There is no way that SVG does everything PDF does and more. SVG only supports RGB, whereas PDF support RGB, Grayscale, CMYK, embedded ICC color profiles, and more.
In fact, PDF spec 1.6 contains so much functionality, that most reader applications only support subsets of the 1.2 or 1.4 specs.
For this reason, I doubt that SVG or Metro, or anything else will ever catch up to PDF.
OS X 10.2 Finder had a similarly annoying issue. It would try to preview.avi files, but couldn't properly since they were DivX. There was this one semi-corrupted.avi file that would crash the Finder. I turned off preview and it's never been an issue since. At least it wasn't the actual icon, but instead a separate pane, so all I had to do was use icon mode to get at the file.
Just to add to this, to show how it's possible now, even without a GPS unit, your computer can already differentiate where it is by which networks it's on. Your computer could use your subnet, or 802.11 SSSID, or info from the DHCP server to tell where you are, work, home, or Starbucks.
Besides the obvious freedom/capitalistic reason that it's their money to spend, as they like, you guys have missed something:
They feel that their money would encourage more involvement in sciences and engineering, which could then expand our technological state, and potentially help invent things which would better mankind forever.
Whereas you infer that their money could be better spent helping the poor in third world countries, which might help a few people now, but wouldn't help us all as much over time.
Even your idea for scientific research has diminishing returns, since many scientific and engineering companies in North America have stated that their greatest chanllenge is finding sufficiently skilled workers, not getting enough funding.
Also, I assume that people's lack of interest in science and engineering is a greater stumbling block than the amount of education funding in that area. Perhaps this one isn't as clear cut as the other points.
I've got you beat. I could format 2 floppies, be downloading several files, play music, and compile code with GCC, all simultaneously, on my A2000 with only a 14 MHz 68020.
One reason why CPUs dissipate heat is because when a state change happens in a transistor, the stored energy is dumped, and is then converted to heat. If that energy could be moved elsewhere, temporarily, and then recycled, then heat would go way down, and clockspeed could go way up.
See, most science minded people think that Intelligent Design is just creationism wrapped in a thin veil of pseudo-science.
So do I, but I think that it actually serves a usefull purpose. First of all, it means that us scientists are beginning to win, because creationists are having to explain their beliefs more from our viewpoint then just with their old dogma. Think of how the Reformation caused people to question aspects of Catholocism, which then led to more people questionning religion itself.
Secondly, it keeps us on our toes. The process of science is great, but not everyone is cut out to being a scientist. By having to defend ourselves, it can only strengthen our requirements of argument, which should weed out those who aren't sufficiently rigorous in following the scientific method.
Sure, politically and educationally this is a step backwards, but in the long run I think ID will be usefull, if only as a cautionary tale of pseudo-science.
Let's say I come up with a theory, which is correct, but seems to go against common sense. Then you should not believe me, until my theory can be proven.
It would be unscientific to wish for the shortcut of accepting any new idea without evidence.
Basically, C++ exceptions simplify error handling code in intermediate functions by doing some hidden processing, which is slower than the existing if..goto solution.
The hypothesis is that the simplicity will reduce bugs and be more maintainable.
I've only done a little kernel programming in OpenBSD, but I've done a lot of Java and C++ programming, which means that I think I can speak from both perspectives.
First off, until this fork can show little to no reduction in performance, it is not wanted in the main branch. This is one way that application software is different from system software. There is no throwing hands up in the air with a shrug and saying, "oh well, we just lost 7% performance, but who will notice?"
There is not a tradeoff of ease of programming for performance in kernel programming. Instead kernel programmers employ a different tradeoff: if you can't handle the difficulty, then goodbye. Perhaps your response will be that "aha, but then they'll just have more bugs!" Well, in theory yes, but in practice, not as much as application software, because there are stricter controls, and everyone involved is better than average.
But, let's explore this relationship between simplicity and bugs a bit more. A kernel is debugged more than an application. Which means that someone is single stepping through code more, not just through the code when it works, but specifically when it's not working, when errors are occuring. Which do you think they would prefer: to go through less code, which has special handlers behind the scenes that automatically jump up several functions, or to go through more code but each thing that happens directly corresponds to the source in front of them, where every nuance is presented specifically.
