If I buy a cd, I can legally make a tape recording (or another CD I suppose) to use in my car, etc. This is fair use. So why should I not be able to COPY my SDMI music from where it is located to anywhere else (to another PC of mine, onto CD so I can listen to somewhere else)? This seems like a draconian restriction.
"This means another different chip and linux to support. Ug."
Um, isn't the whole point of Crusoe/not/ to have to redesign the hardware? All they have to do is plug in a better firmware. I guess it would be pseudo-firmware because it would run at the Code Morphing level (hmm...emulated firmware)...better term anybody? "turgidware"?
"...does anybody think that Transmeta is using Linux+Linus as a way to sell their chips?"
Yes. So?
Transmeta is selling hardware (ok a hardware/software cpu). They don't care what you run on it. They would like you to run anything and everything on it. They just happened to have Linus around to develop and work on a testbed platform that they could do a proof of concept with. I don't see how getting Linux to run on yet/another/ (very promising IMHO) platform as exploitive.
E.g. A video file is not just "video"...it could be "documentation", "work-related", "outdated". Should I put it in my "media" folder or my "docs" folder, or my "work" folder, or my backup "folder", etc...
The answer is all of the above - through a relational database-type system, associate the file with/all/ of the above attributes. The answer cannot be solved simply by a 1-dimensional hierarchy. Data is of various dimensions we should account for.
As some other posters also touched upon, I'm not as concerned about how we save data, or how much we can save, as I am about/what/ we save. It would be a tragedy to save/everything/ and then find that anything of any significance is entirely drowned out by the noise of the irrelevant and insignificant.
We are getting to a point at which traditional "file systems" are going to become archaic. When "file systems" were first created, drives had very low volume, and very few files. The name-space-to-"file" ratio was very high. It was possible for everything you could fit on a disk to have a uniquely identifiable name/location which gave you instant insight into what that file contained or was for. However, we now have/very/ high volume capacities. Traditional "file systems" (systems of files) doesn't scale very well. It is not feasible to uniquely name every file on your hard drive; if it is possible, it is at least very tortuous to maintain. The problem is that tradition file systems have only one dimension. They account for only one strata, on plane, one cross-section, of the many attributes files have - namely their "name"/location. But files have much more meta-data than just their "name". They have content. When we want to obtain a file, we aren't looking for it's name, but it's content.
A new paradigm needs to be introduced. I think traditional file systems will need to acquire characteristics of relational databases. What good is a 17 GB drive if it takes you half an hour to find something you want?? Today we have much richer and diverse content in our data, and our storage systems need to accomodate that. We need to be able to make intelligent, high-level queries, like "All email files which contain spreadsheets on last weeks product demonstration". This is what we are looking for, not "prddemosprsheet012500.text". File's aren't just of one type, or one attribute anymore.
Our data contains many planes of meta-data. We need a storage system that understands that, and allows us to make intelligent and intuitive high-level use of it. We need an associative/relational storage mechanism, whereby files are stored not according to an absolute location, but according to their attributes and relations to other things.
Ex-Apple human interface guru Bruce "Tog" Tognazzini took a thorough look at Apple's new Aqua interface for OSX. But instead of looking at it from a technical standpoint, he examines it from a human interface designer's perspective.
wouldn't it be believable if he just said he forgot it? I mean it/has/ been a long time. Then again, I guess if he forgot the key why would he want the data back...
"Ignorance of what? Does the murderer kill because he's ignorant of the fact that it's wrong? Does the rapist rape because he doesn't know any better? And if they are ignorant of these facts, then why is that so? What's the root of this ignorance?"
Ok, let me clarify. Perhaps I should have said discrimination, or prejudice stems from ignorance. The murderer and rapist probably have a lot more wrong with them than just discrimination, or prejudice, but surely those crimes do happen in many cases due to discriminition or prejudice. My point is that I believe that humans are born murderers or rapists. For most voilent criminals, chances are either something psychologically traumatic happened sometime in theire lifetime, or some sort of chemical imbalance causes them to behave psychologically unstable. Surely murderers and rapists aren't doing these things because they are misunderstanding "right" and "wrong". Do you really think a sane person would think to themselves "Hmm...I think murdering that guy would be a truly/good/ thing...let me do it". Many troubles in this world, if not most, stem for prejudice and a lack of understanding, from ignorance.
