But it does have some subtle - if not intentional - points that are very important.
There is the technology available to avoid spam. Spam blacklists, Bayesian filters, and Challenge-Response systems will handle the vast majority of spam, if not all of it.
Shouldn't we just be encouraging the adoption of these technologies rather than empowering the state with more tools with which to persecute people?
If you left your house door open and somebody entered and made a mess in your house (or worse!) then who is to blame? Who is at fault? If you have a lock available to you then you use it. The same thing goes for your emails.
Laws are there to be dodged and abused. Community cooperation and prevention strengthens us.
We should be encouraging ISPs to use and support the technologies available to them to destroy spam rather than lobbying for useless new laws (they'll just send the spam from another country you idiots!).
You mean that McBride's rants may actually have a bit of substance behind them?
Ok, I'll make it easy for you. Here's by far the most important part of the letter:
"Notably, it appears that most or all of the System V code fragments we found had previously been placed in the public domain, meaning it is very doubtful that the SCO Group has any proprietary claim to these code fragments in any case."
IOW, the letter can be summarised to, "We don't think we've infringed on [SCO's] copyright as this was BSD code, but it was that easy to replace that we've done it anyway."
anything to stop me running thru the US patents list , picking some choice patents and taking out new patents based on them (perhaps ever so slightly modified) in Europe ?
The massive amount of money required to do it.
That's why this is a big coporate thing; they can make lots of patents and extort money out of those that can't afford to patent everything from a straight blade of grass to comfortable desk that helps you to be more productive.
I'm not sure what's worse. The legal and economical fallout from the SCO vs Linux mess, or the fact that we're doomed to hearing the same 'it belongs to SCO' joke attached to every single Linux-related story from for the rest of eternity.
It's a shame that the parent comment is a blatant troll because it does harbour a truth or two.
Gnome Office and OpenOffice.org (I couldn't comment on Star Office as I have not used it) are many features behind Microsoft's latest incarnations of it's Office suite.
However, Microsoft Office has had a head start. It's been going for a great deal longer than any of OpenOffice.org, AbiWord and Gnumeric. It also has many more developers.
Yet the Free Software Office programs seem to be catching up. AbiWord has matured massively between 1.0.x and 2.0 - they're almost unrecognisable from each other.
Gnumeric is the one exception to the 'fewer features' since it actually boasts more functions that Excel. A little bit of polish, tweaking, and a few subtle feature additions and Gnumeric will be superior to Excel - some argue that it already is.
OpenOffice.org is also making great strides. 1.1 is far better than 1.0 in all areas - features, speed, and general polish. The plans for 2.0 are promising - there is a detailed roadmap that makes for interesting reading. Version 2.0 of OpenOffice.org will be a major milestone for the project. 1.0 was the initial release, 1.1 was the produce of a bit of spit and polish, 2.0 will be the first to feel like a true individual project as opposed to a bastard-brother of Star Office.
How is it that these Free Software programs are gaining on the software developed by the software giant?
Since Free Software developers develop for free, I think there's a pride assosciated with their work that inspires them to overcome obstacles insurmountable to a payrolled team. It could also be that we have a superior development platform, but that's just flamebait.
Could be wrong, but I think Microsoft actually "sees the light" in some respects, especially when it comes to a development platform. It makes sense- it builds a larger base of developers using.NET. Maybe not to the degree/.ers would want, but judging by the amount of open-source sites and projects that have a Microsoft affiliation, I think they're moving more that way.
Wow, is it a second coming? I remember when they were seeing the light about 10 years ago when they turned a blind eye to the rife piracy of their products because it meant more people were using them. Now they're starting to crack down because they are the dominant force.
Am I the only one who thinks that Microsoft will happily let Mono and DotGNU develop only as long as it suits Microsoft's cause? 5 years from now, Java is dying,.NET is by far the dominant development platform, do you think Microsoft is going to forget they have a number of key patents that could literally put down it's competition and push people back from Linux into Windows?
Do not confuse business strategy with philosophy. Microsoft only has the former.
One thing Windows gets right is that there is always more than one way to reach your goal.
