Who cares about what the users want? They can barely keep their asses clean, and you want to build a UI around what they want??? This is a UI that give people what they NEED. There is an important distinction made here. The machines are tools. They are supposed to make life easier for people. The best way to make life easier for some is to give them what they need, not what they want. An alcoholic might want booze, but what he needs is coffee and a good kick in the ass and constant reminder of why he is a failure as long as he drinks. This is what a good UI/machine will do for the user. The user may not like it, but that's their tough luck.;P
...I want to say I hate CDs and DVDs. Back when I was a teen, I could go to the record store and buy used vinyl for $4-6 a pop. That meant that I could save up three weeks allowance and buy up to three albums. It was a lot of fun. Then along came CDs and newer releases weren't being traded in as quickly. This meant I had to buy new CDs instead of used initially. And... one new CD would cost me $21 to $27. That sucked. The music industry FORCED people to move to a new medium even if they didn't want to. So screw you once for that RIAA.
Now, more on topic: I haven't had the problems you mention with DVDs other than with software based players. My first DVD player was a Creative Labs DXR-2 kit that had a hardware decoder that did an overlay on the computer desktop. It worked most of the time and was certainly cheaper than buying a stand alone DVD player at the time (1997). But, every so often my friend would bring a movie over and I wouldn't be able to play it. I only used this setup under Windows 95 on a Pentium 100, so I can't tell if it was OS related, driver related, software related or hardware related. I'll never know because I chucked the system.
My next DVD player was a software based player that came bundled with a cheap DVD drive ($79). It was the Cybervision PowerDVD. I used this for quite a few years on a Windows 98 system (P III 600). It worked OK for almost every disc. Occasionally it would crash in the middle of playback, but I am most certain that this was an OS issue due to the nature of the blue screen of death I would always get.
Soon after I started experimenting with Linux as a media PC OS in 2000, I tried Ogle and used that for quite some time with no problem. Then I moved to MPlayer which I only ran into a few discs that wouldn't play. (In retrospect, I think I didn't wait long enough for the disc to decrypt) And I finally got my full Linux based home theater PC working just a few months ago, this time choosing to go with the latest Xine (1.0 dontcha know?) which works SO well it even ignores region encoding and the on-the-fly PAL to NTSC conversion works just great on a Celeron 1.7 GHz. I can't wait to check out the new series of Doctor Who on DVD when BBC releases it this summer/fall.:)
I've never had a standalone DVD player because I think until the past year or two, they've been too expensive for what they do. The new $40 jobs are more on par with what the player should cost, but the quality is pretty low and you still don't get much of a decent feature set. I'm still wondering why no one puts an ethernet jack on a DVD player and the ability to stream the DVD with live transcoding so that you can watch discs on any device that is networked. Oh well... like the RIAA, the MPAA will never "get it".
What the hell does this mean? Did SCO try to pull a fast one and get stopped? Or is SCO attempting to give up because they know they don't have a case but the judge is putting their feet to the fire? Seriously, what's with the legal mumbo-jumbo on/.? We aren't legal professionals. Just give it to us in plain english for god's sake!
Microsoft will never put a dent in the audience of people made up of people like me.
I'm not your average user or admin. I'm an artist first and a computer guy second. Therefore, I need maximum flexibility in the tools that I use. Microsoft Windows cannot provide this because until recently, they've ignored the art community and instead focused solely on business. They've also ignored the needs of people who want to do more with their computer than just buy software and install it. Some people try to belittle this audience as "computer hobbiest" and relegate them to a very small group who do little to further technology. But the, so called, hobbiests are the people who cause technology revolutions. Steve Wozniak did it with the Apple Computer. Linus Torvalds with the Linux kernel. And people like Adam Curry with iPodder.
Microsoft and it's supporters make the mistake of thinking that people like us aren't worth supporting by making a truly flexible and hackable OS + applications. The most important people in technology are the tweakers. The people who will take something apart and rebuild it so it's faster, better or just more fun. Microsoft doesn't allow for that and has therefore lost me as a customer/user. And even when I did use Windows full time all I ever did was gripe about how much it sucked and prevented me from doing what I wanted to do. Linux changed all that.:)
...I can play Unreal 2k4 and Doom 3 with my ATI Radeon All-in-wonder. It's not X.org's fault though. It's ATI's fault because they are idiot arrogant bastards who won't release specs. I have two of those cards and they are sitting in boxes because there is no really good X driver that supports 3D acceleration. I've had to go over to the dark side and buy NVidia cards (they are the dark side because they killed off 3DFX who WAS Linux friendly). That's my only option though. Either that or just don't play the games. As it is right now, I only have one Windows box at home and it's probaby going to disappear in about a year. (Thanks to the Fedora crew!)