"I'm personally convinced that ignorance stems from a reckless disregard for a basis of absolute right and wrong."
I don't buy this moral absolutism at all. Do you/really/ think criminals behave aberrently because they misunderstand right and wrong? Do you/really/ think a theif thinks it is a/good/ thing to steal? Or a murderer thinks that it would be a/good/ thing to murder?
"If this basis is lost, everything is relative, and anything is admissible."
Everything is relative. Not everything is admissible though. The UN has outlined a universal bill or human rights that pretty much describes what is/not/ admissible.
""Knowledge-dispersal" and "awareness-raising" can only do so much when they're based on shifting, ever-changing notions of what's acceptable and what isn't."
Well, that's the point. Knowledge, information, has no bias, has no moral stance. Facts are agnostic of any one belief system. So, by spreading information, making the same/facts/ known to everybody, then everybody will have to come to an accepted version of reality. Facts are not based on your or my perception of right and wrong. They just are.
"Just a minor point, but I think communications is only increasing the information available to people."
Ok, sure. Information and knowledge are two slightly different things. I didn't make the distinction. Knowledge is internalized information. If people should to/ignore/ the information given to them, no amount of information in the world will help them. But certainly giving out less information, disallowing people to become more aware, certainly will not result in more people with knowledge than freely and actively spreading information.
"Knowledge...I don't know. It sure doesn't seem like people are getting any smarter. Look at "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" for an example of that. I had harder questions than that in the third grade!:-)"
Well, if not smarter, than at least more/aware/. I think our society (US specific, and the world as a whole) is becoming a lot more culturally-tolerant, neutral and accepting, and is shedding a lot of old prejudices, and also starting to ask questions we should - about our governments, our ecosystems, etc.
It seems to me "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" is more based on trivia than useful information. I'd say Jeopardy is a better guage. We've had Jeopardy for a long time, and still do.
"But then what about the community factor? I have to agree that all our gadgets and gizmos have made people more distant and disengaged. Sure, there are virtual communities, but are they anything like a real community? Can everybody get together when the electricity goes out for three days to stay warm, light a fire, and cook on the grill (despite the freezing rain)? It's possible and expected to communicate with vast numbers of people on the internet, but where's the depth, the personal in interpersonal communications?
Don't get me wrong, I think communications are a good thing. I like being able to call and e-mail friends and family who live half a country (or world) away. But looking to communications to solve all the world's inequities and woes...I personally don't think that's such a good thing."
Entirely agreed.
Aaron
(please excuse the quoting if it comes out horrible)
While I'm sort of rambling let me just add some more.
Somebody will say that communications is equalizing us. I think this is very true. Another pet belief of mine, and I'm sure many who frequent this site, is that knowledge never/hurts/. It can only help. Bad things happen through ignorance or malice. I am not so pessimistic to think humans are naturally evil and exploitive, so I like to think that malice stems from ignorance. It then follows that all ills can be cured by dispersal of knowledge. Although that sounds laughably optimistic, I do agree with that to a large extent...communications is raising the knowledge level and awareness of people.
At the same time though, my previous argument says that communications are making our relationships less meaningful. So it seems the same technology which is equalizing us, is having the effect of equalizing us by making all of us more distant, debilitated. I can quickly physically equalize pretty much everybody by removing their limbs. Would we would all then rejoice that we are equal? I guess it's the cliched double-edged sword. We are equal by means of being a commodity. If you are presented with aisles upon aisles of bags of sugar (some commodity produc), they will all seem pretty equal.
Returning to Marx, I think we should be careful that/we/ are using communications technology, and not the other way around. (really, do we need X-hundred cable stations, a pager, a cell phone, 3 instant messagers, and 4 email accounts? who's at the service of whom?)
I've always thought that the ideal human grouping is the "clan". For hundreds of thousands if not millions of years, man (and woman) developed and gravitated towards this grouping. A clan is small enough that everybody knows each other and can agree on mores, but not big enough that a separation needs to be made between the "people" and "government". I think the "clan" is the basic unit we still gravitate towards. Numbering hundreds and hundreds of thousands, there are still Geek clans, Musician clans, etc.
