Hmm. Windows and OSX still have not mastered the concept of applets more complex than the clock. Where is a complex mixer, system monitor, and other things. Why are they so hard to implement, and why does WMP have to implement a horrendous hack to get into the taskbar. Why is the OSX dockapp only useful for bouncing icons and static images of windows that are open? Why are they not interactive?
Why is such an important feature missing from these superior DE. Maybe it is because no application is truly superior in everything.
(Disclaimer: I have not seen any of the new OSXs, so I do not know if they changed the gui for the better)
Lucky or smart? There may not be that much difference....
Having a monopoly is not the same as abusing a monopoly. Agreed. But in the real world, it all depends on how many lawyers you can hire. Unfortunately.
Although it is my personal belief is that there should be no monopolies that reduce progress by doing almost nothing themselves. AKA -- get the patents on creation, do not get the monopoly that is simply by prohibiting markets.
Actually, I am realizing that I am presenting my position in a horrible way. I am too tired to try to explain my thinking. But the conclusion is that no one should have a monopoly just because they created a propriatary format and are forcing product choice by bundling. That is not creation, that is abuse.
Once again, sorry for not being very clear. Perhaps I will explain my reasoning again, when I am feeling better.
Maybe this happens because Apple refuses to license either the ipod or its format for use by other manufacturers.
They were lucky to get this much marketshare, but if they get anymore marketshare, they may be charged with abusing a monopoly by not sublicensing its technology. I am not sure how this would work with patents, since they grant you a monoply.
I guess the question is "Can one abuse a monopoly that is guaranteed by law?"
Anyway. I will not chose sides on which player/format is the best, because I do not really care, but I will not be quiet when anybody gets bashed for the wrong reason.
I would like to see Theora (or for that matter Dirac) used inside a matroska container, which to my untrained eye lookes more powerful. It should be possible, but has anyone done it?
Yeah! I am upset as well. I have been trying to post to slashdot in many different languages, and it does not work.
I will try again: Cyrillic: Hebrew:
It does not look like it is working properly. All I see is that it is changed to unicode characters that slashdot seems to filter when they are displayed. What do they think I am going to do with them? Construct a giant unicode version of ascii art goatse?
I am very annoyed! I petition for slashdot to be multilingual.
Oh well... I guess I will answr my own question. Should have RTFA'd closely.
From the site: It is based on the MPEG-1 Layer-2 / MP2 algorithms, but has rapidly developed and vastly improved and is now at an advanced stage in which it contains heavily optimized and patentless code.
I am a bit worried about anything that is MPEG. It sounds like it is impossible to conform to mpeg and not be patent-free.
Well. The only thing left is for mplayer to add support, if they have not done so already.
That is the CMU's School of Computer Science primary web servers. They have more bandwidth than the whole of slashdot, especially with school on vacation. And the servers are likely to be a server farm. It is not going down easily.
It is not a bad idea really. Security and trust can be dealt with. No one on the server will ever run this, some users might. Make sure to have an option of using only open source drivers, or some kind of notification of what is loaded. I would be afraid of silent installs.
Technical issues... How do you plan to deal with all the different kernel versions? Are you providing your own image version? How do you deal with different architectures?
Wrong. Every Chevy car has patents stamped all over the place. You can not just look at the design of the car and make your own copy out of a raw materials. Well, you will probably get away with making it, but not selling it. However, you can always license all the patents, usually by bying the components from GM.
However, the closer analogy would be that a house upon being robbed will create 50 more robbers which will go rob your neighbors. Who is responsible now?
The car manufacturer analogy still works, as they knowingly sold you the car without appropriate safety features. Do your homework -- yes -- but you can not expect people to know everything about a car or a computer.
I have not kept up with MS tech. I believe Avalon is a gui system...maybe I am wrong, but I do not have time to read up now.
Anyway, if a fairly common piece of software on desktops will not use MS gui, it will cause major troubles for the unified look and feel. That may hurt Windows usability. I wonder if they are worried about that....
But then again -- what are they going to do about legacy software?
You compiled the kernel with ISA support, but isapnp is a user-land utility that tries to autoprobe ISA soundcards. Kernel tends to avoid that.
Drivers that are compiled in the kernel that do not autoprobe hardware still need parameters. They are passed in boot time on the kernel boot string. If you have them as modules, they are passed via insmod, making tinkering so much more convenient (no reboots).
If you are using ALSA, then this should be extremely helpful.
Old hardware does not stop being supported. It just becomes hard to figure out how to work it. Fewer sites are available for help, but as long as someone uses it, it stays alive.
Most distros have almost stripped the support for ISA cards. The distros rely on hotplug, and hardware IDs to chose which hardware to load instead of just probing all the drivers. Moreover support for isapnp is frequently disabled.
