If multiple desktops are so cool, then why have user interface experts working for a major computer company discarded multiple desktops as too confusing?
Hmmm... because these UI fellas assume that if it isn't immediately obvious then it's probably confusing? Or perhaps because they were working for Apple, which is aiming its GUI toward people who want computers to be easy?
Multiple desktops are cool, when they're done right.
Same here, except in my case it was some computer with the words "Zenith---the quality goes in before the name goes on" written on it.
In an attempt to make this post vaguely on topic, it's funny how this article says "...the Java programming language, which was key to browser innovation.". When was Java ever key to web innovation?
The feature I like most is the way Opera lets you easily change the appearance
of web pages by clicking some buttons. I like the option to turn off images.
I really like the option to choose between a number of user stylesheets
that come with the browser. Who says browser innovation is dead? It isn't.
True. I'm basically stranded on a browser that doesn't have mouse gestures since I'll do a basic gesture, and it'll just hang there. Then there's that awkward pause. Then I curse the browser and go to the back button.
However, more advanced mouse gestures are harder, like emacs.
Firebird mouse gestures have a delay time, by defult 500ms. If you get the preferential extension you can change the setting to a more reasonable value.
I'm not claiming that this is a good way of configuring the browser, but at least it works....
Ctrl-tab-enter-escape-pageup is the key combination I would use. Your feat is possible by using the back part of your hand (right above the carpals) to hold down alt and ctrl, using your left fingers to hit F1, hitting F12 with your left hand, putting the mouse on the floot, removing your shoes, and moving the mouse in a circle with your foot.
Imagine clippy staring at you and laughing hyterically....
My recommendation: install Mozilla Firebird, and declare it "your" browser. This could make things go smoother with your wife; I know it's helped me whenever I have to share a computer. Install the mouse gestures extension. Right click on the toolbar and select "customize" from the menu, and then you can add/remove/move buttons to your heart's content. It's easy, and it takes about a minute, even if you've never done it before.
I don't know the answer to that. Sigh. Perhaps, if you're clever and lucky, you could try to play two developed countries off against each other. For example, threatening to move to Canada because "America has obviously fallen far behind the rest of the developed world in the space race", and moving to whatever country wants an ego boost.
I'm basically just mentally throwing myself against the bars in a cage here. Do you see any way of getting a private space program, preferably without moving to some place like Bolivia?
A government's job is to create, enforce, and interpret LAWS.
Not replying to your post particularly, but I wish that the government would take more of a hand in getting rid of laws. This may seem crazy, but consider this: you have legislatures everywhere making laws, but to get rid of laws you just (IIRC) have the overburdened court system. It would be nice if we had some full-time body of government that would scrap laws with the same sort of get-some-votes abandon that gets us, say, anti-sodomy laws or fines for nuclear devices within city limits.
I don't think that's a fair comparison. Calling their fans evil criminals is the sort of thing that inspires controversy, divides people into those that agree and those that disagree, and gives people a feeling of worried urgency. It should only be compared with something similar, like promoting pirating their songs, which would also get a lot of attention, I think. It should not be compared with something that can only be properly construed as good news, which is the sort of thing, say, Scientific American specializes in---and look what a huge fan base that has!;-)
People have known that there are perfectly legitimate uses for DeCSS for how long now? I see this as a mixture of good news and bad news. Good news that the mainstream media are figuring this out, bad news that it took so long. And will it make any difference? The media as a whole seem to be eating out of the *AA's hands. Witness the article about music piracy in Time....
For me, Google is no longer a logo and a text box. It is a tiny icon and a text box near the upper-right corner of my screen. That's even simpler, and nicer to use. Plus, I can use the same box to search Amazon.com, Everything2, and dmoz.org, all very easily and without having to worry about ads. Now that's what I call browser innovation!
I've used IE, Opera, and Firebird, and the latter two are both far superior to IE once you get used to them. Try it, you'll like it, if only for the popup blocking and ability to head on over to (in the case of Mozilla, which includes Firebird) Mozdev and download a number of cool extensions like an ad blocker and new themes.
I think that basically the big difference is that non-IE browsers tend to be oriented toward the needs of the user, and IE is optimized toward the foisting of crap on the hapless user. IE still lets javascript open popup windows randomly and utterly without supervision, unless they've changed something recently.
They would be accomplishing something (albeit small) if they had a decent crew on the thing. After all, you never know what experiments may come in handy. Most of the experiments probably won't be useful at all (and frankly I don't want to have spiders in a space station with me, even if I'm going to do some weird experiment with them), but NASA and friends would be building up a body of knowledge if they weren't such cowards.
Personally, I've given up hope that NASA will do anything big or dramatic again, and I'm hoping that somebody manages to get in space seperately. I don't care who. Rutan, Armadillo, whoever; I WANT TO SEE PEOPLE IN SPACE! If it becomes cheaper, then we can get some real stuff done in space.