Technology has forever been enabling us to communicate more easily, and expand the horizons of the world we live in. Our realm of acquantaince is not a few square miles anymore...it is the whole globe. In a clan, the person to person connection is tight because there are a small number of people. Technology is enabling, and/forcing/ us to increase our number of connections. I think this is having the effect of making each connection less meaningful. Humans and communication and the relationships founded thereon are commoditized now - when's the last time you said something meaningful to the cashier or guy behind the counter?
We are all "guys behind the counter".
I think this is actually having the reverse effect of what we expect an increased ability for communications via technology would provide. We now have many many many more connections with people, but they are less and less meaningful. Pervasive communications I think is having the effect of being/more/ isolating, and suffocating. You walk accross a street downtown and may see hundreds of people...but you know not one...they are just a few faces out of billions. It's sort of like being suffocated by oxygen (it can happen). There is so much that you are unable to make use of it. I also think it may be having an effect physically. Animals need space. We are imbued with a sense of our range and a sense of how much space, either physical or emotional, that we need. Increasing our interactions with other so much, I believe is creating a new emergent behavior. Everybody is too close, driving too slow, or talking too much or too loud.
I hope I am wrong...because it is sort of sad. One of the things I think illustrates this "pseudo-theory/feeling" of mine, is, for example, the music and cover art of Radiohead...coldly nihilistic, and nostalgiac. ("let down", "uptight", "lucky", "tourist", etc. on OK Computer, but also The Bends and Pablo Honey...)
I guess to sum it up...pervasive communications is commoditizing us...Marx predicted technology would commoditize us physically...I feel communications technology might be commoditizing us emotionally/spiritually/mentally.
Is SlashCode.com using Slash? I think it actually looks better than Slashdot...I like the ability to put content-boxes on both sides...it also looks a bit more aesthetically pleasing.
When's the last time Slashdot got a makeover? Perhaps one's due...
I think you may be missing (or misunderstanding) the point a bit. Sure, you can furbish an example, or a language, in which a human can optimize the program/statically/ better than a compiler/computer can optimize a program/statically/. But the author makes the point that the most frequently executed parts of the program are very sparse, and that the cost of profiling the program dynamically can be recouped by doing intelligent dynamic optimizations. As hardware gets faster and more complex I think this will be more true. There will simply be no way for humans to statically optimize for such a non-deterministic runtime environment. For example, how many programmers explicitly specify parallelism in their programs? How can they be sure that the CPU at runtime doesn't know better than them how to optimize the program? I say let the CPU decide. There is going to come a point in which it is just not feasible for humans to even attempt to optimize for such a complex runtime environment, and that time is coming fast. The faster chips get, the smaller the more amortized the overhead of finding better optimizations at runtime becomes.
Next time you're playing quake a player runs up to you and shoots you will something and bam!, your balance all thrown off...actually that would make a pretty cool weapon =)
Let me reduce my example a bit. A little bit after the egg is fertilized and splits up, twins will be virtually identical molecularly.../yet/ they are not the same person, and as you rightly show, they will certainly develop along different paths. Just because things are identical does not mean they are physically the same. If my mind were put into a machine and I were killed...there would just be a machine tooling around acting like me...it wouldn't/be/ me...
"Some people here, and tim, are missing the fact that in a massively parrallel development environment (like most OSS teams). Having code like... char a[30], b[20], c[10];
a = b + c;
Do something isn't such a hot idea, as it means no one else will have any idea what the code does."
On the contrary, I think specifically in cases of parallel programming, a concise statement like that is desireable. The compiler will figure out just how it can optimize that statement for multiple CPUs. If the programmer is forced to do manual optimization, the whole operation will end up either done entirely serially (awfull), or the code will be unnecessarily cluttered with manual code for specifying parrallelism. That is something a layer of abstraction can best handle.
What is "@Stake"? Sounds like some flimsy fly-by-night buzzword startup (not to say it IS, just that that stupid @ symbol makes it look like that). I think the name "L0pht" held a lot of weight, if not respect, in the security community. They should have been able to keep the name somehow. I don't know what the hell "@Stake" is...is it some property claims company? is it an e-butcher store? I would hire a "L0pht" but not an "@Stake".
