality is available as an option; the default behavior is to lock it so pressing the button does nothing until the filesystem is unmounted manually). Of course Macs were long criticized for not having an eject button on their floppy drives at all; while I think a Lisa-style software eject button would have been nice, the only real problem was a few Mac models that put the power button near where people expected an eject button to be. Bad.
Sorry for rambling a bit there, it's late. None of that pertains to USB or FireWire devices that can be unplugged. Still, just because you may be in the majority doesn't make you any less clueless! I don't want my computer to do things slower just because I might be as incompetent as you are.
Alright, I think you're nuts, but technically your logic is sound. :-)
You may not get an A record, but I don't think you can register a domain without listing at least two authoritative nameservers, so you should get at least some NS records from a GTLD server.
However, command-line whois (or web-based whois from somebody who isn't sleazy) should work, without any registrar ever knowing about your query. The Verisign registry will know... but they'll know anyway, if they monitor queries to the GTLD servers. Since Verisign no longer operates a registrar, they should have no interest in this, unless they've partnered with a registrar which I'm quite sure would land them in a heap of trouble.
If you want to sell music through Apple, Apple sets the price. Those are the terms, take it or leave it, and because of Apple's monopoly position, Sony can't afford to leave it. Sony sees this as the only way to break Apple's monopoly.
This is why Apple wouldn't license their FairPlay DRM to competitors. Kudos to Steve Jobs for pulling this off. He's always said from the beginning that DRM is a bad idea.
How will this impact Apple? Sales through the iTunes Store may dwindle a little, but sales of iPods will continue to climb.
I guess you can go to church while I welcome our new alien overlords.
Sounds reasonable to me. Believe what you want, and I'll do the same.
It always amazes me when the same people who make fun of Christians for believing in a God we can't see put just as much faith in their belief that extraterrestrial life must exist out there somewhere. At least we have the Bible; what the hell is your belief based on? UFO sightings? The historic account of Eric Cartman's anal probe as revealed in cartoon form?
Pseudoephedrine is a pain in the ass to get now in most states, but here in Oregon, they've made it completely illegal without a prescription. Unfortunately, phenylephrine is no more effective than placebo when ingested orally. Apparently it's effective in nasal sprays, but when ingested it doesn't get absorbed into the bloodstream at all.
Here in the US where "nappy" doesn't mean what it does over there, it's a derogatory term for the naturally tightly coiled hair that is common among black people. Which I didn't know until the Don Imus scandal.
I love public radio. During the Don Imus scandal, I believe it was PRI's "Here and Now" that I was listening to when they talked about it. You know what they did an investigative report on?
Nappy hair.
Including interviews with hair stylists in African-American communities discussing exactly what nappy hair is and what makes it different to work with than straight hair, and exploring the linguistic origins of the word "nappy".
(No, I'm not really Nigerian.)
Those didn't help at all. Do you have a more specific link?
It involves exposing one's genitalia.
:-P
I dunno, some other Slashdotter said it, I was just going along with them.
My thoughts exactly. Isn't rehabilitation one of the purposes of prison? Sex-related crimes (such as public urination) are basically getting mandatory life sentences now - a couple years in prison, then the rest of your life shunned by society with no opportunity to turn over a new leaf. If we were just talking about repeat-offending child molesters and rapists here, the situation would be different, but we're not.