Is 'tabbed browsing' a goal or a method? I'd suggest it's the latter. And methods should always be logical and consistent. By offering various unecessary preferences on how your tabs behave, you provide the user with a means to confuse themselves. However, if the most logical default method is used, then there is no confusion available to occur and the user finds it intuitive. If the method is not intuitive, then a different setting should be used.
As for multiple paths to reach all goals; it depends on the goal. The clock example is a good example of multiple logical paths to the one goal. Double clicking to activate, right clicking to bring up the contextual menu, and an appropriate entry in the control panel. These are all routes that a user might try to take to configure the time on their computer.
All logical routes should be available to any goal, but sometimes there is only one logical route. For instance, you would not want multiple ways to disable popups in Epiphany, just a simple entry in the preferences for Epiphany.
Do not confuse methods with goals, nor assume all goals have multiple intuitive pathways.
Secondly, only two 'desktops' have their own 'integrated' browser; Gnome (Epiphany) and KDE (Konqueror).
The purpose of the integrated web browser is to provide a default for users, and to provide extra functionality through tight integration with the desktop. Think Internet Explorer in Windows.
- Imagine if you installed your new Gnome and tried to browse the web, only to find no browser available - Epiphany views can be embedded in Nautilus - Epiphany strictly follows the HIG and other Gnome2 standards (GConf etc)
In a decent desktop, every basic task should be accomplishable through a default suite of applications; playing media, writing documents, browsing the web, checking your email. And each of these components should be substitutable so those requiring extra functionality (or with a simple preference) can drop-in their preferred application. This is part the Utopia the Gnome project is working towards.
You do realise that spam is termed 'U.C.E.' as in Unsolicited commercial email?
The phrase "but I'm just contacting genuine potential customers" is the mainstay of every spammers excuse list.
Ok, I'm not a complete idiot and do realise that in the strictest definition of UCC (Unsoliciteds Commercial Correspondence), this would be considered UCC.
However, I do not liken UCC to spam. Spam is sent to random people or organisations with no particular bias or particular knowledge of them. It targets anybody and everybody in the hope that somewhere in that supergroup there is a tiny subgroup who will respond - usually out of ignorance.
It's a slightly different kettle of fish.
We are providing a service that keeps an economy afloat and is vital to a large number of companies, even some that don't know it. Our UCC is targetted at specific entities and never sent to those who it would not apply to. On the other hand, most spam mail is trivial crap and unexclusive in it's targetting. There is a market and reason for our UCC, whereas spam is just annoying and only takes advantage of the ignorant.
What else, apart from sending spam or selling the list to someone else who'll send spam, would such a list be used for?
One of our sales guys subscribes to what is basically a giant list of potential customers (businesses), which also includes a breakdown of some key figures (income/profits/etc) for each business as well as the appropriate people to contact (FDs, MDs, addresses - email, web, and physical). He then analyses the data and sends a few sales letters to see if they're interested in our services.
That's not spam, because we're contacting genuine potential customers. It's one or two letters a year, at most, to each business and each letter is addressed to the appropriate contact at the target business.
I know it's not email based, but email addresses come on the CD. It just happens that snail mail is his chosen transport.
These kind of lists are almost essential for promoting the slightly obscure services we provide (Credit Insurance) in order to contact new clients. Many of them aren't even sure what credit insurance is, despite the fact it's vital to any company that trades a large amount (greater than $500,000) of goods on credit.
That's a fairly legitimate use, right? There is a place for list generating software.
Whilst I'm not a fan of the Catholic Church, I find your arguments to be rather bitter and ridiculous.
Well, Scientologists don't burn people alive.
When did the Catholic Church last burn people alive? When they were burning people alive, it was a common practise. As was rape, war, pillaging, tortue, and execution. To use that as a point to contrast the Catholic Church and Scientology is to undermine your entire argument.
You argue that the Catholic Church blocked people from learning. Again, the answer varies across history. Yes, it's teachings were only commonly available in Latin for a long period, but that's because it was considered to be the language of the educated (not the 'dead' language it is considered to be today). Also, printing books was not cheap or even possible until very recently (19th Century).
You should only really judge the Catholic Church on how it behaves today.
