It kinda annoys me that this guy makes a perfectly sensible argument and gets modded down for it.. He wasn't offtopic.. he wasn't trolling (that I could see), and he wasn't looking for a flamefest.. He just made an argument that some people don't wanna hear. The vast majority of people on this planet hold irrational beliefs in higher powers. If you're going to allow the majority to pressure what can and can't be researched with government money then obviously you're going to end up with what the majority wants to be researched.. and it isn't stuff that tells them their irrational beliefs are irrational; they don't wanna hear that shit. To most people, science exists to aid the development of technology.. the kind of technology that saves them labour, protects them from bad people and gives them something interesting to look at.
Just cause you disagree, doesn't mean he isn't making a valuable contribution.
It is this argument which is at the center of the evolution debate. People who make this argument have little to no actual grasp of the concept of evolution is why we're having this debate. Is this really surprising when evolution is taught so poorly? And no, I'm not talking about Kansas... I'm talking about the teaching of neo-darwinistic evolution as "fact" in secondary schools. Evolution is so much more complicated than random mutation + natural selection = new species, but that's what people are taught.
Slight sidenote, I remember when I first heard the premise of the X-Men series: humans evolving, into superheroes, in only a few generations, and lots and lots of individuals at the same time. Now we have this tv show Heroes (which rocks, BTW) that has the exact same premise.. and I'm starting to wonder if the authors of these works weren't just having a bit of fun with the concept of evolution. Maybe they actually think that's what evolution is all about!
You should tell em that even if they don't believe that one species can evolve from another that, at least, God wants us to think that, otherwise He wouldn't have left all this great evidence around that they do.
The supposed victim, the copyright holder, in this victimless crime is located in the US. What are you going to do? Tell the victim that they need to come here to Australia to have a trial? Or are you suggesting that it should be ok to convict people for crimes when the victim can't even be bothered coming to the court room?
Of course, the fact that the laws where the victim lives are much harsher than the laws in Australia.. ah, that's just a co-incidence.. it has nothing to do with the lobbying the supposed victim has done over years and years.
Well, yeah. Are you trying to suggest it doesn't? Believe it or not but normal people don't go to EB to get their games, even if you think they do, have you seen the PC Games sold at EB? It's getting as bad as the Mac Games section. Steam is the writing on the wall.. pretty soon we'll be back to comparing shareware titles (and maybe that won't be so bad).
If you've got XGB of RAM, you may as well *use* it to cache commonly used data etc. and speed up your system, rather than just have it sit there like a lemon. Yes, because it costs nothing to deallocate that memory and give it to another process when the pre-caching gets it wrong..
To summarize, you didn't choose to buy Vista, you were forced to buy it, and now you're upset that I'm pointing out that you are rationalizing this decision. You do not think Vista is better than XP.. you would not have chosen Vista over XP if you had the choice.
Blizzard has been discussing WoW on Xbox 360.. soon as that happens, say goodbye to AAA titles on the PC. The only people left developing for the PC will be independants who can't get the console makers to return their phone calls so they can get a contract to develop on the platform. But ya never know, maybe someone will figure out that making an open console (aka a hardware specification and a trademark) and snapping up these independants is a good way to get the AAA game makers to pay attention and compete against the proprietary platforms. I wouldn't count on it though.
Are you a developer who runs Vista to write and test software?
Would you recommend Vista to people because it might reduce the number of people running XP and mean you don't need to test on XP as much?
Do you not think this makes you a shill?
Or do you honestly think Vista is better than XP and that's why people should upgrade? Cause if that's the case I'm gunna have to suggest that you're in a freakishly small minority.
I definitely had more fun playing Oblivion than I ever had playing Doom. My WoW addicted friends have more fun playing that than they ever had playing Doom. I've also had at least a hundred times more fun playing Counterstrike than I ever had playing Doom. Primarily because I spent at least 20% of my time trying to get MS-DOS to network back when I played Doom. I often put up with bad players or just guys who were completely above my skill level when I played Doom cause there was virtually no-one else to play with. Not to mention the fact that I had to give out my telephone number to totally strangers to play (back in the days of one-on-one only for modem users) and got nagged inceasently to get off the phone.
All in all, my fondest memory of playing Doom was the LAN party I went to where I guy showed up in a Darth Vader costume for no apparent reason.
I guess Microsoft figures that they are not going to release another OS for the next 10 years (assuming they're even in the OS business in 10 years time) so they better make it so Vista runs at best performance in about 5 years time.
Kinda makes you think Eric S. Raymond's argument about 2008 being the hard deadline for Linux to get it's shit together on the desktop has got some truth.