I can't wait to see idiot racists get pissed when they find out great-great-great-great-great-great-grandma was asian, african or even GASP semite. As much as people don't want to know... the truth needs to be told, we're all mutts. There is no "master race".
Sir. I fail to see how.Net (not the TLD) and IDE drive interphaces have anything to do with one another. But I digest...
XUL and the Firefox Chrome afford every developer on every platform the ability to build robust and static apps on a widely dispersed and growing platform. I can see a day when all computer programs run on Firefox. And what does.Net offer? A single platform which is really just a hodgepodge of old APIs that have been reorganized and renamed into catchy new names. It is obvious that most developers are abandoning.Net simply because it still falls under the limita[tt]ions of the APIs it is based on. There was a notable developer who wrote a column on.Net who recently ended his column by saying that.Net offers nothing new over older APIs and in fact still shows many of the ill-thought signatures of Visual Basic development! Is that what you really want to bank your life on? Is there anyone with a sane mind who would invest their development into a platform that is nothing more than Visual Basic with a few APIs borrowed from other MS languages? I think not..Net will fail where Firefox will take the world by storm. Firefox is, was and always shall be forevermore the platfrom to end all platforms! There will be a loud crack of thunder in the skies of IT and a rain of cleansing shall pour down upon the keyboards of developers everywhere!!! And the Fox in the sky shall also say unto them, "Put down the Paxil laced Kool-Ade that the Gates has given you and drink from the fresh rain of enlightment that cometh from the sky of Mozilla"! Then a wheel shall appear in the sky resembling that of the Netscape Navigator and it shall be told to all that this is as it was foretold in the book of development! And Stallman shall rise in the clouds sourrounded by cherubs singing verses and his mouth shall open and he will utter forth, "I am the 1 and the 0"! And so shall it be. Go forth in peace and spread the word of Firefox. For thou hast been annointed.
I sure don't think so. As long as computer systems and their security are incredibly complex mechanisms that only a fraction of the people on the planet can operate, we're going to be in this boat. Sit down and think for a minute. In the past (long before computers) confidential and valuable information or posessions were stored by trusted sources. Banks, legal firms, certain museums, etc... They all were more than capable of protecting valuable information or posessions from theft. The occasional break in would happen, but not anywhere near the frequency that we see computer systems being compromised. And who was responsible for security in those insititutions? Did we have security staff that went to college and were learned in maths and science? Were the lawyers who protected secrets expert lock smiths and did they have break-in drills to hone their security? No.
So how did we survive all those centuries without the need for the kind of security practices we see as a requirement today? I'll [tt]ell you how... the systems that secured the information or posessions were built with security in mind. A bank vault, for instance, isn't going to be made out of glass, ceramic or some other easily penetrable substance (like certain biological orifices). When it came to the legal profession in the past, there were stronger barriers to entry. Those barriers, for the most part, ensured the integrity of the people who entered into the profession. Again, for legal professionals of the past, confidentiality was assured as far as can be since we are all human.
The plain truth that no one wants to acknowledge is that computers are not secure by nature. The OS or hardware platforms all have faults (with the possible exception of OpenVMS on Alphas). What is needed is a completely new hardware and OS platform that is built completely with security in mind. A system where the hardware platform has restrictions built in that only allow proper access through only one channel. Just a vault only has one door, so too should a system, that is storing sensitive data. This should be implemented in hardware BEFORE the OS.
Why isn't this happening? Because it's not profitable enough. There isn't enough demand for this kind of system yet, and there won't be demand until the businesses are made to acknowledge that these kinds of break ins are unacceptable.
There are a lot of communities working on wide area wireless projects and free municipal hot spots. But the biggest problem with a lot of them is that the PR just isn't that good. You can put up all the WiFi and WiMax sigs you want all over the city, but "joe average" is not going to understand. My proof? Just the other day I was talking to a very intelligent professional and I told him about the free hotspot that is located in the "Reading Garden" of the Cleveland Public Library. He was VERY intrigued. (ie. there are potential users out there who would love to get on this thing) But, he then asked me if his modem in his laptop would work with it. Therein lies the problem. As an industry, IT people are very poor at communicating concepts like this to users.