Somebody else mentiones that you would be outcast by childbith out of wedlock. Not in my country (UK).
To compare Scientology now to Catholicism 100s of years ago is not a fair reflection on the Catholic Church as it stands today. The world was a darker place all those years ago.
Had Scientology existed in medieval times, they would probably have been drinking people's blood and wearing people's skin for clothing.
Remember, the early church didn't have the bible, the first attempts to pull together a canonical collection was in the second century AD. Then for a long time it was the case that only the priesthood and educated laymen were given access to the bible.
You readily assume such things as translation - both the Bible and sermons were previously only commonly available in Latin.
The Catholic Church has never been comparable to Scientology. It's never charged for mere information and it has always had it's true preachers who would not bias their services to the rich.
That the Catholic Church has been a power base, an organisation that actively sought to accumulate both land and other forms of wealth, is not in doubt. Like all ancient organisations, it's had dark roots and dark periods.
But it's very rare that you get turned down at a Catholic church. Scientology, on the other hand, is just a scam to extort the rich.
One of the common misconceptions with Free Software is that there are not many high quality games. There are many, many high quality Free Software games.
Talking of game quality... isn't that why Atari went bust? If you don't make good games or good games hardware packaged with good games any more, people won't pay for them.
There are decent Exchange replacements out there, quite a number of them. We just don't seem to be able to generate the same kind of awareness that we can for other office components.
That's a load of crap and you know it - or at least if you don't know it, you don't know much.
XFree is nothing to do with the slowness of your average Linux desktop. In fact, XFree is possibly one of the best components of the Linux desktop experience.
Quite often, it can just be using something as large as Gnome or KDE - usually what people compare Windows to. Fire up fluxbox or waimea or another window manager instead of your Gnome/KDE and you'll often have a zippier, snappier desktop.
Applications being slow to launch comes down to a lack of refinement of application code. For instance, fire up Evolution. It loads in a couple of seconds - far faster than Outlook in it's native Windows. But then fire up the Gnome Calculator - it takes nearly twice as long as Evolution! That's because a lot more attention and focus is placed on Evolution, especially with it having commercial sponsor - Ximian. All of Gnome's apps could launch as quickly or more quickly than Evolution, there just hasn't been the manpower of the attention to detail to make them load up quickly. Another good example is Gnumeric which has a near-instant launch time.
Perhaps Gnome / KDE should dedicate a release phase to making their desktop applications more efficient. (Yeah, right, like that'd happen.)
Other issues with not being snappy, or the desktop slowing under IO or CPU load are down to 1) a crap video card / machine, 2) a crap connection from which you access your XServer (think modem) or 3) the Linux kernel itself.
I'm a Linux advocate, but I have to take my hat of to FreeBSD on (3) because it has had decent process / IO scheduling for quite some years. I hear a lot of good things about XFree under FreeBSD and it felt very smooth on the one occasion I tried it. A lot of hoo haa about Linux 2.6 is the new scheduling concepts that do indeed solve a lot of these problems, but the reality is that it's about time! If anything, until 2.6, Linux has been somewhat overrated at times.
Any performance problems are not XFree related. Just get over it, we can't keep making XFree a scape goat when it's not even an accessory to the crime in question, let alone the culprit.
I'll follow up by shedding light on why we haven't heard about it:
"Zoom Player Standard remains Free for Non-Commercial use, while Zoom Player Professional comes in a Fully Functional (uncrippled) trial version and requires registration ($19.95 U.S.)."
Didn't you know? We're Free Software advocates, not free software advocates.
Perhaps a tad pedantic, but X11 is the protocol and hasn't evolved. XFree is, what I think, you are referring to.
Replace all the X11 references with XFree86 and the parent was a very informative post!
Re:things slowly moving on, but still it's a monol
on
Xr Renamed to Cairo
·
· Score: 1
You read too much into too little.
If you bothered to read the mailing lists, or even the three links to roadmap/goals in the article, you'd recognise that it's not that simple.
Yes, Xouvert intends to be a development branch of XFree. No, Xouvert does not intend to be shackled by a slow adoption of new features in XFree. If XFree fails to move with the times, Xouvert will be a drop-in replacement for (and indeed coexist with) XFree.