Worse yet is the case when you have a program installed on the system already and you want to override it with a user copy.. and it goes and reads the system wide configuration file instead of the local one. But yes, that's a failing of the program.
'also'? Just trying to see the relevance of your post.. we know you can extract the contents of a deb.. the problem is that you can't run it because the program assumes you have installed it..
Yes, very good point. Forgot that one. Sometimes I actually think every user should have their own unionfs for / then they could write anywhere they want, change any configuration file they want, etc. Of course, when the su or sudo their unionfs goes away:)
there should be a standard way to update the source of a debian source package to the latest CVS (or whatever) version. I shouldn't have to go to the project's web site and figure out how they do source code management. I know some people are already working on this one with bazaar.
Once that's done, there should be a nice gui way to temporarily upgrade to the latest version of the software and then downgrade back to stable.. that way when I find a bug in a program I can quickly find out if it is fixed or not. This, of course, is a lot of different problems rolled into one.
Friend of mine hates the way Ubuntu seperates things into a main package, a -dev package, a -docs package, etc.. There should be a --fat-packages option that he can use to combine all them together.. and yeah, this should be in the gui package installers too.
Adding new repositories and setting your level of trust in them or preference over other repositories is still a pain.
Apt rules, shame about dpkg. Even bigger shame that apt is built on dpkg, eh?
What pisses me off is the 32 step process to making a deb (that's what dpkg calls a package btw.. just incase you're playing acronym bingo out there). So if you want to install something you built from source, and be able to remove it later, you need some freakin' magician to have made it into a source package.. cause there's no way in hell you're doing it yourself.
What really depresses me is that debs, dpkg and apt, that's about the best anyone has done. Unless, of course, you actually like building everything from source.
It still aint 60 km/hr and if you're in traffic going 60 km/hr then you need to do at least 50+ or you are going to cause an accident.. that's if you're in a car or on a bike. Really, it isn't a matter of velocity, it's a matter of acceleration. If you can't start and stop at the same rate as the rest of the traffic, you're a hazard. This is why bike lanes are a good idea.. and yes, they should be everywhere.
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It kinda annoys me that this guy makes a perfectly sensible argument and gets modded down for it.. He wasn't offtopic.. he wasn't trolling (that I could see), and he wasn't looking for a flamefest.. He just made an argument that some people don't wanna hear. The vast majority of people on this planet hold irrational beliefs in higher powers. If you're going to allow the majority to pressure what can and can't be researched with government money then obviously you're going to end up with what the majority wants to be researched.. and it isn't stuff that tells them their irrational beliefs are irrational; they don't wanna hear that shit. To most people, science exists to aid the development of technology.. the kind of technology that saves them labour, protects them from bad people and gives them something interesting to look at.
Just cause you disagree, doesn't mean he isn't making a valuable contribution.
It is this argument which is at the center of the evolution debate. People who make this argument have little to no actual grasp of the concept of evolution is why we're having this debate. Is this really surprising when evolution is taught so poorly? And no, I'm not talking about Kansas... I'm talking about the teaching of neo-darwinistic evolution as "fact" in secondary schools. Evolution is so much more complicated than random mutation + natural selection = new species, but that's what people are taught.
Slight sidenote, I remember when I first heard the premise of the X-Men series: humans evolving, into superheroes, in only a few generations, and lots and lots of individuals at the same time. Now we have this tv show Heroes (which rocks, BTW) that has the exact same premise.. and I'm starting to wonder if the authors of these works weren't just having a bit of fun with the concept of evolution. Maybe they actually think that's what evolution is all about!
No wonder people are against it.
only 34% believe in ghosts? Wow, that must be an old poll.
You should tell em that even if they don't believe that one species can evolve from another that, at least, God wants us to think that, otherwise He wouldn't have left all this great evidence around that they do.
Do you seriously not know?
The supposed victim, the copyright holder, in this victimless crime is located in the US. What are you going to do? Tell the victim that they need to come here to Australia to have a trial? Or are you suggesting that it should be ok to convict people for crimes when the victim can't even be bothered coming to the court room?
Of course, the fact that the laws where the victim lives are much harsher than the laws in Australia.. ah, that's just a co-incidence.. it has nothing to do with the lobbying the supposed victim has done over years and years.
Well, yeah. Are you trying to suggest it doesn't? Believe it or not but normal people don't go to EB to get their games, even if you think they do, have you seen the PC Games sold at EB? It's getting as bad as the Mac Games section. Steam is the writing on the wall.. pretty soon we'll be back to comparing shareware titles (and maybe that won't be so bad).
Hehehe.. well enjoy your shiny new OS. Turned off restricted administrator yet?