Choosing the name "Wireless" or "WiFi" for short range wireless networks was poor. The average person isn't going to "get it". We would have been better off if they were called "Cordless Internet Bases". This way they would have some clue that this thing isn't long range and requires some kind of reciever with an antenna on it. Just like a Cordless Phone Base. And WiMax should have been called something more like "Cellular High Speed Internet Access". and Cell Phone Modem connections should be called "Cell Phone Dial-up". I think part of the problem is that the marketers like "whiz bang" terms with cool factor appeal. Marketing something as an 802.11b access point lacks any way of making it stylish. But creating a logo and mainstream name that doesn't relate to anything else that is already similar is a bad move too. We need to find a better way...
It looks to me like the days of the Microsoft monopoly are at an end. They are quickly losing market share because they made the mistake of thinking that their monopoly status ensures their hold on most computer users. Their IE 7 release is going to be a little too li[tt]le a little too late. And with.Net falling out of favor with most developers (nay, never having gotten favor in the first place)... I believe that the dark clouds for MS approach.
The open source revolution has fired yet another salvo at the hegemony that is MS. Firefox was the the harbinger and now this new approach of treating Firefox as a platform is going to steal the thunder from under MS for sure. Imagine a day when all applications on your PC are Firefox based web services and they work on ALL platforms. The OS no longer matters to the end user since it's just support for the browser platform. And once those apps are ubiquitous, the move to a better platform (like Linux or *BSD) will be easy. When vendors start offering these alternative OSes per-installed and secured, the end user will have cheaper options with better performance. HP has already lead the charge by selling new systems with FreeDOS on them. Why do they do this? So that the end user is free to install whatever OS they want on the box without paying the MS tax.
The end approacheth. I can hear the hooves of the angry peasants as they apprach the gate of Gates' empire with torches and pitchforks. The evil that has gripped the computer world for far too long is surely to be ousted in short order! Victory is at hand!!!
Does anyone know where I can get a good chili dog for lunch in Clevo?
I'd be surprised if my ISP (Speakeasy) signs on for this kind of corporate fascism. I'll make the statement up front that I don't pirate music or movies. But I have high bandwidth usage a lot because I tunnel multiple networks through my home in order to keep connected with family and friends. Many times, they are streaming content that I provide privately over SSL tunnels. So even though my usage is high, I'm not doing anything illegal. An ISP would have to be completely braindead to accept this kind of policy. But I'm sure there will be some major ones that WILL sign on to this criminal behavior. If only to make a statement for their owning corporate parents. What next? Are we going to need licenses to serve out content above a certain bendwidth level? Idiots. They are all complete idiots. I'd like to meet s few in person so I could very physically express my opinion of this garbage on them (err... I mean) too them.
How does someone think they can get away with something like that? This guys exemplifies the worst outcome of capitalism. He wanted money, he had a product (which wasn't his) and he found a buyer, and by god he was going to make a profit! I hope they lock him up in ass raping prison for a decade or two. Someone who thinks they should be able to make money any way they see fit is a dangerous person.
Yup. You're in the visually challenged group of people who don't "get it". Congrats comrade on being a good citizen of the state! Err... I mean, congratulations on being a good American.
(Who needs "in Soviet Russia" when you live in a truly evil empire?)
Because most of America is populated by illogical fools who fear change and don't see the value in practicality when it upsets long held convention. When they were considering color for our bills recently, they only wound up adding a slight hint of color. The reason why? Well, according to what I've read, the decision was made because the U.S. treasury was told by what amounts to a marketing group, that Americans think of money as green. I was livid when I heard this because I'd just come back from Australia and I think they have gorgeous bills (nice colors and a clear plastic section for anti-counterfeiting measures). A lot of idiots here will say that it doesn't matter what color money is as long as it has value, which may be true, but jesus people! Get a fucking sense of style!
Hello braindead individual. It's time to pull out your feeding tube.