In fact, the goal/roadmap links suggest massive architectural changes in the code base. But that's mean of me to point that out - I mean how would you know that since you didn't bother to read it.;)
This way, new features get developed and there is a option for the future. I suspect that, supposing XFree do not align themselves with Xouvert as it evolves, this project will indeed become a full fork.
Yes, they are serious. I've been bombarding my local MEPs about it. And recently I got a very interesting response.
It made me think that maybe we misunderstand the proposal - especially after it was recently been amended.
I quote directly from Article 4a:
Exclusions from patentability:
A computer-implemented invention shall not be regarded as making a technical contribution merely because it involves the use of a computer, network or other programmable apparatus. Accordingly, inventions involving computer programs which implement business, mathematical or other methods and do not produce any technical effects beyond the normal physical interactions between a program and the computer, network or other programmable apparatus in which it is run shall not be patentable.
Justification
This, in conjunction with the corresponding recital, provides clarification that simply specifying technical means is not enough for patentability. There must be a technical contribution. It also makes it clear that the computer implementation of a business method simpliciter is not a patentable invention."
IANAL but to me that satisfies everything we, as Free Software advocates, are seeking? Why are we so strongly opposing this? If you read the full directive, it sounds fairly sensible.
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps it is just Libertarian rhetoric.
But it does have some subtle - if not intentional - points that are very important.
There is the technology available to avoid spam. Spam blacklists, Bayesian filters, and Challenge-Response systems will handle the vast majority of spam, if not all of it.
Shouldn't we just be encouraging the adoption of these technologies rather than empowering the state with more tools with which to persecute people?
If you left your house door open and somebody entered and made a mess in your house (or worse!) then who is to blame? Who is at fault? If you have a lock available to you then you use it. The same thing goes for your emails.
Laws are there to be dodged and abused. Community cooperation and prevention strengthens us.
We should be encouraging ISPs to use and support the technologies available to them to destroy spam rather than lobbying for useless new laws (they'll just send the spam from another country you idiots!).
I can just hear IBM, as the glance between SCO and a cheap coffin...
"Like a glove!"
You mean that McBride's rants may actually have a bit of substance behind them?
Ok, I'll make it easy for you. Here's by far the most important part of the letter:
"Notably, it appears that most or all of the System V code fragments we found had previously been placed in the public domain, meaning it is very doubtful that the SCO Group has any proprietary claim to these code fragments in any case."
IOW, the letter can be summarised to, "We don't think we've infringed on [SCO's] copyright as this was BSD code, but it was that easy to replace that we've done it anyway."
anything to stop me running thru the US patents list , picking some choice patents and taking out new patents based on them (perhaps ever so slightly modified) in Europe ?
The massive amount of money required to do it.
That's why this is a big coporate thing; they can make lots of patents and extort money out of those that can't afford to patent everything from a straight blade of grass to comfortable desk that helps you to be more productive.
I wonder how many people will actually bother to understand what was and what wasn't passed.
Judging by the average post so far on this story, most readers are seeing this as a very black and white situation.
Passing bad, not passing good.
I'm not sure what's worse. The legal and economical fallout from the SCO vs Linux mess, or the fact that we're doomed to hearing the same 'it belongs to SCO' joke attached to every single Linux-related story from for the rest of eternity.
It's like a curse.
Actually, Crystal Reports is easy once you know how. Finding out that 'how' takes forever.
The trick is to start at the table which defines the initial ordering.
So, for an example of a report on client accounts, sorted by client, then by year:
Client -> Account -> Year
It took me 3 days to do my first report. It's not taken more than 20 minutes to do one since.
It's a shame that the parent comment is a blatant troll because it does harbour a truth or two.
Gnome Office and OpenOffice.org (I couldn't comment on Star Office as I have not used it) are many features behind Microsoft's latest incarnations of it's Office suite.
However, Microsoft Office has had a head start. It's been going for a great deal longer than any of OpenOffice.org, AbiWord and Gnumeric. It also has many more developers.
Yet the Free Software Office programs seem to be catching up. AbiWord has matured massively between 1.0.x and 2.0 - they're almost unrecognisable from each other.