To summarize, you didn't choose to buy Vista, you were forced to buy it, and now you're upset that I'm pointing out that you are rationalizing this decision. You do not think Vista is better than XP.. you would not have chosen Vista over XP if you had the choice.
Blizzard has been discussing WoW on Xbox 360.. soon as that happens, say goodbye to AAA titles on the PC. The only people left developing for the PC will be independants who can't get the console makers to return their phone calls so they can get a contract to develop on the platform. But ya never know, maybe someone will figure out that making an open console (aka a hardware specification and a trademark) and snapping up these independants is a good way to get the AAA game makers to pay attention and compete against the proprietary platforms. I wouldn't count on it though.
Are you a developer who runs Vista to write and test software?
Would you recommend Vista to people because it might reduce the number of people running XP and mean you don't need to test on XP as much?
Do you not think this makes you a shill?
Or do you honestly think Vista is better than XP and that's why people should upgrade? Cause if that's the case I'm gunna have to suggest that you're in a freakishly small minority.
I definitely had more fun playing Oblivion than I ever had playing Doom. My WoW addicted friends have more fun playing that than they ever had playing Doom. I've also had at least a hundred times more fun playing Counterstrike than I ever had playing Doom. Primarily because I spent at least 20% of my time trying to get MS-DOS to network back when I played Doom. I often put up with bad players or just guys who were completely above my skill level when I played Doom cause there was virtually no-one else to play with. Not to mention the fact that I had to give out my telephone number to totally strangers to play (back in the days of one-on-one only for modem users) and got nagged inceasently to get off the phone.
All in all, my fondest memory of playing Doom was the LAN party I went to where I guy showed up in a Darth Vader costume for no apparent reason.
So that's a no to going to the PC Games section of your local department store recently. Open your eyes man.
PC Gaming is DEAD. It's only a matter of time before MMORPGs move to the consoles too.
I guess Microsoft figures that they are not going to release another OS for the next 10 years (assuming they're even in the OS business in 10 years time) so they better make it so Vista runs at best performance in about 5 years time.
Kinda makes you think Eric S. Raymond's argument about 2008 being the hard deadline for Linux to get it's shit together on the desktop has got some truth.
I ended up doing this:
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/`apt-cache show netris | grep Filename | awk '{print $2}'`
dpkg --extract netris_0.52-5_i386.deb netris
Just a random package I chose there.
One more thing about this.. how do I get the package? Is there an apt-get command I can use as a normal user?
Worse yet is the case when you have a program installed on the system already and you want to override it with a user copy.. and it goes and reads the system wide configuration file instead of the local one. But yes, that's a failing of the program.
'also'? Just trying to see the relevance of your post.. we know you can extract the contents of a deb.. the problem is that you can't run it because the program assumes you have installed it..
Yes, because you can setup chroots as a normal user.
Yes, very good point. Forgot that one. Sometimes I actually think every user should have their own unionfs for / then they could write anywhere they want, change any configuration file they want, etc. Of course, when the su or sudo their unionfs goes away :)
Thanks, checkinstall looks sweet.
As for suggestions, sure..
there should be a standard way to update the source of a debian source package to the latest CVS (or whatever) version. I shouldn't have to go to the project's web site and figure out how they do source code management. I know some people are already working on this one with bazaar.
Once that's done, there should be a nice gui way to temporarily upgrade to the latest version of the software and then downgrade back to stable.. that way when I find a bug in a program I can quickly find out if it is fixed or not. This, of course, is a lot of different problems rolled into one.
Friend of mine hates the way Ubuntu seperates things into a main package, a -dev package, a -docs package, etc.. There should be a --fat-packages option that he can use to combine all them together.. and yeah, this should be in the gui package installers too.
Adding new repositories and setting your level of trust in them or preference over other repositories is still a pain.
Can't think of any others at the moment.
Apt rules, shame about dpkg. Even bigger shame that apt is built on dpkg, eh?
What pisses me off is the 32 step process to making a deb (that's what dpkg calls a package btw.. just incase you're playing acronym bingo out there). So if you want to install something you built from source, and be able to remove it later, you need some freakin' magician to have made it into a source package.. cause there's no way in hell you're doing it yourself.
What really depresses me is that debs, dpkg and apt, that's about the best anyone has done. Unless, of course, you actually like building everything from source.
It still aint 60 km/hr and if you're in traffic going 60 km/hr then you need to do at least 50+ or you are going to cause an accident.. that's if you're in a car or on a bike. Really, it isn't a matter of velocity, it's a matter of acceleration. If you can't start and stop at the same rate as the rest of the traffic, you're a hazard. This is why bike lanes are a good idea.. and yes, they should be everywhere.