I have used WinBook, Acer, Toshiba and Dell notebooks. Their battery life is pretty good. I would suggest disabling sounds to GUI events to get more battery life.
Do you have enough RAM in the laptop? Excessive paging uses more electricity with the constant hard disk access.
Lastly, if possible, operate the notebook with full charge/discharge cycles. I mean, really flatten the battery, then charge it. This is also good advice for mobile phones.
This is the HTTP_USER_AGENT of Safari if anyone is interested: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/48 (like Gecko) Safari/48
I wonder why it says "like Gecko"?
I still think that organisations (organizations for the Yanks) who develop web standards (such as the W3C) should make free cross platform libraries available. So Netcape, Mozilla, Internet Explorer, etc. all produce the same output, have the same standards compliance and render pages exactly the same. Only the GUI and some additional features can be different.
Since this is not likely to happen, I will have to settle for my favourite (favorite for the Yanks) browser, Mozilla. Pity how at work all we have to develop for is Internet Explorer.
My suggestions: Kokoda (dragon) Raptor (the dinosaur) (It tears shreds of Internet Explorer) Anti-MS Internet Exploder Goanna (an Aussie lizard... also known as a Sand Monitor)
Stargate (after the TV series) Mozilla Jr. Minizilla MoreZilla MultiZilla
LCARZilla
AraneaVola (Web Fly in Latin) AraneaPorta (Web Gate in Latin) ParvulusAranea (Tiny Web in Latin) StabilisAranea (stable/steadfast Web in Latin) VeloxAranea (quick/rapid/swift/fast Web in Latin) ParvulusVeloxAraneaStabilis P.V.A.S (Tiny Fast Web Stable in Latin)
I am not running IE on RedHat Linux (although as a web developer I wish that I easily could). It is just a Mozilla theme. It may be downloaded here: http://themes.mozdev.org/themes/ie.html
The only memory intensive applications I use are Mozilla, OpenOffice & the Gimp. Performance is not an issue (on my Pentium III 450 MHz with 384 MB RAM). Services such as Apache and MySQL also run well.
The way it looks is purely for aesthetic reasons. Something new and different. Something fun to play with, whilst learning where to put themes/skins, how to tweak them, etc.
Am I correct in assuming that this Darwin ISO will not install the pretty GUI associated with OSX?
Last Saturday I played with my RedHat 7.3 distro, to make it look a little like MacOS. This was accomplished with a Sawfish theme, a GTK 2 theme, an XMMS skin and a Nautilus theme.
I really wish people wouldn't worship the ground Nielson walks on. He SO does not deserve it. Just because he was one of the first to make some common sense suggestions to help web sites download faster, does not mean he is an expert in HCI. It just means that he was too cheap to get a modem faster than 9.6 kbps.
I have been developing web pages commercially for 5 years. Frames do have a use, as do embedded images. W3C is smarter than Nielson. They have forsight and understanding of how people like to present their content.
Take a look at the source code of http://www.useit.com/. Uppercase HTML tags, unquoted attributes within tags, single HTML tags such as img, br and hr without closing forward slashes at the end. He doesn't know what he is talking about. And worst of all, he uses Verdana, an ugly, unreadable font that is not as suitable as Arial, Helvetica and sans-serif for viewing text on computer screens.
One reason new technologies are created is to enhance the education and entertainment that can be provided by online content systems. If content provided is dry and boring (eg: www.useit.com), viewers are going to learn less and be less satisfied with their experience.
Nielson should take a reality check and leave the publication of usability papers to people who are experts, not just claim to be.
The air from the air compressor takes air from inside the case, compresses it, then releases it quickly back into the case... a closed system. This is how a car air conditioner works when the knob is not switched to intake fresh air.
The air pressure inside the box would remain constant, maybe even at 1 ATM (atmosphere... 101.325 kPa). Minimal insulation would be required to stop noise getting out, or heat transfer into the box.
I will never buy an iMac (or any other Mac for that reason). I can get a much faster machine, compatible with more types of software (linux, windows), that is more upgradeable for a much cheaper price. So what if the case isn't colourful. hehe.
If I recall correctly, ANR involves adding sound waves together to cancel each other out (as the waves are out of phase by half). This can't be a perfect implementation as there are many frequencies of sounds that are emitted from a computer at different times.