Gnumeric is the one exception to the 'fewer features' since it actually boasts more functions that Excel. A little bit of polish, tweaking, and a few subtle feature additions and Gnumeric will be superior to Excel - some argue that it already is.
OpenOffice.org is also making great strides. 1.1 is far better than 1.0 in all areas - features, speed, and general polish. The plans for 2.0 are promising - there is a detailed roadmap that makes for interesting reading. Version 2.0 of OpenOffice.org will be a major milestone for the project. 1.0 was the initial release, 1.1 was the produce of a bit of spit and polish, 2.0 will be the first to feel like a true individual project as opposed to a bastard-brother of Star Office.
How is it that these Free Software programs are gaining on the software developed by the software giant?
Since Free Software developers develop for free, I think there's a pride assosciated with their work that inspires them to overcome obstacles insurmountable to a payrolled team. It could also be that we have a superior development platform, but that's just flamebait.
Could be wrong, but I think Microsoft actually "sees the light" in some respects, especially when it comes to a development platform. It makes sense- it builds a larger base of developers using .NET. Maybe not to the degree /.ers would want, but judging by the amount of open-source sites and projects that have a Microsoft affiliation, I think they're moving more that way.
.NET is by far the dominant development platform, do you think Microsoft is going to forget they have a number of key patents that could literally put down it's competition and push people back from Linux into Windows?
Wow, is it a second coming? I remember when they were seeing the light about 10 years ago when they turned a blind eye to the rife piracy of their products because it meant more people were using them. Now they're starting to crack down because they are the dominant force.
Am I the only one who thinks that Microsoft will happily let Mono and DotGNU develop only as long as it suits Microsoft's cause? 5 years from now, Java is dying,
Do not confuse business strategy with philosophy. Microsoft only has the former.
You have both valid and invalid points.
One thing Windows gets right is that there is always more than one way to reach your goal.
Is 'tabbed browsing' a goal or a method? I'd suggest it's the latter. And methods should always be logical and consistent. By offering various unecessary preferences on how your tabs behave, you provide the user with a means to confuse themselves. However, if the most logical default method is used, then there is no confusion available to occur and the user finds it intuitive. If the method is not intuitive, then a different setting should be used.
As for multiple paths to reach all goals; it depends on the goal. The clock example is a good example of multiple logical paths to the one goal. Double clicking to activate, right clicking to bring up the contextual menu, and an appropriate entry in the control panel. These are all routes that a user might try to take to configure the time on their computer.
All logical routes should be available to any goal, but sometimes there is only one logical route. For instance, you would not want multiple ways to disable popups in Epiphany, just a simple entry in the preferences for Epiphany.
Do not confuse methods with goals, nor assume all goals have multiple intuitive pathways.
Firstly, Gnome is not an X Window Manager.
Secondly, only two 'desktops' have their own 'integrated' browser; Gnome (Epiphany) and KDE (Konqueror).
The purpose of the integrated web browser is to provide a default for users, and to provide extra functionality through tight integration with the desktop. Think Internet Explorer in Windows.
- Imagine if you installed your new Gnome and tried to browse the web, only to find no browser available
- Epiphany views can be embedded in Nautilus
- Epiphany strictly follows the HIG and other Gnome2 standards (GConf etc)
In a decent desktop, every basic task should be accomplishable through a default suite of applications; playing media, writing documents, browsing the web, checking your email. And each of these components should be substitutable so those requiring extra functionality (or with a simple preference) can drop-in their preferred application. This is part the Utopia the Gnome project is working towards.
You and others are showing a complete ignorance of the world.
Perhaps if you knew what Credit Insurance was, you'd be less obtuse.
You do realise that spam is termed 'U.C.E.' as in Unsolicited commercial email?
The phrase "but I'm just contacting genuine potential customers" is the mainstay of every spammers excuse list.
Ok, I'm not a complete idiot and do realise that in the strictest definition of UCC (Unsoliciteds Commercial Correspondence), this would be considered UCC.
However, I do not liken UCC to spam. Spam is sent to random people or organisations with no particular bias or particular knowledge of them. It targets anybody and everybody in the hope that somewhere in that supergroup there is a tiny subgroup who will respond - usually out of ignorance.