Maybe one could argue that the exception would somehow reduce bugs more than the current way is better at actually fixing them. But, in the end, bugs will happen none-the-less, and I know which system I'd prefer to have when trying to fix them.
So, to attack the nomenclature of the proponents of exceptions, which is actually "simpler", less source code, or source code that more precisely matches the executable code?
I think that the whole Flash versus Java Applets thing is a good lesson in learning the difference between strategies.
Flash tried to be the best platform for bringing dynamic content over the web. And so it did that. And won.
Java was shoe horned into Applets, with little regard for what people try to do in web browsers. So it didn't do what people needed. And failed.
Anyone remember what it took to get an Applet to print or save data to the hard disk or play sound files, back before the Java Plugin? Remember how IE and Netscape had different, incompatible security models? What a fiasco. It's obvious that someone made a little animation demo, showed that to marketing, and they were like "We can revolutionise the web!!!"...
Non-the-less, we have Java to thank for popularising the sandbox mentality, which ActiveX so completely lacked.
So far, Java seems like a stinker to me. I've never written a Java program, never more than glanced over reference books about it, but I have a hunch that it won't be a very successful language. I may turn out to be mistaken; making predictions about technology is a dangerous business. But for what it's worth, as a sort of time capsule, here's why I don't like the look of Java:
Err, it already is very successful. The real question is, how successful will it be in two or three decades.
1. It has been so energetically hyped. Real standards don't have to be promoted. No one had to promote C, or Unix, or HTML. A real standard tends to be already established by the time most people hear about it. On the hacker radar screen, Perl is as big as Java, or bigger, just on the strength of its own merits.
C, UNIX and HTML became so popular due to their low cost, ie some implementations being free. Sun probably was hoping to make some money off of it, and so felt some marketing was in order. Plus, since they're up against Microsoft, I'm sure they preferred overkill to underkill.
2. It's aimed low. In the original Java white paper, Gosling explicitly says Java was designed not to be too difficult for programmers used to C. It was designed to be another C++: C plus a few ideas taken from more advanced languages. Like the creators of sitcoms or junk food or package tours, Java's designers were consciously designing a product for people not as smart as them. Historically, languages designed for other people to use have been bad: Cobol, PL/I, Pascal, Ada, C++. The good languages have been those that were designed for their own creators: C, Perl, Smalltalk, Lisp.
I agree. But, I think you're use of the word "good" is misplaced. All of those "good" languages have proven themselves useful to the advanced programmers, and dangerous to the, shall we say, introductory level programmers. To me, how good a language is, depends on its theoretical capabilities, such as the potential is has for usefulness, as well as its emperically expressed capabilities, such as how people actually use it. If an elite cabal of programmers can spin webs of logic with magic language X, yet the average programmer can only crash busloads of screaming people into their doom with language X, then I'd say their damn sure is a market for language Y which is aimed at these regular programmers.
I can't count the hours of my life I've lost to debugging programs others wrote in C++, where they've hung themselves from the tallest tree, but those same people have made no such mistakes in their Java programs.
So, since most programs are made by the less skilled, then something that gives them the capability to work without error, is "gooder", in my opinion.
3. It has ulterior motives. Someone once said that the world would be a better place if people only wrote books because they had something to say, rather than because they wanted to write a book. Likewise, the reason we hear about Java all the time is not because it has something to say about programming languages. We hear about Java as part of a plan by Sun to undermine Microsoft.
Yes, the real world has politics. Ideas flourish or fail, irregardless of their technical merits, due to the corrupting nature of politics. But since everything is touched by politics, it's not really a reason to be against something, merely because some side is overt in its politics.
4. No one loves it. C, Perl, Python, Smalltalk, and Lisp programmers love their languages. I've never heard anyone say that they loved Java.
I love Java:) I'd prefer programmers to adhere to the best tool for the job mentality, rather than some blind love for their perceived one hammer fits all language.
One thing I do know, is that I hate weakly typed languages, which covers most of the "loved" languages you list.
5. People are forced to use it. A lot of the people I know using Java
I think we need to realise that sometimes a task requires specialists because the human skillset is specialised, and sometimes because the required tools are beyond the reach of most people.