As for going to mars, having nuclear propelled spacecraft would be, IMHO, the only hope of sending actual people to mars. I'm also a bit bitter that people recoil whenever "nuclear" is mentioned.
But let's do something! Not just sit on our butts!
Secondly OpenBSD (the version I use, and care about) needs to be free "for use in baby-mulching machines, or to drop atomic bombs on Australia". GPL isn't free to do that.
I won't comment on the GPL vs. Foo debate, but how do you figure that GPL isn't free for use in baby-mulchers and atom bombs? I didn't see anything in the GPL about only using it for ethical or legal things.
I was waiting at a supermarket checkout the other day when a customer had three cartons of cans of soft drink ($13 each). Rather than lifting the things off the trolley, two of the staff tried to work out the cost:[...]
That sort of thing is the reason that everyone should know how to do very basic arithmetic mentally. Anything more complicated is good calculator fodder. 13*2: double both digits, getting $26. Of course, if I'm wrong on that you can discount my point...:-)
I had a drafting teacher who recommended that we all practice using architectural (or, more precisely, engineering) lettering, since it's very legible and you can get used to it. He is now incapable of writing any other way, and his handwriting is fast and very good.
I say, if elementary schools are going to force a writing system on you it should be something that people can actually read.
As far as social skills go - social skills are also a 'learned ability' just like typing. That would've been an interesting class I think.
I remember hearing about a high school class called "Interpersonal Skills", but my guess is that it's just stuff like "make eye contact [perhaps included: 'with her eyes, not her breasts!']". It might be cool to get an anthropology-type analysis of social skills, though.
Sorry, I'm just big on being time efficient. If we can't teach our children something truely valuable - why are we keeping them in school until 3pm? Or until the age of 18? To keep them out of our way? Because we say they have to to and that's final?
Ah, because school is a time for learning;-)! Unfortunately it doesn't follow that time in school is mostly time learning. Lots of it is time, say, listening to an old english teacher hit you over the head with the message in The Grapes of Wrath (an already heavy and rather preachy book).
I remember back in elementary school when teachers often insisted on cursive. To this day, I have no use for cursive, although it did alter the way I draw g's. Why should anyone have to be put through cursive? It's hard to read, damn it.
Speaking of nuclear waste, I don't see what the problem with it is. Instead of spewing out countless tons of incredibly poisonous substances randomly into the atmospere, you get some middlingly toxic stuff that you have lots of control over. It's amazingly clean, compared to the alternatives---oddly enough, the alternatices we've been forced to use by the fact that people find nuclear unclean somehow.
I agree that nuclear stuff is the only practical way we've yet invented to get humans to mars. With that said, couldn't some huge and disgusting government program send people there without nuclear technology, albeit at the cost of many billions of dollars and reinforcing the idea that space is only for colossal government programs for decades to come? Suppose you got something in space with loads of shielding and supplies, and enough conventional propellant to fling the thing. The mere thought is making my sense of aesthetics want to stand in a corner and sing 3.14.
I hear ya. Part of the "War on Drugs" involves a lot of "Just Say No", and there are numerous speeches, assemblies, and such about drugs, sex, Wait Until Marriage, Use Condoms, Just Say No, It's Illegal, and pretty much anything else you can think of. People are completely inundated with these messages. If they ignore them, perhaps it is because of things other than not having heard them. Perhaps, for instance, some people are inclined to regard credibility as inversely proportional to seniority and trust their frinds much more than the School (or whatever other source this stuff comes from).
Dot-matrix printers really aren't so bad anymore, and you don't get extorted for one of the nine billion different incompatible inkjet cartridges. Plus, they're fast and cheap, for people who don't print much.
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Hmmm... because these UI fellas assume that if it isn't immediately obvious then it's probably confusing? Or perhaps because they were working for Apple, which is aiming its GUI toward people who want computers to be easy?
Multiple desktops are cool, when they're done right.
In an attempt to make this post vaguely on topic, it's funny how this article says "...the Java programming language, which was key to browser innovation.". When was Java ever key to web innovation?
The feature I like most is the way Opera lets you easily change the appearance of web pages by clicking some buttons. I like the option to turn off images. I really like the option to choose between a number of user stylesheets that come with the browser. Who says browser innovation is dead? It isn't.
However, more advanced mouse gestures are harder, like emacs.
I'm not claiming that this is a good way of configuring the browser, but at least it works....
Imagine clippy staring at you and laughing hyterically....
Cheers!
And there you are!
I'm basically just mentally throwing myself against the bars in a cage here. Do you see any way of getting a private space program, preferably without moving to some place like Bolivia?