It's a slightly different kettle of fish.
We are providing a service that keeps an economy afloat and is vital to a large number of companies, even some that don't know it. Our UCC is targetted at specific entities and never sent to those who it would not apply to. On the other hand, most spam mail is trivial crap and unexclusive in it's targetting. There is a market and reason for our UCC, whereas spam is just annoying and only takes advantage of the ignorant.
What else, apart from sending spam or selling the list to someone else who'll send spam, would such a list be used for?
One of our sales guys subscribes to what is basically a giant list of potential customers (businesses), which also includes a breakdown of some key figures (income/profits/etc) for each business as well as the appropriate people to contact (FDs, MDs, addresses - email, web, and physical). He then analyses the data and sends a few sales letters to see if they're interested in our services.
That's not spam, because we're contacting genuine potential customers. It's one or two letters a year, at most, to each business and each letter is addressed to the appropriate contact at the target business.
I know it's not email based, but email addresses come on the CD. It just happens that snail mail is his chosen transport.
These kind of lists are almost essential for promoting the slightly obscure services we provide (Credit Insurance) in order to contact new clients. Many of them aren't even sure what credit insurance is, despite the fact it's vital to any company that trades a large amount (greater than $500,000) of goods on credit.
That's a fairly legitimate use, right? There is a place for list generating software.
Whilst I'm not a fan of the Catholic Church, I find your arguments to be rather bitter and ridiculous.
Well, Scientologists don't burn people alive.
When did the Catholic Church last burn people alive? When they were burning people alive, it was a common practise. As was rape, war, pillaging, tortue, and execution. To use that as a point to contrast the Catholic Church and Scientology is to undermine your entire argument.
You argue that the Catholic Church blocked people from learning. Again, the answer varies across history. Yes, it's teachings were only commonly available in Latin for a long period, but that's because it was considered to be the language of the educated (not the 'dead' language it is considered to be today). Also, printing books was not cheap or even possible until very recently (19th Century).
You should only really judge the Catholic Church on how it behaves today.
Somebody else mentiones that you would be outcast by childbith out of wedlock. Not in my country (UK).
To compare Scientology now to Catholicism 100s of years ago is not a fair reflection on the Catholic Church as it stands today. The world was a darker place all those years ago.
Had Scientology existed in medieval times, they would probably have been drinking people's blood and wearing people's skin for clothing.
Remember, the early church didn't have the bible, the first attempts to pull together a canonical collection was in the second century AD. Then for a long time it was the case that only the priesthood and educated laymen were given access to the bible.
You readily assume such things as translation - both the Bible and sermons were previously only commonly available in Latin.
The Catholic Church has never been comparable to Scientology. It's never charged for mere information and it has always had it's true preachers who would not bias their services to the rich.
That the Catholic Church has been a power base, an organisation that actively sought to accumulate both land and other forms of wealth, is not in doubt. Like all ancient organisations, it's had dark roots and dark periods.
But it's very rare that you get turned down at a Catholic church. Scientology, on the other hand, is just a scam to extort the rich.
Or you could try the Free Software equivalents, of which there are 2 that I know of:
* Neverball
* Trackballs
One of the common misconceptions with Free Software is that there are not many high quality games. There are many, many high quality Free Software games.
Talking of game quality... isn't that why Atari went bust? If you don't make good games or good games hardware packaged with good games any more, people won't pay for them.
Ugh... hate to say it... Outlook client using exchange.
Outlook? You could use Evolution or Moz Mail + Moz Calender (soon to be Moz Thunderbird + Moz Sunbird).
Exchange? You could use Exchange4Linux or Apache James + JiCal or OpenGroupware.
There are decent Exchange replacements out there, quite a number of them. We just don't seem to be able to generate the same kind of awareness that we can for other office components.
Because of XFree86's poor scheduler.
That's a load of crap and you know it - or at least if you don't know it, you don't know much.
XFree is nothing to do with the slowness of your average Linux desktop. In fact, XFree is possibly one of the best components of the Linux desktop experience.