Right wing or left wing bias in news media is unwelcome to anyone who actually thinks. The only job that jounralism has is to present the basic information and let people form their own opinions. This is not what happens today. Instead, opinions get presented as facts. And idiots who don't think take these opinions and treat them like the final word from supposed authorities. The sad part is that there is damn little that can be done about it. You really can't trust many sources of information right now because it's become all too easy to turn lies into plausible situations thanks to technology and years of building very cunning strategies to manipulate people with. Couple all that with people who want to control your opinion for a profit motive (yea capitliasm!) and you have a media monster that is unstoppable and uncontrolable.
A lot of people expected the internet to democratize society and the media a good deal. It was supposed to result in the end-user becoming the producer. But then we have the problem of determining how authoritative a source is. ANYONE can put up a blog and claim to have inside information or breaking news. The fakest of the fake get weeded out, but the best bloggers and alternative news sources have a way of making their take on a story both very convoluted and plausible. It's next to impossible to discern between truth and convenient misdirection. You read these blogs and "insider" news sites and then you think, "Hmmm... that sounds right". Then you read the other side and if you're a level headed and unbaised person you think "Hmmmm... that sounds right too". Only one side has to be closer to the truth, but good luck figuring out which. Especially since many of the things discussed involve people and places you will never personally meet or visit. Without being there or seeing something for yourself, you're always at a disadvantage.
News media is screwed by technology and paid strategists. The only way to really know the truth about things is to actually witness everything yourself. However, in many cases you can't because you're not privvy to the information. For example, how many of us could have actually walked into Terri Shiavo's hospital room and attempted to get her to smile or utter a sound? I'd guess that would be a big fat zero. On the other hand we could buy into the other side of the story that says she's been brain dead (like most people here in the U.S.) for a very long time. But that requires faith in the source of that inforrmation. Somewhere in that mess is truth. But I'll be damned if I take a side on that story because there just isn't enough reliable information from either side to convince me one way or the other. I've seen the video of her, I've read the medical reports. Too much dissonance.
It's a case of too many questions and everyone with an agenda (which is to keep you blinded to certain facts). This is the case with every major news story that impacts you indirectly. You can chose to take a side (which is stupid these days) or you can deeply research things on your own (which many of us don't have time for) or you can just ignore it all and hole up in your house. These days, I read a lot and then decide that there is no truth in the media for either side. There are bits and pieces but they are hand picked and packaged to fit the ideologies that the U.S. and many other parts of the world have been manipulated into siding with.
Gore's plan sounds interesting on the surface, but it will likely be too much work for the majority of Americans who despise the act of thinking and prefer to have their ideas spoon fed to them. There is no generation that is interested in multiple simultaneous media mostly because most people don't want to be made to think. Most people don't want to be aware of just how bad things are for some people. It's too disappointing and frightening because it makes the world that surround you personally very fragile. If you make people aware of the fragility of their comfortable lives, they will attack you just like Gollum attacks when someone tries to keep him from his "precious". Sad. Really, really sad.
...but, I swear when I read the headline that they meant that crack (as in crack cocaine) was found in the shuttle tank. I was trying to figure out how someone who would have crack would even gain access to where the shuttle tanks are kept. I also got this mental image of a seedy character dropping a few rocks into this very large, very smooth metal container. Considering how much bad luck we've had with the shuttle projects, I wouldn't be surprised if there was a good deal of drug use happening there though. Probably not crack.
Plain, honest English only works if you're not a congenital mental defective. The questions you pose indicate much bigger issues than just computer literacy.
Microsoft has a recommended maintenance path. And yes... the sales people are sorely lacking in informing their customers about this. Microsoft should crack the whi[ even harder and make sure that any business selling their products are required to inform their customers about Windows Update and offer services to configure it for the customer at no charge.
You can easily replace "hard drive" with "computer" and the user should understand.
Zombie is just a colloquialism at this point within the "net community". Even the lowest on the food chain "get " the concept even if they've never heard it before.
The "Why does this have to be so hard? Can't you just do it for me? You know computers, right" gripes are just indicative of the fact that computers are not simple machines like I stated originally. I'd tell people who said that to get a Mac or an appliance.