In a pre-emptive correction, I do realize that nuclear power powers many toasters. My point was that it was specifically embedded to do that task, as the 1950s Jetson-ian view of the future: Atomic Car! Atomic Toothbrush! Atomic Toilet!
The same thing happened when electricity was first harnessed. They attempted to apply it to everything. Remember those magical "Electric!" belts and hair brushes that were supposed to cure every single medical problem?
I have a prediction: In 2029 when we read this article we will roll over laughing.
Every time some new technology is invented people come out in droves attempting to apply it to everything. Remember nuclear fission? That was supposed to toast our bread, power our cars, and allow us to fly about in personal airplanes. Didn't happen. Why? Because nobody/needed/ it to toast bread, power cars, or fly around. Just because a technology is invented doesn't mean it/has/ to be used for everything...just where it is applicable.
What would be the/use/ of being injected with nanobots so I could live in some virtual world. Living in the/real/ world is complicated and real enough already. Nobody needs a whole other world to live in...there is plenty of reality here already.
I think the time scale is a bit optomistic also. Surgical implants are one thing. We are just starting to hack around and make stupid kludges with the brain. It's a VERY far cry from complete pervasiveness and integration. For one thing, I'd hate to be the guy whose body/rejected/ the nanobots and mounted an immune response on my brain!
And of course there is the philosophical question. Twins are/identical/ genetically...down to all those wonderful neurons the author says we will replicate. Does that mean twins are the same person? Obviously they are not. I think transplanting heads onto younger bodies is a more practical form of longevity than copying yourself into a computer (man, wasn't there even a Slashdot article a while back saying that that had/already/ been accomplished??)
Let's just chill out and take the red pill for a while longer...
Slashdot Mirror
If I buy a cd, I can legally make a tape recording (or another CD I suppose) to use in my car, etc. This is fair use. So why should I not be able to COPY my SDMI music from where it is located to anywhere else (to another PC of mine, onto CD so I can listen to somewhere else)? This seems like a draconian restriction.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Quick...somebody make a QT or GTK Java PLAF.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
"This means another different chip and linux to support. Ug."
/not/ to have to redesign the hardware? All they have to do is plug in a better firmware. I guess it would be pseudo-firmware because it would run at the Code Morphing level (hmm...emulated firmware)...better term anybody? "turgidware"?
Um, isn't the whole point of Crusoe
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
"However, the fact of the matter is that Transmeta does have some good ideas but really no working prototype."
HUH?! Did you miss the press conference? They ran Quake on a Windows system and a Linux system to demo the stuff. Am I missing something?
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
"...does anybody think that Transmeta is using Linux+Linus as a way to sell their chips?"
/another/ (very promising IMHO) platform as exploitive.
Yes. So?
Transmeta is selling hardware (ok a hardware/software cpu). They don't care what you run on it. They would like you to run anything and everything on it. They just happened to have Linus around to develop and work on a testbed platform that they could do a proof of concept with. I don't see how getting Linux to run on yet
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Later on I will be starting a 'data collection' of software I have purchased. Everybody can have access to it for a nominal fee. :)
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
E.g. A video file is not just "video"...it could be "documentation", "work-related", "outdated". Should I put it in my "media" folder or my "docs" folder, or my "work" folder, or my backup "folder", etc...
/all/ of the above attributes. The answer cannot be solved simply by a 1-dimensional hierarchy. Data is of various dimensions we should account for.
The answer is all of the above - through a relational database-type system, associate the file with
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
As some other posters also touched upon, I'm not as concerned about how we save data, or how much we can save, as I am about /what/ we save. It would be a tragedy to save /everything/ and then find that anything of any significance is entirely drowned out by the noise of the irrelevant and insignificant.
/very/ high volume capacities. Traditional "file systems" (systems of files) doesn't scale very well. It is not feasible to uniquely name every file on your hard drive; if it is possible, it is at least very tortuous to maintain. The problem is that tradition file systems have only one dimension. They account for only one strata, on plane, one cross-section, of the many attributes files have - namely their "name"/location. But files have much more meta-data than just their "name". They have content. When we want to obtain a file, we aren't looking for it's name, but it's content.