Quite often, it can just be using something as large as Gnome or KDE - usually what people compare Windows to. Fire up fluxbox or waimea or another window manager instead of your Gnome/KDE and you'll often have a zippier, snappier desktop.
Applications being slow to launch comes down to a lack of refinement of application code. For instance, fire up Evolution. It loads in a couple of seconds - far faster than Outlook in it's native Windows. But then fire up the Gnome Calculator - it takes nearly twice as long as Evolution! That's because a lot more attention and focus is placed on Evolution, especially with it having commercial sponsor - Ximian. All of Gnome's apps could launch as quickly or more quickly than Evolution, there just hasn't been the manpower of the attention to detail to make them load up quickly. Another good example is Gnumeric which has a near-instant launch time.
Perhaps Gnome / KDE should dedicate a release phase to making their desktop applications more efficient. (Yeah, right, like that'd happen.)
Other issues with not being snappy, or the desktop slowing under IO or CPU load are down to 1) a crap video card / machine, 2) a crap connection from which you access your XServer (think modem) or 3) the Linux kernel itself.
I'm a Linux advocate, but I have to take my hat of to FreeBSD on (3) because it has had decent process / IO scheduling for quite some years. I hear a lot of good things about XFree under FreeBSD and it felt very smooth on the one occasion I tried it. A lot of hoo haa about Linux 2.6 is the new scheduling concepts that do indeed solve a lot of these problems, but the reality is that it's about time! If anything, until 2.6, Linux has been somewhat overrated at times.
Any performance problems are not XFree related. Just get over it, we can't keep making XFree a scape goat when it's not even an accessory to the crime in question, let alone the culprit.
I'll start by giving the direct link to Zoom Player.
I'll follow up by shedding light on why we haven't heard about it:
"Zoom Player Standard remains Free for Non-Commercial use, while Zoom Player Professional comes in a Fully Functional (uncrippled) trial version and requires registration ($19.95 U.S.)."
Didn't you know? We're Free Software advocates, not free software advocates.
I agree gmplayer is a very poor interface.
I much prefer Totem - although that's Gtk+ based.
You could try KPlayer or eMotion - the only KDE/Qt alternatives I'm aware of.
Or <flamebait>you could just switch to a better desktop</flamebait> - the perfect time now that the 2.4 release is imminent!
Look up sarcasm in the dictionary.
Perhaps a tad pedantic, but X11 is the protocol and hasn't evolved. XFree is, what I think, you are referring to.
Replace all the X11 references with XFree86 and the parent was a very informative post!
You read too much into too little.
;)
If you bothered to read the mailing lists, or even the three links to roadmap/goals in the article, you'd recognise that it's not that simple.
Yes, Xouvert intends to be a development branch of XFree. No, Xouvert does not intend to be shackled by a slow adoption of new features in XFree. If XFree fails to move with the times, Xouvert will be a drop-in replacement for (and indeed coexist with) XFree.
In fact, the goal/roadmap links suggest massive architectural changes in the code base. But that's mean of me to point that out - I mean how would you know that since you didn't bother to read it.
This way, new features get developed and there is a option for the future. I suspect that, supposing XFree do not align themselves with Xouvert as it evolves, this project will indeed become a full fork.
Software patents are serious.
Yes, they are serious. I've been bombarding my local MEPs about it. And recently I got a very interesting response.
It made me think that maybe we misunderstand the proposal - especially after it was recently been amended.
I quote directly from Article 4a:
Exclusions from patentability:
A computer-implemented invention shall not be regarded as making a technical contribution merely because it involves the use of a computer, network or other programmable apparatus. Accordingly, inventions involving computer programs which implement business, mathematical or other methods and do not produce any technical effects beyond the normal physical interactions between a program and the computer, network or other programmable apparatus in which it is run shall not be patentable.
Justification
This, in conjunction with the corresponding recital, provides clarification that simply specifying technical means is not enough for patentability. There must be a technical contribution. It also makes it clear that the computer implementation of a business method simpliciter is not a patentable invention."
IANAL but to me that satisfies everything we, as Free Software advocates, are seeking? Why are we so strongly opposing this? If you read the full directive, it sounds fairly sensible.