So, if a task is doable by most people, then increasing computational power will help bring that ability to the masses, and will drive computing innovation. These tasks should not be used as an argument against the need for faster/better computers.
Or perhaps the central computer the controls the TIVO network has decided that television is dangerous to humanity's safety, and thus, allowing TIVO users to watch television would violate the first law of robotics.
What is up with the consistent number of claims by anti-Moore people to just randomly assert that Moore is lying? In each case here, links are then provided to show he's not.
Try this:
"Please provide a link to backup your claims"
I don't know about you, but I prefer to not look foolish, by asserting things I don't know. I instead just say I'm not sure, and request more details.
You can talk about anything in Canada so long as your speech is not deemed racist, sexist, or ageist by the government. Instead of having a 1st Amendment you have a college speech code as the law of your land.
No, we have freedom of speech that is only limited by hate laws, which means that I can say racist things, but cannot incite other to, for example, try to kill others, for racist reasons.
We are not allowed to discriminate, based on those categories, but that is different than speach.
No one says "unpatriotic" in Canada because no one says "patriotic". Canadians by definition are those colonists who were too servile to fight for their independence in 1776; you never won your nationhood, the British just got tired of governing you.
At that time, Canada was comprised of Brittish, French and First Peoples, which was a heterogeneous grouping, whereas in the Brittish 13 colonies, things were a bit more homogeneous. This meant that we were more prone to infighting, and less prone to risk fracturing existing alliances. It's not a case a servility, it's a case of practicality.
As well, Canada was a nation that was built through time, not forged through war, which means that we thankfully lack certain warring neurosis, which I think has led to a bit more balanced set of priorities and views. Independence is not something that needs to be won, it is something that is earned, especially in a western, democratic, civil, state.
Let me give a personal analogy. My sister left home quite early, and has led a difficult life because of this. I waited until I was ready (18), and have led an easier life because of it. Maybe she feels more pride from raising herself by her bootstraps, but I feel more pride from my successes. This is to say, it would be foolish of either of us to chastise the other, because we both have different priorities, and are both independent in the end.
Calling Moore an extermist, a buffoon, or a hypocrite is just as much a form of free speech as his highly distorted films are
Of course. We both have the right to say that, in our respective countries, it's just that we have the tact to voluntarily refrain from sitting around calling someone names, when it's their actual view points we have the problem with.
Another point is that Moore is clearly someone who is trying to reach the common man - those who do not calmly debate poilitcal ideas with their peers, on a regular basis. He's covering material that I'm surprised most people don't know already. So, he tries to reach them in a way that they're receptive, which is to throw in some entertainment value and try to ellicit an emotional response. Fine, that's a valid tool, but it has the side effect where serious people such as you and I might think he is a buffoon. But, if we fail to get our point across to others because we're too dry, and lack a little showmanship, then we have failed too.
In short: Dear Canadians, please grow up and get a (national) life. Develop a culture and identity of your own. Be something original instead of always defining yourselves as less obnoxious, more mediocre versions of Americans.
Since our focus has always been more on social responsibility, and less on throwing caution to the wind, one might suspect that we have always had the more mature focus, so I'm not sure why you would feel that we have to grow up. Perhapse that means something else to you, then most others would think.
Canada has, for a long time, celebrated the distinct cultures of its subgroups. We do not feel the need to homogenise our cultures into one single pablum. Does this somehow confuse you into thinking we have no culture?
The last several generations have seen a world open up, advances in science have led to new perspectives, and decline of religion have seen the old preconceptions lose sway. Each of these generations have had to decide their own identity, and in turn reject components of previous generations'
Slashdot Mirror
DJVU is more optimized in image compression, but lacks all of the other features of PDF that someone in the print industry could never live without.
Plus, any of those image compression algorithms could be easily added to the next PDF spec, and then PDF would again be completely the best.
So, I have no idea why you're knocking PDF so much...
There is no way that SVG does everything PDF does and more. SVG only supports RGB, whereas PDF support RGB, Grayscale, CMYK, embedded ICC color profiles, and more.