Would it not be better for case manufacturers to manufacutre boxes that are sealed (sound proof). No air vents. Plus a tiny air compressor (air conditioning) inside that keeps the temperature, humidity at desireable levels. It would also remove what little dust is present too.
Current levels of technology could implement this easily and cheapily. Prevention is better than cure. This is a simple solution, not a bandage fix.
"I would like to change the world, but Microsoft will never give away any source code!"
Personally I think every new version of Windows becomes more "bloated" than the previous. When you think about it, we are generally doing the same tasks as before, and with the new operating systems we are not really doing them faster or better. I would use Windows 95, but Windows 98 (ok and Win 95c) have Fat32 support.
But the hardware required for each new version gets more expensive and extravagant. A state of the art computer is worth almost nothing 4 years later.
In answer to the question, what would I do with the source code? Well since I program ASP and web related languages, I would not be able to do much with it.
I would like to send it to Mr Carmack from ID Software, and get him to make a small, fast Windows OS with the bare essentials only. This is like the/. article earlier today, on the RULE project.
http://www.freesoftware.fsf.org/rule/
I think the RULE project (minimised/optimised RedHat distribution) is a great idea. I run RedHat 7.1 on a 266 Mhz laptop (160 MB RAM), and think it is a little too sluggish.
A couple of weeks ago I found my Atari 2600 back from early 80s. It was the only console my parents ever purchased. It only had 3 games, Tennis, Donkey Kong and Enduro (car racing).
After some time I found that it plugs into the antenna connection, not the AV. After switching many channels, I just made out the image on the screen. Black and white and badly distorted.
I opened the console, and found inside a variable resister with a plastic cap. Some fine tuning with a flat head screwdriver brought up the image perfectly on the screen. I was overjoyed.
I drilled a hole through the plastic in the top of the console, so I could adjust it again as needed, without opening the console.
I found the interface far less friendly than Napster, but it also allowed searching for other file types (I rarely used this feature anyway).
I also disliked the addware/spyware installed with the program. After installing it, an extra program appears in my unistall list, which it won't let me remove.
I also thought the mechanism for sharing directories was meant to be intuitive, but it wasn't really. My searches for audio only ever yielded 128 kbps and less bitrate files.
Maybe the closing of this service will force users to migrate to other services. I'm going to start looking.
Speaking about legal action against people/companies providing content (files and web pages), I strongly believe that prosecution should only happen in the country of origin, not the destination. For example, eBay should not have to block German Nazi relics and items, but German ISPs should. A judge in one country should not be able to affect the services available to users around the entire world.
My 2
"I would like to change the world, but they won't give me the source code!"
I agree with you re: a small, stable kernel with memory and processor management, but when you think about it, USB hardware is very common. I bought my box 3 years ago and it has USB (even though I have never used it).
This is my opinion:
optional hardware, devices, peripherals -> modules
hardware found on most x86 machines -> built in
Does anyone know when the official kernels from kernel.org will come with pre-emptive multitasking? The foundations of Linux are mature, so why do we have to go to another site and download source code with this feature? From a newbie's point of view, this can be daunting. I want RPMs!!! lol
So the latest stable version is 2.4.17... and 2.4 has been in development for a year. As someone with not much knowledge on the history and progress of Linux, I sure would be interested in seing a cartesian graph of kernel version vs. date of release.
Computer's have several physical attributes: size, power consumption, aesthetic appearance, power, cost of building, quietness, etc. These need to be ranked. To me, lower cost and higher performance is more important than size or how pretty the machine is. I feel the same about cars.
When you think about it, Moore's Law will hold true for another 20 years at least. This will mean virtually every part in your computer will be replaced/upgraded/superceded every 3 or so years.
I had to get a 10mbps coax cable down a brick wall into the room below, but coax cable was too thick and the metal BNC connectors were too bulky. I ended up using audio cable that would normally link a stereo to it's speakers. Ping times were still 10 ms. I guess provided that the transfer medium has similiar properties of resistivity, etc, many metal replacements and objects used in infrastructure can be used to transmit data.
Haha, you have been watching that Simpsons episode...
We do have electricity in Australia. And broad band so we can keep RedHat 7.2 up to date and download StarTrek Enterprise episodes that will not be aired here until the 2nd quarter of next year.
