Oh, wait, it just hit me: Microsoft wasn't talking about W3C standards. They were talking about *Microsoft* standards.
I find this to be an increasingly standard
(groan) view: things are viewed as
"standard", "user-friendly" or just plain good depending
entirely on how well they conform to Microsoft-isms. Even if the person making the evaluation
has
never seen and
can't name a single non-Microsoft
product or system in the particular area.
I've had people tell me that
writing code for the Win32 API is
A Good Thing,
because it's portable.
Hotmail has given me this error message with Opera for several weeks now:
Browser Limitations
Your Current Web Browsing Software Will Limit Your Ability to Use Hotmail
With a button to continue using Hotmail anyway...
If I tell Opera to lie about its identity everything
works except for some silly JavaScript-based
navigation. This lie, however, does not work
with the new improved
(yeah, right...) MSN,
which Hotmail automatically
directs you to after you log out.
My system at work runs an antiquated
version of Netscape (4.7, under Solaris 8), and
it crashes on the new improved MSN page.
This guy doesn't sound quirky at all.
Just a Type 2 Prima Donna, the sort who hide their
incompetence behind bravado.
Face it: if you want creative solutions
to problems, you need creative people. Who are usually a bit weird.
I couldn't help but notice that, in all
the replies I've read so far, their hasn't been a
single reference to quirky folk who happen
to be female...
I have plain old residential ADSL from the local telco and,
after some near-disasterous teething problems,
it works fine. It was actually easier
to set up under Linux than under Windows.
Quelle surprise!
I bought the modem (one of the 3Com jobs)
and they ding me $CDN 34.95 for the service. Or,
rather, they will, after I use up all the rebates and incentives.
Oh, BTW: a week and a half from placing the order to getting a green
ADSL Status light on the modem.
Wonder if someone at X-10 is reading this...or reading the book?
I too despise those idiotic X10 ads. But
isn't it curious that everybody knows the name X10?
They've attracted our attention and have
created a very high profile brand name. Sounds
like pretty good marketing to me.
It's a very fine line between attracting peoples' attention and pissing people off.
If you don't risk pissing people off you
don't risk attracting their attention either.
Now if they actually had something to sell...they could make a bundle!
This even more strongly underscores the
current state of the art: we have astonishing hardware. OK, now what do we do with
it? Other than grumble about Windows XP memory requirements?:-)
I wouldn't mind finding out. I bet it will
be cool.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but what makes the results so astounding? Did the experimenters think the GPS satellites transmitted/responded in one direction only (toward Earth)?
The antenna patterns of the GPS satellites are
not in fact published. It's probably a safe assumption that they point at Earth, but the
DoD have never published any specs.
There are a number of challenges to using GPS
for satellite navigation. A terrestrial receiver
isn't going to be in much trouble if it takes a few milliseconds to compute a fix. A satellite receiver will
move an appreciable distance in the same time,
rendering the fix meaningless.
AMSAT had to use a semi-custom GPS receiver to get around
the anti-SCUD provisions that are mandated for
commercial GPS receivers.
A propos DMCA: the GPS algorithms are all published. You can download them from the Internet.
Man in that sense is NOT referring to the male gender, but is instead a gender neatural description of the human race. There's a huge difference, and I think most people would agree that the version of "man" used there was decidedly gender netural.
People do not agree.
The last original work I know of
to take this position was written
in the 1920s. Everything since then has either quoted The Elements of Style,
or taken the view that "man" isn't at all
generic and shouldn't be used as such.
I've long since quit grumbling over the
fact that the mores of the supposedly-futuristic
cultures depicted in Star Trek are pure
late-20th-century Middle America.
Exactly why is not clear: either the writers have no imagination, or (more probably, methinks)
they are
terrified of offending advertisers and/or
political pressure groups.
I dunno. Enterprise wasn't bad. A few
rough edges, but, overall, not bad.
StarChoice
and
ExpressVu
will sell their
wares to anybody. As long as you're in Canada, they don't care where you live.
The cable companies are not amused by the
profusion of little dishes, even in cities that have perfectly good cable, but
they've been told they should try competing for a change...
Christ almighty, can we at least wait until the damn thing has AIRED on the west coast? It doesn't start for twenty minutes over here.
Heh, heh. That's what satellite TV is for. I watched an eastern time zone feed (City TV). I set
the VCR before
I left for work this morning
and it was all ready to watch by the time
I had supper ready.
The show itself? It has potential.
Being so much closer to today it had a
certain, well, resonance.