In fact, PDF spec 1.6 contains so much functionality, that most reader applications only support subsets of the 1.2 or 1.4 specs.
For this reason, I doubt that SVG or Metro, or anything else will ever catch up to PDF.
Is Bush Jar Jar Binks?
OS X 10.2 Finder had a similarly annoying issue. It would try to preview .avi files, but couldn't properly since they were DivX. There was this one semi-corrupted .avi file that would crash the Finder. I turned off preview and it's never been an issue since. At least it wasn't the actual icon, but instead a separate pane, so all I had to do was use icon mode to get at the file.
Just to add to this, to show how it's possible now, even without a GPS unit, your computer can already differentiate where it is by which networks it's on. Your computer could use your subnet, or 802.11 SSSID, or info from the DHCP server to tell where you are, work, home, or Starbucks.
Besides the obvious freedom/capitalistic reason that it's their money to spend, as they like, you guys have missed something:
They feel that their money would encourage more involvement in sciences and engineering, which could then expand our technological state, and potentially help invent things which would better mankind forever.
Whereas you infer that their money could be better spent helping the poor in third world countries, which might help a few people now, but wouldn't help us all as much over time.
Even your idea for scientific research has diminishing returns, since many scientific and engineering companies in North America have stated that their greatest chanllenge is finding sufficiently skilled workers, not getting enough funding.
Also, I assume that people's lack of interest in science and engineering is a greater stumbling block than the amount of education funding in that area. Perhaps this one isn't as clear cut as the other points.
I've got you beat. I could format 2 floppies, be downloading several files, play music, and compile code with GCC, all simultaneously, on my A2000 with only a 14 MHz 68020.
One reason why CPUs dissipate heat is because when a state change happens in a transistor, the stored energy is dumped, and is then converted to heat. If that energy could be moved elsewhere, temporarily, and then recycled, then heat would go way down, and clockspeed could go way up.
Or I'm just pulling that out of my ass.
You guys had better be voting on the second, instead of sitting at home reading /.
See, most science minded people think that Intelligent Design is just creationism wrapped in a thin veil of pseudo-science.
So do I, but I think that it actually serves a usefull purpose. First of all, it means that us scientists are beginning to win, because creationists are having to explain their beliefs more from our viewpoint then just with their old dogma. Think of how the Reformation caused people to question aspects of Catholocism, which then led to more people questionning religion itself.
Secondly, it keeps us on our toes. The process of science is great, but not everyone is cut out to being a scientist. By having to defend ourselves, it can only strengthen our requirements of argument, which should weed out those who aren't sufficiently rigorous in following the scientific method.
Sure, politically and educationally this is a step backwards, but in the long run I think ID will be usefull, if only as a cautionary tale of pseudo-science.
Let's say I come up with a theory, which is correct, but seems to go against common sense. Then you should not believe me, until my theory can be proven.
It would be unscientific to wish for the shortcut of accepting any new idea without evidence.
I now see why this argument is at an impasse.
Basically, C++ exceptions simplify error handling code in intermediate functions by doing some hidden processing, which is slower than the existing if..goto solution.
The hypothesis is that the simplicity will reduce bugs and be more maintainable.
I've only done a little kernel programming in OpenBSD, but I've done a lot of Java and C++ programming, which means that I think I can speak from both perspectives.
First off, until this fork can show little to no reduction in performance, it is not wanted in the main branch. This is one way that application software is different from system software. There is no throwing hands up in the air with a shrug and saying, "oh well, we just lost 7% performance, but who will notice?"
There is not a tradeoff of ease of programming for performance in kernel programming. Instead kernel programmers employ a different tradeoff: if you can't handle the difficulty, then goodbye. Perhaps your response will be that "aha, but then they'll just have more bugs!" Well, in theory yes, but in practice, not as much as application software, because there are stricter controls, and everyone involved is better than average.
But, let's explore this relationship between simplicity and bugs a bit more. A kernel is debugged more than an application. Which means that someone is single stepping through code more, not just through the code when it works, but specifically when it's not working, when errors are occuring. Which do you think they would prefer: to go through less code, which has special handlers behind the scenes that automatically jump up several functions, or to go through more code but each thing that happens directly corresponds to the source in front of them, where every nuance is presented specifically.