We have really clean water and beautiful gothic women. I'm happy. And we can buy alcohol legally at 18. Not that it matters now that I'm 23.
But we don't have thanks giving. We don't say happy holidays either. We say "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year."
Would you take advice from someone on how to design/build a web site if they can't construct their own correctly?
I thought as a Slashdot reader, you would have a reasonably founded opinion that you can't believe everything that Microsoft says. Eg: Win95 runs on a 386 with 4 MB of RAM (even though it isn't usable).
If this book is anything like his web site, I will never read it. I have studied human computer interaction (HCI) and usability at university, and have very little respect for Nielson.
While I admit there are problems with some web pages, and some of his 10 heuristics are good (aka common sense... thus should not be mentioned), some of his suggestions are ludicrous.
I have been developing web pages commercially for 4 years, and have to say that frames can be used correctly, and images on web pages are ok. People are not using 9.6 kbps modems anymore.
Take a look at the source code of http://www.useit.com/. Uppercase HTML tags, unquoted attributes within tags, single HTML tags such as img, br and hr without closing forward slashes at the end. He doesn't know what he is talking about. And worst of all, he uses Verdana, an ugly, unreadable font that is not as suitable as Arial, Helvetica and sans-serif for viewing text on computer screens.
One reason new technologies are created is to enhance the education and entertainment that can be provided by online content systems. If content provided is dry and boring (eg: www.useit.com), viewers are going to learn less and be less satisfied with their experience.
Nielson should take a reality check and leave the publication of usability books and papers to people who are experts, not just claim to be.
Slashdot Mirror
I have used WinBook, Acer, Toshiba and Dell notebooks. Their battery life is pretty good. I would suggest disabling sounds to GUI events to get more battery life.
Do you have enough RAM in the laptop? Excessive paging uses more electricity with the constant hard disk access.
Lastly, if possible, operate the notebook with full charge/discharge cycles. I mean, really flatten the battery, then charge it. This is also good advice for mobile phones.
Mike
This is the HTTP_USER_AGENT of Safari if anyone is interested: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/48 (like Gecko) Safari/48
I wonder why it says "like Gecko"?
I still think that organisations (organizations for the Yanks) who develop web standards (such as the W3C) should make free cross platform libraries available. So Netcape, Mozilla, Internet Explorer, etc. all produce the same output, have the same standards compliance and render pages exactly the same. Only the GUI and some additional features can be different.
Since this is not likely to happen, I will have to settle for my favourite (favorite for the Yanks) browser, Mozilla. Pity how at work all we have to develop for is Internet Explorer.
I would have thought love was the tallest roller coaster in the world. Fast, great distance to fall...
My suggestions:
Kokoda (dragon)
Raptor (the dinosaur) (It tears shreds of Internet Explorer)
Anti-MS Internet Exploder
Goanna (an Aussie lizard... also known as a Sand Monitor)
Stargate (after the TV series)
Mozilla Jr.
Minizilla
MoreZilla
MultiZilla
LCARZilla
AraneaVola (Web Fly in Latin)
AraneaPorta (Web Gate in Latin)
ParvulusAranea (Tiny Web in Latin)
StabilisAranea (stable/steadfast Web in Latin)
VeloxAranea (quick/rapid/swift/fast Web in Latin)
ParvulusVeloxAraneaStabilis P.V.A.S (Tiny Fast Web Stable in Latin)
I hope you found them mildy amusing...
>Also, what the hell are you doing running a window manager as root?
I did a fresh install on Saturday, and was still installing programs that require super-user privs, and I prefer not to use sudo.
I don't actually want Mac OSX, just a GUI as close to it as possible.
I am not running IE on RedHat Linux (although as a web developer I wish that I easily could). It is just a Mozilla theme. It may be downloaded here: http://themes.mozdev.org/themes/ie.html
The only memory intensive applications I use are Mozilla, OpenOffice & the Gimp. Performance is not an issue (on my Pentium III 450 MHz with 384 MB RAM). Services such as Apache and MySQL also run well.
The way it looks is purely for aesthetic reasons. Something new and different. Something fun to play with, whilst learning where to put themes/skins, how to tweak them, etc.
Am I correct in assuming that this Darwin ISO will not install the pretty GUI associated with OSX?
Last Saturday I played with my RedHat 7.3 distro, to make it look a little like MacOS. This was accomplished with a Sawfish theme, a GTK 2 theme, an XMMS skin and a Nautilus theme.