Now to see what they do with it.
Get it right and they have a winner.
Get it wrong and they have another
Voyager.
Never in Star Trek or TNG has a major character died permanantly. I can recall Dr. McCoy getting killed on that fantasy planet, and Chekov got killed atleast twice, once in a wild-west illusion of all things.
Is this just a sci fi thing? I can think of several non-sci fi tv
shows that killed off main characters. Successful, well-liked main characters. People were upset, but got over it.
I know it's terribly fashionable to ignore
advertising, but last time I checked this was all to do with a
free-market capitalist economy.
People
have stuff to sell. Somehow, they must link
up with people who wish to buy it.
Sorry. I guess I was mistaken.
Proletarii vsyekh stran...
Why would someone pay for something that is moderately better when they have a perfectly acceptable *free* version already available?
But it isn't free. Advertisers pay the bills, and
you pay the advertisers when you buy products or services from them.
Somebody has to pay the bills. It may be when you buy something from an advertiser, who pass the cost on to you.
It may be by direct subscription (e.g. NPR). It may be through taxes (e.g. CBC) or
licensing fees (e.g. BBC). But you still pay.
There have been several attempts to destabilize the economy of a country by flooding it with counterfeit notes - Laos in the 1960s comes to mind. Germany was planning to ruin the U.K. pound the same way in WW2 but never got around to it.
I live in a mainly cashless society now. In Canada we have a nationwide debit card system that all the banks and 99% of businesses participate in. We still have the option to pay cash for things, but with fewer businesses taking anything larger than a $20 bill (counterfeiting problems), this is an increasingly awkward option.
Yes, the banks take a cut. They
always do.
They view it as charging for a service, and, for now, I accept that.
If I didn't have the option of using cash I'd have to reconsider.
...laura
Re:Try be inovative instead of just replicate ?
on
Linux on the Desktop
·
· Score: 1
The core issue is, dont try to walk your way to the desktop by making [almost as good] replicas of existing desktop software. Instead, offer something better! Something like a uniform word processor that uses the XML standard. Maybe use the same XML for spreadsheats, email programs, etc etc etc.
I routinely encounter people whose
notions of "user friendly" and "useful" are based
entirely on how something resembles Windows. Or not.
We should not be bound by such things. Let's be a little more creative!
I'm glad others have reliable Internet to consider something like this - I tried downloading the ISOs for a Linux distribution over ADSL over the weekend and gave up. Apparently 90 consecutive minutes of service was just not going to happen, not with the jokers I deal with.
Whine.
...laura who bought the CDs at a computer store that afternoon instead
Re:What can be done about terrorism?
on
More On Tragedy
·
· Score: 1
Minor factual error:
I'd like to see just one of those countries that is
gloating over the erosion of the United States dollar
build its own airplane. Does any other country in the
world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the
Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10? If so, why
don't they fly them? Why do all the International
lines except Russia fly American Planes?
Sorry, not true.
Airbus
make nice planes. Many airlines
use them for international flights. The A330 (2 engines) is licensed for over-water flights under similar provisions
to those that apply to the Boeing 767.
According to the alternate Kira on DS9, Spock was successful. That's how the Bajorans (who wre not at all interested in peace) took over the Empire and made humans slaves.
That's a new one on me - the mirror Mirror universe (to use the TOS episode title) was an alternate universe with a warlike Empire instead of a Federation - which fell when Kirk convinced alternate-Spock to give peace a chance.
This is not the Yesterday's Enterprise universe, a straightforward (?) alternate timeline where the Federation/Klingon peace talks failed.
Note that Mirror Mirror was set long before the Khitomer talks.
Maybe I'm just confused. All these alternate universes and alternate realities!
Indeed - I have read that limited range is a significant commercial problem for Concorde.
When it was designed in the 1960s, New York to London was big business, and was the kind of range you could make money with. Now it's L.A. to Hong Kong, far beyond Concorde's reach unless you refuel. Which kills the speed advantage.
I've heard Concordes take off from Heathrow, and they are indeed loud. They have that turbojet shriek that you only hear from military jets nowadays.
Except that they don't. The vast majority of hams, if they even acknowledge the existence of such technology, are content to let a tiny minority innovate while they merely consume.
The fact that this stuff is viewed as significant (it is far from new) merely shows how badly out of touch most hams are with anything resembling modern technology.
I make my living programming embedded systems whose processors are 68020 derivatives, and which have 8 or 12 MB RAM, depending on what the customer needs. It's not that long ago this was the recipe for a serious computer (e.g. Mac IIfx).