We are getting to a point at which traditional "file systems" are going to become archaic. When "file systems" were first created, drives had very low volume, and very few files. The name-space-to-"file" ratio was very high. It was possible for everything you could fit on a disk to have a uniquely identifiable name/location which gave you instant insight into what that file contained or was for. However, we now have
A new paradigm needs to be introduced. I think traditional file systems will need to acquire characteristics of relational databases. What good is a 17 GB drive if it takes you half an hour to find something you want?? Today we have much richer and diverse content in our data, and our storage systems need to accomodate that. We need to be able to make intelligent, high-level queries, like "All email files which contain spreadsheets on last weeks product demonstration". This is what we are looking for, not "prddemosprsheet012500.text". File's aren't just of one type, or one attribute anymore.
Our data contains many planes of meta-data. We need a storage system that understands that, and allows us to make intelligent and intuitive high-level use of it. We need an associative/relational storage mechanism, whereby files are stored not according to an absolute location, but according to their attributes and relations to other things.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Ex-Apple human interface guru Bruce "Tog" Tognazzini took a thorough look at Apple's new Aqua interface for OSX. But instead of looking at it from a technical standpoint, he examines it from a human interface designer's perspective.
h tml
http://www.asktog.com/columns/034OSX-FirstLook.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
wouldn't it be believable if he just said he forgot it? I mean it /has/ been a long time. Then again, I guess if he forgot the key why would he want the data back...
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
"Ignorance of what? Does the murderer kill because he's ignorant of the fact that it's wrong? Does the rapist rape because he doesn't know any better? And if they are ignorant of these facts, then why is that so? What's the root of this ignorance?"
/good/ thing...let me do it". Many troubles in this world, if not most, stem for prejudice and a lack of understanding, from ignorance.
/really/ think criminals behave aberrently because they misunderstand right and wrong? Do you /really/ think a theif thinks it is a /good/ thing to steal? Or a murderer thinks that it would be a /good/ thing to murder?
/not/ admissible.
/facts/ known to everybody, then everybody will have to come to an accepted version of reality. Facts are not based on your or my perception of right and wrong. They just are.
/ignore/ the information given to them, no amount of information in the world will help them. But certainly giving out less information, disallowing people to become more aware, certainly will not result in more people with knowledge than freely and actively spreading information.
:-)"
/aware/. I think our society (US specific, and the world as a whole) is becoming a lot more culturally-tolerant, neutral and accepting, and is shedding a lot of old prejudices, and also starting to ask questions we should - about our governments, our ecosystems, etc.
Ok, let me clarify. Perhaps I should have said discrimination, or prejudice stems from ignorance. The murderer and rapist probably have a lot more wrong with them than just discrimination, or prejudice, but surely those crimes do happen in many cases due to discriminition or prejudice. My point is that I believe that humans are born murderers or rapists. For most voilent criminals, chances are either something psychologically traumatic happened sometime in theire lifetime, or some sort of chemical imbalance causes them to behave psychologically unstable. Surely murderers and rapists aren't doing these things because they are misunderstanding "right" and "wrong". Do you really think a sane person would think to themselves "Hmm...I think murdering that guy would be a truly
"I'm personally convinced that ignorance stems from a reckless disregard for a basis of absolute
right and wrong."
I don't buy this moral absolutism at all. Do you
"If this basis is lost, everything is relative, and anything is admissible."
Everything is relative. Not everything is admissible though. The UN has outlined a universal bill or human rights that pretty much describes what is
""Knowledge-dispersal" and "awareness-raising" can only do so much when they're based on shifting, ever-changing notions of what's acceptable and what isn't."
Well, that's the point. Knowledge, information, has no bias, has no moral stance. Facts are agnostic of any one belief system. So, by spreading information, making the same
"Just a minor point, but I think communications is only increasing the information available to people."
Ok, sure. Information and knowledge are two slightly different things. I didn't make the distinction. Knowledge is internalized information. If people should to
"Knowledge...I don't know. It sure doesn't seem like people are getting any smarter.
Look at "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" for an example of that. I had harder questions than that in the third grade!
Well, if not smarter, than at least more
It seems to me "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" is more based on trivia than useful information. I'd say Jeopardy is a better guage. We've had Jeopardy for a long time, and still do.