So get yourself isapnp, and insmod sb or sb16 with all the parameters necessary, and it will probably work.
What is so interesting about the author ranting about sound card support?
Firstly his distro from the start did not do ALSA, which is a mistake for the most part. Second he said that he did get it to work, until he rebooted, which indicates that he simply did not update the start scripts to use alsa, and REMOVE oss.
Actually this makes me wonder if the machine in question is a laptop. The only time I have seen hardware support issues is when using a laptop, where sound card always seem to report themselves as something else.
By the way, why is the author saying "even windows 95 can handle this". No it can not. Have you ever installed a new sound card in Win95. Yes one that did not come with drivers. Can not be done. How about the one made in 1996 with XP, such as Ensoniq AudioPCI. I tried, and I could not get the microphone to work. Support is gone, and generics just do nothing.
AFAIConcerned, linux has much better generic driver system than windows. My computer for example has never managed to boot windows 98 or 2000 (when I first built it, I was still dual-boot) It would simply lock up the moment the screen went into graphics mode (or a few seconds later). Disable AGP, everything is fine.... Linux booted up perfectly, even with AGP. I later learned that the TVtuner was crashing the AGP bus given windows's drivers, and there were no workarounds.
From that I can say with as much credibility as the author that no version of windows could even offer me a chance to figure out what is going on, and linux had no problems with this, before it even had proper hardware support, as it does now (2 years later).
Anecdotal evidence is not a conclusive anything. All it does is fuel a rant. And unfortunately the author's rant is long and pointless, and now mine is too.
You should have just posted a link to his machine. The problem would have been immediately replaced with the noise from the fire engine crew. Much better.
But hey, at least it will not run an email server, and will not be able to restart itself on the next reboot. Or does windows not have a concept of priveledged ports, and permission separated registry?
Slashdot Mirror
Hmm. Windows and OSX still have not mastered the concept of applets more complex than the clock. Where is a complex mixer, system monitor, and other things. Why are they so hard to implement, and why does WMP have to implement a horrendous hack to get into the taskbar. Why is the OSX dockapp only useful for bouncing icons and static images of windows that are open? Why are they not interactive?
Why is such an important feature missing from these superior DE. Maybe it is because no application is truly superior in everything.
(Disclaimer: I have not seen any of the new OSXs, so I do not know if they changed the gui for the better)
Lucky or smart?
There may not be that much difference....
Having a monopoly is not the same as abusing a monopoly.
Agreed. But in the real world, it all depends on how many lawyers you can hire. Unfortunately.
Although it is my personal belief is that there should be no monopolies that reduce progress by doing almost nothing themselves. AKA -- get the patents on creation, do not get the monopoly that is simply by prohibiting markets.
Actually, I am realizing that I am presenting my position in a horrible way. I am too tired to try to explain my thinking. But the conclusion is that no one should have a monopoly just because they created a propriatary format and are forcing product choice by bundling. That is not creation, that is abuse.
Once again, sorry for not being very clear. Perhaps I will explain my reasoning again, when I am feeling better.
Maybe this happens because Apple refuses to license either the ipod or its format for use by other manufacturers.
They were lucky to get this much marketshare, but if they get anymore marketshare, they may be charged with abusing a monopoly by not sublicensing its technology. I am not sure how this would work with patents, since they grant you a monoply.
I guess the question is "Can one abuse a monopoly that is guaranteed by law?"
Anyway. I will not chose sides on which player/format is the best, because I do not really care, but I will not be quiet when anybody gets bashed for the wrong reason.
Worker: Hey, what do we do with these spent pebbles.
Boss: Just throw it in the sewer.
Worker: But our water system is circulated.
Boss: So what! They are ceramic covered.
Worker: But this on is cracked.
Boss: Would you rather pay the money to dispose it properly yourself.
Worker: Well no.
Boss: Then do what you are told.
Conclusion:
There is a lot more to an oversight than the reactor going critical.
I was going to post a draggable link, but it seems that slashdot filter does not allow javascript hrefs, so it will have to be done manually.
Create a bookmark with this location.Next time you are offended by the it color scheme, just click.
Pretty much untested, and has no failsafes (as in it will ruin other sites), for that open source look and feel.
In the next version I plan to add ability to remove any slashdot section as I think the apple theme is a bit overdone as well....
ummm
MS wireless optical mouse
I can take all of your vital information, take urine, blood, stool samples with out reading you your rights.
And I will refuse until you show me a warrant for those things.
Why would EFF get involved. This has nothing to do with internet, or any other electronic medium, which is the only domain of EFF.
ACLU is what you are looking for.
like not landing on the moon at all
Well, more like delaying the landing by a few years. Of course a delay by a few years will allow Russians (Reiser) to get there first.
I'm sticking with 5.25" until the dust settles.