Maybe one could argue that the exception would somehow reduce bugs more than the current way is better at actually fixing them. But, in the end, bugs will happen none-the-less, and I know which system I'd prefer to have when trying to fix them.
So, to attack the nomenclature of the proponents of exceptions, which is actually "simpler", less source code, or source code that more precisely matches the executable code?
Science is the religion of believing whatever is most believable.
I hope you don't actually believe that.
Not to thread-jack, but does anyone know where the myth comes from, that size does not matter? I'm just curious.
Cool! But I couldn't find any screenshots :( /Joking
I give you the benefit of the doubt :)
I think that the whole Flash versus Java Applets thing is a good lesson in learning the difference between strategies.
...
Flash tried to be the best platform for bringing dynamic content over the web. And so it did that. And won.
Java was shoe horned into Applets, with little regard for what people try to do in web browsers. So it didn't do what people needed. And failed.
Anyone remember what it took to get an Applet to print or save data to the hard disk or play sound files, back before the Java Plugin? Remember how IE and Netscape had different, incompatible security models? What a fiasco. It's obvious that someone made a little animation demo, showed that to marketing, and they were like "We can revolutionise the web!!!"
Non-the-less, we have Java to thank for popularising the sandbox mentality, which ActiveX so completely lacked.
So far, Java seems like a stinker to me. I've never written a Java program, never more than glanced over reference books about it, but I have a hunch that it won't be a very successful language. I may turn out to be mistaken; making predictions about technology is a dangerous business. But for what it's worth, as a sort of time capsule, here's why I don't like the look of Java:
:) I'd prefer programmers to adhere to the best tool for the job mentality, rather than some blind love for their perceived one hammer fits all language.
Err, it already is very successful. The real question is, how successful will it be in two or three decades.
1. It has been so energetically hyped. Real standards don't have to be promoted. No one had to promote C, or Unix, or HTML. A real standard tends to be already established by the time most people hear about it. On the hacker radar screen, Perl is as big as Java, or bigger, just on the strength of its own merits.
C, UNIX and HTML became so popular due to their low cost, ie some implementations being free. Sun probably was hoping to make some money off of it, and so felt some marketing was in order. Plus, since they're up against Microsoft, I'm sure they preferred overkill to underkill.
2. It's aimed low. In the original Java white paper, Gosling explicitly says Java was designed not to be too difficult for programmers used to C. It was designed to be another C++: C plus a few ideas taken from more advanced languages. Like the creators of sitcoms or junk food or package tours, Java's designers were consciously designing a product for people not as smart as them. Historically, languages designed for other people to use have been bad: Cobol, PL/I, Pascal, Ada, C++. The good languages have been those that were designed for their own creators: C, Perl, Smalltalk, Lisp.
I agree. But, I think you're use of the word "good" is misplaced. All of those "good" languages have proven themselves useful to the advanced programmers, and dangerous to the, shall we say, introductory level programmers. To me, how good a language is, depends on its theoretical capabilities, such as the potential is has for usefulness, as well as its emperically expressed capabilities, such as how people actually use it. If an elite cabal of programmers can spin webs of logic with magic language X, yet the average programmer can only crash busloads of screaming people into their doom with language X, then I'd say their damn sure is a market for language Y which is aimed at these regular programmers.
I can't count the hours of my life I've lost to debugging programs others wrote in C++, where they've hung themselves from the tallest tree, but those same people have made no such mistakes in their Java programs.
So, since most programs are made by the less skilled, then something that gives them the capability to work without error, is "gooder", in my opinion.
3. It has ulterior motives. Someone once said that the world would be a better place if people only wrote books because they had something to say, rather than because they wanted to write a book. Likewise, the reason we hear about Java all the time is not because it has something to say about programming languages. We hear about Java as part of a plan by Sun to undermine Microsoft.
Yes, the real world has politics. Ideas flourish or fail, irregardless of their technical merits, due to the corrupting nature of politics. But since everything is touched by politics, it's not really a reason to be against something, merely because some side is overt in its politics.
4. No one loves it. C, Perl, Python, Smalltalk, and Lisp programmers love their languages. I've never heard anyone say that they loved Java.