"But then what about the community factor? I have to agree that all our gadgets and gizmos
have made people more distant and disengaged. Sure, there are virtual communities, but are
they anything like a real community? Can everybody get together when the electricity goes out
for three days to stay warm, light a fire, and cook on the grill (despite the freezing rain)? It's possible and expected to communicate with vast numbers of people on the internet, but where's the depth, the personal in interpersonal communications?
Don't get me wrong, I think communications are a good thing. I like being able to call and e-mail
friends and family who live half a country (or world) away. But looking to communications to
solve all the world's inequities and woes...I personally don't think that's such a good thing."
Entirely agreed.
Aaron
(please excuse the quoting if it comes out horrible)
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
While I'm sort of rambling let me just add some more.
/hurts/. It can only help. Bad things happen through ignorance or malice. I am not so pessimistic to think humans are naturally evil and exploitive, so I like to think that malice stems from ignorance. It then follows that all ills can be cured by dispersal of knowledge. Although that sounds laughably optimistic, I do agree with that to a large extent...communications is raising the knowledge level and awareness of people.
/we/ are using communications technology, and not the other way around. (really, do we need X-hundred cable stations, a pager, a cell phone, 3 instant messagers, and 4 email accounts? who's at the service of whom?)
Somebody will say that communications is equalizing us. I think this is very true. Another pet belief of mine, and I'm sure many who frequent this site, is that knowledge never
At the same time though, my previous argument says that communications are making our relationships less meaningful. So it seems the same technology which is equalizing us, is having the effect of equalizing us by making all of us more distant, debilitated. I can quickly physically equalize pretty much everybody by removing their limbs. Would we would all then rejoice that we are equal? I guess it's the cliched double-edged sword. We are equal by means of being a commodity. If you are presented with aisles upon aisles of bags of sugar (some commodity produc), they will all seem pretty equal.
Returning to Marx, I think we should be careful that
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Here is my theory:
/forcing/ us to increase our number of connections. I think this is having the effect of making each connection less meaningful. Humans and communication and the relationships founded thereon are commoditized now - when's the last time you said something meaningful to the cashier or guy behind the counter?
/more/ isolating, and suffocating. You walk accross a street downtown and may see hundreds of people...but you know not one...they are just a few faces out of billions. It's sort of like being suffocated by oxygen (it can happen). There is so much that you are unable to make use of it. I also think it may be having an effect physically. Animals need space. We are imbued with a sense of our range and a sense of how much space, either physical or emotional, that we need. Increasing our interactions with other so much, I believe is creating a new emergent behavior. Everybody is too close, driving too slow, or talking too much or too loud.
I've always thought that the ideal human grouping is the "clan". For hundreds of thousands if not millions of years, man (and woman) developed and gravitated towards this grouping. A clan is small enough that everybody knows each other and can agree on mores, but not big enough that a separation needs to be made between the "people" and "government". I think the "clan" is the basic unit we still gravitate towards. Numbering hundreds and hundreds of thousands, there are still Geek clans, Musician clans, etc.
Technology has forever been enabling us to communicate more easily, and expand the horizons of the world we live in. Our realm of acquantaince is not a few square miles anymore...it is the whole globe. In a clan, the person to person connection is tight because there are a small number of people. Technology is enabling, and
We are all "guys behind the counter".
I think this is actually having the reverse effect of what we expect an increased ability for communications via technology would provide. We now have many many many more connections with people, but they are less and less meaningful. Pervasive communications I think is having the effect of being
I hope I am wrong...because it is sort of sad. One of the things I think illustrates this "pseudo-theory/feeling" of mine, is, for example, the music and cover art of Radiohead...coldly nihilistic, and nostalgiac. ("let down", "uptight", "lucky", "tourist", etc. on OK Computer, but also The Bends and Pablo Honey...)
I guess to sum it up...pervasive communications is commoditizing us...Marx predicted technology would commoditize us physically...I feel communications technology might be commoditizing us emotionally/spiritually/mentally.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Is SlashCode.com using Slash? I think it actually looks better than Slashdot...I like the ability to put content-boxes on both sides...it also looks a bit more aesthetically pleasing.
When's the last time Slashdot got a makeover? Perhaps one's due...