Three screenshots within GNOME: http://opax.swin.edu.au/~137591/linux/
I really wish people wouldn't worship the ground Nielson walks on. He SO does not deserve it. Just because he was one of the first to make some common sense suggestions to help web sites download faster, does not mean he is an expert in HCI. It just means that he was too cheap to get a modem faster than 9.6 kbps.
I have been developing web pages commercially for 5 years. Frames do have a use, as do embedded images. W3C is smarter than Nielson. They have forsight and understanding of how people like to present their content.
Take a look at the source code of http://www.useit.com/. Uppercase HTML tags, unquoted attributes within tags, single HTML tags such as img, br and hr without closing forward slashes at the end. He doesn't know what he is talking about. And worst of all, he uses Verdana, an ugly, unreadable font that is not as suitable as Arial, Helvetica and sans-serif for viewing text on computer screens.
One reason new technologies are created is to enhance the education and entertainment that can be provided by online content systems. If content provided is dry and boring (eg: www.useit.com), viewers are going to learn less and be less satisfied with their experience.
Nielson should take a reality check and leave the publication of usability papers to people who are experts, not just claim to be.
The air from the air compressor takes air from inside the case, compresses it, then releases it quickly back into the case... a closed system. This is how a car air conditioner works when the knob is not switched to intake fresh air.
The air pressure inside the box would remain constant, maybe even at 1 ATM (atmosphere... 101.325 kPa). Minimal insulation would be required to stop noise getting out, or heat transfer into the box.
I will never buy an iMac (or any other Mac for that reason). I can get a much faster machine, compatible with more types of software (linux, windows), that is more upgradeable for a much cheaper price. So what if the case isn't colourful. hehe.
If I recall correctly, ANR involves adding sound waves together to cancel each other out (as the waves are out of phase by half). This can't be a perfect implementation as there are many frequencies of sounds that are emitted from a computer at different times.
Would it not be better for case manufacturers to manufacutre boxes that are sealed (sound proof). No air vents. Plus a tiny air compressor (air conditioning) inside that keeps the temperature, humidity at desireable levels. It would also remove what little dust is present too.
Current levels of technology could implement this easily and cheapily. Prevention is better than cure. This is a simple solution, not a bandage fix.
"I would like to change the world, but Microsoft will never give away any source code!"
Personally I think every new version of Windows becomes more "bloated" than the previous. When you think about it, we are generally doing the same tasks as before, and with the new operating systems we are not really doing them faster or better. I would use Windows 95, but Windows 98 (ok and Win 95c) have Fat32 support.
/. article earlier today, on the RULE project.
But the hardware required for each new version gets more expensive and extravagant. A state of the art computer is worth almost nothing 4 years later.
In answer to the question, what would I do with the source code? Well since I program ASP and web related languages, I would not be able to do much with it.
I would like to send it to Mr Carmack from ID Software, and get him to make a small, fast Windows OS with the bare essentials only. This is like the
http://www.freesoftware.fsf.org/rule/
I think the RULE project (minimised/optimised RedHat distribution) is a great idea. I run RedHat 7.1 on a 266 Mhz laptop (160 MB RAM), and think it is a little too sluggish.
A couple of weeks ago I found my Atari 2600 back from early 80s. It was the only console my parents ever purchased. It only had 3 games, Tennis, Donkey Kong and Enduro (car racing).
After some time I found that it plugs into the antenna connection, not the AV. After switching many channels, I just made out the image on the screen. Black and white and badly distorted.
I opened the console, and found inside a variable resister with a plastic cap. Some fine tuning with a flat head screwdriver brought up the image perfectly on the screen. I was overjoyed.
I drilled a hole through the plastic in the top of the console, so I could adjust it again as needed, without opening the console.
What happens if someone steals your card? It is like forging a signature, although harder to deny.
Wouldn't thumb or retinal scans be more secure (maybe more expensive though?)
A new Slashdot article has cleared up my misconceptions and provided this link:
3 4. html
http://www.linuxdevices.com/articles/AT82672987
When Napster closed Kazaa was my next move.
I found the interface far less friendly than Napster, but it also allowed searching for other file types (I rarely used this feature anyway).
I also disliked the addware/spyware installed with the program. After installing it, an extra program appears in my unistall list, which it won't let me remove.