I love Java
One thing I do know, is that I hate weakly typed languages, which covers most of the "loved" languages you list.
5. People are forced to use it. A lot of the people I know using Java
I think we need to realise that sometimes a task requires specialists because the human skillset is specialised, and sometimes because the required tools are beyond the reach of most people.
So, if a task is doable by most people, then increasing computational power will help bring that ability to the masses, and will drive computing innovation. These tasks should not be used as an argument against the need for faster/better computers.
Isaac Asimov's "Three Laws of Robotics"
1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
( http://www.auburn.edu/~vestmon/robotics.html )
Or perhaps the central computer the controls the TIVO network has decided that television is dangerous to humanity's safety, and thus, allowing TIVO users to watch television would violate the first law of robotics.
A real Amiga enthusiast would use a SCSI drive! :)
I can only show you the Future Shop door. You're the one that has to walk through it.
What is up with the consistent number of claims by anti-Moore people to just randomly assert that Moore is lying? In each case here, links are then provided to show he's not.
Try this:
"Please provide a link to backup your claims"
I don't know about you, but I prefer to not look foolish, by asserting things I don't know. I instead just say I'm not sure, and request more details.
You can talk about anything in Canada so long as your speech is not deemed racist, sexist, or ageist by the government. Instead of having a 1st Amendment you have a college speech code as the law of your land.
No, we have freedom of speech that is only limited by hate laws, which means that I can say racist things, but cannot incite other to, for example, try to kill others, for racist reasons.
We are not allowed to discriminate, based on those categories, but that is different than speach.
No one says "unpatriotic" in Canada because no one says "patriotic". Canadians by definition are those colonists who were too servile to fight for their independence in 1776; you never won your nationhood, the British just got tired of governing you.
At that time, Canada was comprised of Brittish, French and First Peoples, which was a heterogeneous grouping, whereas in the Brittish 13 colonies, things were a bit more homogeneous. This meant that we were more prone to infighting, and less prone to risk fracturing existing alliances. It's not a case a servility, it's a case of practicality.
As well, Canada was a nation that was built through time, not forged through war, which means that we thankfully lack certain warring neurosis, which I think has led to a bit more balanced set of priorities and views. Independence is not something that needs to be won, it is something that is earned, especially in a western, democratic, civil, state.
Let me give a personal analogy. My sister left home quite early, and has led a difficult life because of this. I waited until I was ready (18), and have led an easier life because of it. Maybe she feels more pride from raising herself by her bootstraps, but I feel more pride from my successes. This is to say, it would be foolish of either of us to chastise the other, because we both have different priorities, and are both independent in the end.
Calling Moore an extermist, a buffoon, or a hypocrite is just as much a form of free speech as his highly distorted films are
Of course. We both have the right to say that, in our respective countries, it's just that we have the tact to voluntarily refrain from sitting around calling someone names, when it's their actual view points we have the problem with.
Another point is that Moore is clearly someone who is trying to reach the common man - those who do not calmly debate poilitcal ideas with their peers, on a regular basis. He's covering material that I'm surprised most people don't know already. So, he tries to reach them in a way that they're receptive, which is to throw in some entertainment value and try to ellicit an emotional response. Fine, that's a valid tool, but it has the side effect where serious people such as you and I might think he is a buffoon. But, if we fail to get our point across to others because we're too dry, and lack a little showmanship, then we have failed too.
In short: Dear Canadians, please grow up and get a (national) life. Develop a culture and identity of your own. Be something original instead of always defining yourselves as less obnoxious, more mediocre versions of Americans.
Since our focus has always been more on social responsibility, and less on throwing caution to the wind, one might suspect that we have always had the more mature focus, so I'm not sure why you would feel that we have to grow up. Perhapse that means something else to you, then most others would think.
Canada has, for a long time, celebrated the distinct cultures of its subgroups. We do not feel the need to homogenise our cultures into one single pablum. Does this somehow confuse you into thinking we have no culture?
The last several generations have seen a world open up, advances in science have led to new perspectives, and decline of religion have seen the old preconceptions lose sway. Each of these generations have had to decide their own identity, and in turn reject components of previous generations'