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Right. I've always thought an ounce of design is worth a pound of optimization ;)
Leave the design to the humans...leave the optimization to the compilers.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
I think you may be missing (or misunderstanding) the point a bit. Sure, you can furbish an example, or a language, in which a human can optimize the program /statically/ better than a compiler/computer can optimize a program /statically/. But the author makes the point that the most frequently executed parts of the program are very sparse, and that the cost of profiling the program dynamically can be recouped by doing intelligent dynamic optimizations. As hardware gets faster and more complex I think this will be more true. There will simply be no way for humans to statically optimize for such a non-deterministic runtime environment. For example, how many programmers explicitly specify parallelism in their programs? How can they be sure that the CPU at runtime doesn't know better than them how to optimize the program? I say let the CPU decide. There is going to come a point in which it is just not feasible for humans to even attempt to optimize for such a complex runtime environment, and that time is coming fast. The faster chips get, the smaller the more amortized the overhead of finding better optimizations at runtime becomes.
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
heh...I can see the cheats now
Next time you're playing quake a player runs up to you and shoots you will something and bam!, your balance all thrown off...actually that would make a pretty cool weapon =)
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Ok, you're right....
/be/ me...
Let me reduce my example a bit. A little bit after the egg is fertilized and splits up, twins will be virtually identical molecularly.../yet/ they are not the same person, and as you rightly show, they will certainly develop along different paths. Just because things are identical does not mean they are physically the same. If my mind were put into a machine and I were killed...there would just be a machine tooling around acting like me...it wouldn't
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
Man...those /are/ cool poems...
I'm downloading the free edition and running it against Sylvia Plath, and Radiohead lyrics...
Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla
"Some people here, and tim, are missing the
fact that in a massively parrallel development environment (like most OSS teams). Having code
like...
char a[30], b[20], c[10];
a = b + c;
Do something isn't such a hot idea, as it means no one else will have any idea what the code does."
On the contrary, I think specifically in cases of parallel programming, a concise statement like that is desireable. The compiler will figure out just how it can optimize that statement for multiple CPUs. If the programmer is forced to do manual optimization, the whole operation will end up either done entirely serially (awfull), or the code will be unnecessarily cluttered with manual code for specifying parrallelism. That is something a layer of abstraction can best handle.
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BraINE Is Not Emulation
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What is "@Stake"? Sounds like some flimsy fly-by-night buzzword startup (not to say it IS, just that that stupid @ symbol makes it look like that). I think the name "L0pht" held a lot of weight, if not respect, in the security community. They should have been able to keep the name somehow. I don't know what the hell "@Stake" is...is it some property claims company? is it an e-butcher store? I would hire a "L0pht" but not an "@Stake".
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doh! "was specifically" -> "wasn't specifically"
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In a pre-emptive correction, I do realize that nuclear power powers many toasters. My point was that it was specifically embedded to do that task, as the 1950s Jetson-ian view of the future: Atomic Car! Atomic Toothbrush! Atomic Toilet!
The same thing happened when electricity was first harnessed. They attempted to apply it to everything. Remember those magical "Electric!" belts and hair brushes that were supposed to cure every single medical problem?
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I have a prediction: In 2029 when we read this article we will roll over laughing.
/needed/ it to toast bread, power cars, or fly around. Just because a technology is invented doesn't mean it /has/ to be used for everything...just where it is applicable.
/use/ of being injected with nanobots so I could live in some virtual world. Living in the /real/ world is complicated and real enough already. Nobody needs a whole other world to live in...there is plenty of reality here already.
/rejected/ the nanobots and mounted an immune response on my brain!
/identical/ genetically...down to all those wonderful neurons the author says we will replicate. Does that mean twins are the same person? Obviously they are not. I think transplanting heads onto younger bodies is a more practical form of longevity than copying yourself into a computer (man, wasn't there even a Slashdot article a while back saying that that had /already/ been accomplished??)
Every time some new technology is invented people come out in droves attempting to apply it to everything. Remember nuclear fission? That was supposed to toast our bread, power our cars, and allow us to fly about in personal airplanes. Didn't happen. Why? Because nobody
What would be the
I think the time scale is a bit optomistic also. Surgical implants are one thing. We are just starting to hack around and make stupid kludges with the brain. It's a VERY far cry from complete pervasiveness and integration. For one thing, I'd hate to be the guy whose body
And of course there is the philosophical question. Twins are
Let's just chill out and take the red pill for a while longer...
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