Not replying to your post particularly, but I wish that the government would take more of a hand in getting rid of laws. This may seem crazy, but consider this: you have legislatures everywhere making laws, but to get rid of laws you just (IIRC) have the overburdened court system. It would be nice if we had some full-time body of government that would scrap laws with the same sort of get-some-votes abandon that gets us, say, anti-sodomy laws or fines for nuclear devices within city limits.
I don't think that's a fair comparison. Calling their fans evil criminals is the sort of thing that inspires controversy, divides people into those that agree and those that disagree, and gives people a feeling of worried urgency. It should only be compared with something similar, like promoting pirating their songs, which would also get a lot of attention, I think. It should not be compared with something that can only be properly construed as good news, which is the sort of thing, say, Scientific American specializes in---and look what a huge fan base that has! ;-)
People have known that there are perfectly legitimate uses for DeCSS for how long now? I see this as a mixture of good news and bad news. Good news that the mainstream media are figuring this out, bad news that it took so long. And will it make any difference? The media as a whole seem to be eating out of the *AA's hands. Witness the article about music piracy in Time....
For me, Google is no longer a logo and a text box. It is a tiny icon and a text box near the upper-right corner of my screen. That's even simpler, and nicer to use. Plus, I can use the same box to search Amazon.com, Everything2, and dmoz.org, all very easily and without having to worry about ads. Now that's what I call browser innovation!
I think that basically the big difference is that non-IE browsers tend to be oriented toward the needs of the user, and IE is optimized toward the foisting of crap on the hapless user. IE still lets javascript open popup windows randomly and utterly without supervision, unless they've changed something recently.
Personally, I've given up hope that NASA will do anything big or dramatic again, and I'm hoping that somebody manages to get in space seperately. I don't care who. Rutan, Armadillo, whoever; I WANT TO SEE PEOPLE IN SPACE! If it becomes cheaper, then we can get some real stuff done in space.
As for going to mars, having nuclear propelled spacecraft would be, IMHO, the only hope of sending actual people to mars. I'm also a bit bitter that people recoil whenever "nuclear" is mentioned.
But let's do something! Not just sit on our butts!
I won't comment on the GPL vs. Foo debate, but how do you figure that GPL isn't free for use in baby-mulchers and atom bombs? I didn't see anything in the GPL about only using it for ethical or legal things.
That sort of thing is the reason that everyone should know how to do very basic arithmetic mentally. Anything more complicated is good calculator fodder. 13*2: double both digits, getting $26. Of course, if I'm wrong on that you can discount my point... :-)
I say, if elementary schools are going to force a writing system on you it should be something that people can actually read.
I remember hearing about a high school class called "Interpersonal Skills", but my guess is that it's just stuff like "make eye contact [perhaps included: 'with her eyes, not her breasts!']". It might be cool to get an anthropology-type analysis of social skills, though.
Sorry, I'm just big on being time efficient. If we can't teach our children something truely valuable - why are we keeping them in school until 3pm? Or until the age of 18? To keep them out of our way? Because we say they have to to and that's final?
Ah, because school is a time for learning ;-)! Unfortunately it doesn't follow that time in school is mostly time learning. Lots of it is time, say, listening to an old english teacher hit you over the head with the message in The Grapes of Wrath (an already heavy and rather preachy book).
I remember back in elementary school when teachers often insisted on cursive. To this day, I have no use for cursive, although it did alter the way I draw g's. Why should anyone have to be put through cursive? It's hard to read, damn it.
Speaking of nuclear waste, I don't see what the problem with it is. Instead of spewing out countless tons of incredibly poisonous substances randomly into the atmospere, you get some middlingly toxic stuff that you have lots of control over. It's amazingly clean, compared to the alternatives---oddly enough, the alternatices we've been forced to use by the fact that people find nuclear unclean somehow.
I agree that nuclear stuff is the only practical way we've yet invented to get humans to mars. With that said, couldn't some huge and disgusting government program send people there without nuclear technology, albeit at the cost of many billions of dollars and reinforcing the idea that space is only for colossal government programs for decades to come? Suppose you got something in space with loads of shielding and supplies, and enough conventional propellant to fling the thing. The mere thought is making my sense of aesthetics want to stand in a corner and sing 3.14.
On the other hand, about the only thing I know about "antena's" is that there is a nice introduction to apostrophe usage floating around on the web.
I hear ya. Part of the "War on Drugs" involves a lot of "Just Say No", and there are numerous speeches, assemblies, and such about drugs, sex, Wait Until Marriage, Use Condoms, Just Say No, It's Illegal, and pretty much anything else you can think of. People are completely inundated with these messages. If they ignore them, perhaps it is because of things other than not having heard them. Perhaps, for instance, some people are inclined to regard credibility as inversely proportional to seniority and trust their frinds much more than the School (or whatever other source this stuff comes from).
Dot-matrix printers really aren't so bad anymore, and you don't get extorted for one of the nine billion different incompatible inkjet cartridges. Plus, they're fast and cheap, for people who don't print much.