I also thought the mechanism for sharing directories was meant to be intuitive, but it wasn't really. My searches for audio only ever yielded 128 kbps and less bitrate files.
Maybe the closing of this service will force users to migrate to other services. I'm going to start looking.
Speaking about legal action against people/companies providing content (files and web pages), I strongly believe that prosecution should only happen in the country of origin, not the destination. For example, eBay should not have to block German Nazi relics and items, but German ISPs should. A judge in one country should not be able to affect the services available to users around the entire world.
My 2
"I would like to change the world, but they won't give me the source code!"
I agree with you re: a small, stable kernel with memory and processor management, but when you think about it, USB hardware is very common. I bought my box 3 years ago and it has USB (even though I have never used it).
This is my opinion:
optional hardware, devices, peripherals -> modules
hardware found on most x86 machines -> built in
Does anyone know when the official kernels from kernel.org will come with pre-emptive multitasking? The foundations of Linux are mature, so why do we have to go to another site and download source code with this feature? From a newbie's point of view, this can be daunting. I want RPMs!!! lol
So the latest stable version is 2.4.17... and 2.4 has been in development for a year. As someone with not much knowledge on the history and progress of Linux, I sure would be interested in seing a cartesian graph of kernel version vs. date of release.
What is the obession with small?
Computer's have several physical attributes: size, power consumption, aesthetic appearance, power, cost of building, quietness, etc. These need to be ranked. To me, lower cost and higher performance is more important than size or how pretty the machine is. I feel the same about cars.
When you think about it, Moore's Law will hold true for another 20 years at least. This will mean virtually every part in your computer will be replaced/upgraded/superceded every 3 or so years.
I had to get a 10mbps coax cable down a brick wall into the room below, but coax cable was too thick and the metal BNC connectors were too bulky. I ended up using audio cable that would normally link a stereo to it's speakers. Ping times were still 10 ms. I guess provided that the transfer medium has similiar properties of resistivity, etc, many metal replacements and objects used in infrastructure can be used to transmit data.
Haha, you have been watching that Simpsons episode...
We do have electricity in Australia. And broad band so we can keep RedHat 7.2 up to date and download StarTrek Enterprise episodes that will not be aired here until the 2nd quarter of next year.
We have really clean water and beautiful gothic women. I'm happy. And we can buy alcohol legally at 18. Not that it matters now that I'm 23.
But we don't have thanks giving. We don't say happy holidays either. We say "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year."
Peace.
Would you take advice from someone on how to design/build a web site if they can't construct their own correctly?
I thought as a Slashdot reader, you would have a reasonably founded opinion that you can't believe everything that Microsoft says. Eg: Win95 runs on a 386 with 4 MB of RAM (even though it isn't usable).
If this book is anything like his web site, I will never read it. I have studied human computer interaction (HCI) and usability at university, and have very little respect for Nielson.
While I admit there are problems with some web pages, and some of his 10 heuristics are good (aka common sense... thus should not be mentioned), some of his suggestions are ludicrous.
I have been developing web pages commercially for 4 years, and have to say that frames can be used correctly, and images on web pages are ok. People are not using 9.6 kbps modems anymore.
Take a look at the source code of http://www.useit.com/. Uppercase HTML tags, unquoted attributes within tags, single HTML tags such as img, br and hr without closing forward slashes at the end. He doesn't know what he is talking about. And worst of all, he uses Verdana, an ugly, unreadable font that is not as suitable as Arial, Helvetica and sans-serif for viewing text on computer screens.
One reason new technologies are created is to enhance the education and entertainment that can be provided by online content systems. If content provided is dry and boring (eg: www.useit.com), viewers are going to learn less and be less satisfied with their experience.
Nielson should take a reality check and leave the publication of usability books and papers to people who are experts, not just claim to be.
Cryptography doesn't kill, it is merely a useful tool. Steak knives are useful tools too, except in the hands of a rare few.
If a guy get's stabbed in an dark street by a crazed kitchen knife wielding person, steak knives would not be outlawed will they?
Apple is the Netscape of operating systems. It simply isn't good enough.
http://opax.swin.edu.au/137591/img/crapple.png
Apple is the Netscape of operating systems. It simply isn't good enough.
http://opax.swin.edu.au/137591/img/crapple.png