Those nice folks at hotmail have come up with a new one that I have yet to figure out how to disable: Display the banner ad, connect to the server to display your inbox, and then wait for a few seconds before proceeding. Your browser is locked up waiting for a reply from the server. There's nothing you can do.
Sigh.
Why are all these ads so tacky? Doesn't anybody with any class advertise on the Internet?
Like all research, they don't know, in advance, what they're going to find out. If they did, there would be no point in doing the research.
They may find nothing at all. They may find something totally revolutionary. But until they find it, they won't know. They may not even recognize what they've found at first.
Slashdot Mirror
I find this to be an increasingly standard (groan) view: things are viewed as "standard", "user-friendly" or just plain good depending entirely on how well they conform to Microsoft-isms. Even if the person making the evaluation has never seen and can't name a single non-Microsoft product or system in the particular area.
I've had people tell me that writing code for the Win32 API is A Good Thing, because it's portable.
No, I don't work there any more.
...laura
Hotmail has given me this error message with Opera for several weeks now:
With a button to continue using Hotmail anyway...
If I tell Opera to lie about its identity everything works except for some silly JavaScript-based navigation. This lie, however, does not work with the new improved (yeah, right...) MSN, which Hotmail automatically directs you to after you log out.
My system at work runs an antiquated version of Netscape (4.7, under Solaris 8), and it crashes on the new improved MSN page.
Ain't technology wonderful?
...laura
This guy doesn't sound quirky at all. Just a Type 2 Prima Donna, the sort who hide their incompetence behind bravado. Face it: if you want creative solutions to problems, you need creative people. Who are usually a bit weird.
I couldn't help but notice that, in all the replies I've read so far, their hasn't been a single reference to quirky folk who happen to be female...
...laura
Their low-end ones are horrible. Lousy picture quality, buggy software (I never did get USB to work on one), crummy support.
If they spent half as much on getting the thing to actually work as they spent on the cutesy graphics they might have had something.
...laura
I have plain old residential ADSL from the local telco and, after some near-disasterous teething problems, it works fine. It was actually easier to set up under Linux than under Windows. Quelle surprise!
I bought the modem (one of the 3Com jobs) and they ding me $CDN 34.95 for the service. Or, rather, they will, after I use up all the rebates and incentives.
Oh, BTW: a week and a half from placing the order to getting a green ADSL Status light on the modem.
...laura who likes high-speed Internet
I too despise those idiotic X10 ads. But isn't it curious that everybody knows the name X10? They've attracted our attention and have created a very high profile brand name. Sounds like pretty good marketing to me.
It's a very fine line between attracting peoples' attention and pissing people off. If you don't risk pissing people off you don't risk attracting their attention either.
Now if they actually had something to sell...they could make a bundle!
...laura
Yeah. Me too.
This even more strongly underscores the current state of the art: we have astonishing hardware. OK, now what do we do with it? Other than grumble about Windows XP memory requirements? :-)
I wouldn't mind finding out. I bet it will be cool.
...laura
The antenna patterns of the GPS satellites are not in fact published. It's probably a safe assumption that they point at Earth, but the DoD have never published any specs.
There are a number of challenges to using GPS for satellite navigation. A terrestrial receiver isn't going to be in much trouble if it takes a few milliseconds to compute a fix. A satellite receiver will move an appreciable distance in the same time, rendering the fix meaningless.
AMSAT had to use a semi-custom GPS receiver to get around the anti-SCUD provisions that are mandated for commercial GPS receivers.
A propos DMCA: the GPS algorithms are all published. You can download them from the Internet.
...laura
People do not agree.
The last original work I know of to take this position was written in the 1920s. Everything since then has either quoted The Elements of Style, or taken the view that "man" isn't at all generic and shouldn't be used as such.
I've long since quit grumbling over the fact that the mores of the supposedly-futuristic cultures depicted in Star Trek are pure late-20th-century Middle America. Exactly why is not clear: either the writers have no imagination, or (more probably, methinks) they are terrified of offending advertisers and/or political pressure groups.
I dunno. Enterprise wasn't bad. A few rough edges, but, overall, not bad.
...laura
StarChoice and ExpressVu will sell their wares to anybody. As long as you're in Canada, they don't care where you live.
The cable companies are not amused by the profusion of little dishes, even in cities that have perfectly good cable, but they've been told they should try competing for a change...