Hmm. Once the dust settles, those things do get pretty unreadable.
I would like to see Theora (or for that matter Dirac) used inside a matroska container, which to my untrained eye lookes more powerful. It should be possible, but has anyone done it?
Yeah! I am upset as well. I have been trying to post to slashdot in many different languages, and it does not work.
I will try again:
Cyrillic:
Hebrew:
It does not look like it is working properly. All I see is that it is changed to unicode characters that slashdot seems to filter when they are displayed. What do they think I am going to do with them? Construct a giant unicode version of ascii art goatse?
I am very annoyed! I petition for slashdot to be multilingual.
Oh well... I guess I will answr my own question. Should have RTFA'd closely.
From the site:
It is based on the MPEG-1 Layer-2 / MP2 algorithms, but has rapidly developed and vastly improved and is now at an advanced stage in which it contains heavily optimized and patentless code.
I am a bit worried about anything that is MPEG. It sounds like it is impossible to conform to mpeg and not be patent-free.
Well. The only thing left is for mplayer to add support, if they have not done so already.
But is it patent encumbered?
(Score:1, Informative)
(Score:2, Insightful)
???????
More like (Score:5, Funny)
Check the link:
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~devin/
That is the CMU's School of Computer Science primary web servers. They have more bandwidth than the whole of slashdot, especially with school on vacation. And the servers are likely to be a server farm. It is not going down easily.
It is not a bad idea really. Security and trust can be dealt with. No one on the server will ever run this, some users might. Make sure to have an option of using only open source drivers, or some kind of notification of what is loaded. I would be afraid of silent installs.
Technical issues...
How do you plan to deal with all the different kernel versions? Are you providing your own image version? How do you deal with different architectures?
Chevy can't come after me for that.
Wrong.
Every Chevy car has patents stamped all over the place. You can not just look at the design of the car and make your own copy out of a raw materials. Well, you will probably get away with making it, but not selling it. However, you can always license all the patents, usually by bying the components from GM.
However, the closer analogy would be that a house upon being robbed will create 50 more robbers which will go rob your neighbors. Who is responsible now?
The car manufacturer analogy still works, as they knowingly sold you the car without appropriate safety features. Do your homework -- yes -- but you can not expect people to know everything about a car or a computer.
I have not kept up with MS tech. I believe Avalon is a gui system...maybe I am wrong, but I do not have time to read up now.
Anyway, if a fairly common piece of software on desktops will not use MS gui, it will cause major troubles for the unified look and feel. That may hurt Windows usability. I wonder if they are worried about that....
But then again -- what are they going to do about legacy software?
Old hardware does not stop being supported. It just becomes hard to figure out how to work it. Fewer sites are available for help, but as long as someone uses it, it stays alive.
Good luck in your efforts.
Maybe he is referring to the software approach.
Most distros have almost stripped the support for ISA cards. The distros rely on hotplug, and hardware IDs to chose which hardware to load instead of just probing all the drivers. Moreover support for isapnp is frequently disabled.
So get yourself isapnp, and insmod sb or sb16 with all the parameters necessary, and it will probably work.
What is so interesting about the author ranting about sound card support?
.
Firstly his distro from the start did not do ALSA, which is a mistake for the most part. Second he said that he did get it to work, until he rebooted, which indicates that he simply did not update the start scripts to use alsa, and REMOVE oss.
Actually this makes me wonder if the machine in question is a laptop. The only time I have seen hardware support issues is when using a laptop, where sound card always seem to report themselves as something else.
By the way, why is the author saying "even windows 95 can handle this". No it can not. Have you ever installed a new sound card in Win95. Yes one that did not come with drivers. Can not be done. How about the one made in 1996 with XP, such as Ensoniq AudioPCI. I tried, and I could not get the microphone to work. Support is gone, and generics just do nothing.
AFAIConcerned, linux has much better generic driver system than windows. My computer for example has never managed to boot windows 98 or 2000 (when I first built it, I was still dual-boot) It would simply lock up the moment the screen went into graphics mode (or a few seconds later). Disable AGP, everything is fine.... Linux booted up perfectly, even with AGP. I later learned that the TVtuner was crashing the AGP bus given windows's drivers, and there were no workarounds.
From that I can say with as much credibility as the author that no version of windows could even offer me a chance to figure out what is going on, and linux had no problems with this, before it even had proper hardware support, as it does now (2 years later).
Anecdotal evidence is not a conclusive anything. All it does is fuel a rant. And unfortunately the author's rant is long and pointless, and now mine is too.
You should have just posted a link to his machine. The problem would have been immediately replaced with the noise from the fire engine crew. Much better.
But hey, at least it will not run an email server, and will not be able to restart itself on the next reboot. Or does windows not have a concept of priveledged ports, and permission separated registry?