...laura
Heh, heh. That's what satellite TV is for. I watched an eastern time zone feed (City TV). I set the VCR before I left for work this morning and it was all ready to watch by the time I had supper ready.
The show itself? It has potential. Being so much closer to today it had a certain, well, resonance.
Now to see what they do with it. Get it right and they have a winner. Get it wrong and they have another Voyager.
...laura
Is this just a sci fi thing? I can think of several non-sci fi tv shows that killed off main characters. Successful, well-liked main characters. People were upset, but got over it.
...laura who still prefers Rachel over Alex
I know it's terribly fashionable to ignore advertising, but last time I checked this was all to do with a free-market capitalist economy. People have stuff to sell. Somehow, they must link up with people who wish to buy it.
Sorry. I guess I was mistaken. Proletarii vsyekh stran...
...laura
But it isn't free. Advertisers pay the bills, and you pay the advertisers when you buy products or services from them.
Somebody has to pay the bills. It may be when you buy something from an advertiser, who pass the cost on to you. It may be by direct subscription (e.g. NPR). It may be through taxes (e.g. CBC) or licensing fees (e.g. BBC). But you still pay.
...laura
There have been several attempts to destabilize the economy of a country by flooding it with counterfeit notes - Laos in the 1960s comes to mind. Germany was planning to ruin the U.K. pound the same way in WW2 but never got around to it.
I live in a mainly cashless society now. In Canada we have a nationwide debit card system that all the banks and 99% of businesses participate in. We still have the option to pay cash for things, but with fewer businesses taking anything larger than a $20 bill (counterfeiting problems), this is an increasingly awkward option.
Yes, the banks take a cut. They always do. They view it as charging for a service, and, for now, I accept that. If I didn't have the option of using cash I'd have to reconsider.
...laura
I routinely encounter people whose notions of "user friendly" and "useful" are based entirely on how something resembles Windows. Or not.
We should not be bound by such things. Let's be a little more creative!
...laura
I'm glad others have reliable Internet to consider something like this - I tried downloading the ISOs for a Linux distribution over ADSL over the weekend and gave up. Apparently 90 consecutive minutes of service was just not going to happen, not with the jokers I deal with.
Whine.
...laura who bought the CDs at a computer store that afternoon instead
Minor factual error:
Sorry, not true.
Airbus make nice planes. Many airlines use them for international flights. The A330 (2 engines) is licensed for over-water flights under similar provisions to those that apply to the Boeing 767.
...laura
According to the alternate Kira on DS9, Spock was successful. That's how the Bajorans (who wre not at all interested in peace) took over the Empire and made humans slaves.
...laura
That's a new one on me - the mirror Mirror universe (to use the TOS episode title) was an alternate universe with a warlike Empire instead of a Federation - which fell when Kirk convinced alternate-Spock to give peace a chance.
This is not the Yesterday's Enterprise universe, a straightforward (?) alternate timeline where the Federation/Klingon peace talks failed.
Note that Mirror Mirror was set long before the Khitomer talks.
Maybe I'm just confused. All these alternate universes and alternate realities!
...laura
Indeed - I have read that limited range is a significant commercial problem for Concorde.
When it was designed in the 1960s, New York to London was big business, and was the kind of range you could make money with. Now it's L.A. to Hong Kong, far beyond Concorde's reach unless you refuel. Which kills the speed advantage.
I've heard Concordes take off from Heathrow, and they are indeed loud. They have that turbojet shriek that you only hear from military jets nowadays.
I still want to ride on one.
...laura
Except that they don't. The vast majority of hams, if they even acknowledge the existence of such technology, are content to let a tiny minority innovate while they merely consume.
The fact that this stuff is viewed as significant (it is far from new) merely shows how badly out of touch most hams are with anything resembling modern technology.
Grumble!
...a ham
I make my living programming embedded systems whose processors are 68020 derivatives, and which have 8 or 12 MB RAM, depending on what the customer needs. It's not that long ago this was the recipe for a serious computer (e.g. Mac IIfx).
Who else had a CARDIAC?
...laura
Those nice folks at hotmail have come up with a new one that I have yet to figure out how to disable: Display the banner ad, connect to the server to display your inbox, and then wait for a few seconds before proceeding. Your browser is locked up waiting for a reply from the server. There's nothing you can do.
Sigh.
Why are all these ads so tacky? Doesn't anybody with any class advertise on the Internet?
...laura
They may find nothing at all. They may find something totally revolutionary. But until they find it, they won't know. They may not even recognize what they've found at first.