Personally, I use Cygwin OpenSSH and VNC to provide my family and friends with remote assistance. They connect to my SSH server with the click of an icon and it establishes a reverse tunnel so I can access their machines with VNC. Last week, I got a call from my father-in-law who had some really screwy thing happen with his WordPerfect window. He couldn't describe the problem with enough detail and he has difficulty with the layered window concept, so I told him to just double click the two icons on his quick launch bar and then I got in with VNC from my Linux box. His problem was solved in about 5 minutes. For those of us with the ability, it's better to build your own support package with Free/Open tools (come on, it's easy!) and then provide that to your family and friends. You'll rarely have to leave your house to help them.
Subject: New computer virus is attacking all home computers that run Windows and that have internet access.
Q. Are you affected? A. You may be affected if your system is a Windows system purchased after 8/1/2000 and you haven't done any Microsoft recommended maintenance on it.
Q. What can happen if I get infected? A. This virus will allow the programmer who wrote the virus to open all confidential information stored on your computer's hard drive. This includes personal e-mail, all history of web sites that you've visited (yes, even THOSE websites), any personal documents you may have created (word processor, spread sheet, database, photos, etc...). It also turns your computer into a "zombie" that is used to send junk e-mail (spam).
Q. What happens if I ignore this problem? A. The people responsible for creating this virus may gain the ability to delete or destroy all of your confidential data. If your system is being used as a "zombie" to send junk e-mail, your internet sevice may cut you off until the problem is resolved.
Q. How do I know if I am infected? A. Consider paying a professional to check your system for you. If you are infected, the cost of bringing your system back to a secure and usable condition may be very high. After that expense, consider it the cost of learning that it's cheaper to prevent the problem to begin with by maintaining your system. You get oil changes for your car, right? You cleanse your toilet bowl, correct? same thing... Maintina your computer either by learning how to do it, or paying someone to do it for you.
Computers are not simple machines. This problem is here for a good long while until the approach shfts.
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Who cares about what the users want? They can barely keep their asses clean, and you want to build a UI around what they want??? This is a UI that give people what they NEED. There is an important distinction made here. The machines are tools. They are supposed to make life easier for people. The best way to make life easier for some is to give them what they need, not what they want. An alcoholic might want booze, but what he needs is coffee and a good kick in the ass and constant reminder of why he is a failure as long as he drinks. This is what a good UI/machine will do for the user. The user may not like it, but that's their tough luck. ;P
I don't care how strong a bloke's arm is, there comes a point in time when, no matter how hard he throws a dart, gravity is going to win. :P
...I want to say I hate CDs and DVDs. Back when I was a teen, I could go to the record store and buy used vinyl for $4-6 a pop. That meant that I could save up three weeks allowance and buy up to three albums. It was a lot of fun. Then along came CDs and newer releases weren't being traded in as quickly. This meant I had to buy new CDs instead of used initially. And... one new CD would cost me $21 to $27. That sucked. The music industry FORCED people to move to a new medium even if they didn't want to. So screw you once for that RIAA.
:)
Now, more on topic: I haven't had the problems you mention with DVDs other than with software based players. My first DVD player was a Creative Labs DXR-2 kit that had a hardware decoder that did an overlay on the computer desktop. It worked most of the time and was certainly cheaper than buying a stand alone DVD player at the time (1997). But, every so often my friend would bring a movie over and I wouldn't be able to play it. I only used this setup under Windows 95 on a Pentium 100, so I can't tell if it was OS related, driver related, software related or hardware related. I'll never know because I chucked the system.
My next DVD player was a software based player that came bundled with a cheap DVD drive ($79). It was the Cybervision PowerDVD. I used this for quite a few years on a Windows 98 system (P III 600). It worked OK for almost every disc. Occasionally it would crash in the middle of playback, but I am most certain that this was an OS issue due to the nature of the blue screen of death I would always get.
Soon after I started experimenting with Linux as a media PC OS in 2000, I tried Ogle and used that for quite some time with no problem. Then I moved to MPlayer which I only ran into a few discs that wouldn't play. (In retrospect, I think I didn't wait long enough for the disc to decrypt) And I finally got my full Linux based home theater PC working just a few months ago, this time choosing to go with the latest Xine (1.0 dontcha know?) which works SO well it even ignores region encoding and the on-the-fly PAL to NTSC conversion works just great on a Celeron 1.7 GHz. I can't wait to check out the new series of Doctor Who on DVD when BBC releases it this summer/fall.
I've never had a standalone DVD player because I think until the past year or two, they've been too expensive for what they do. The new $40 jobs are more on par with what the player should cost, but the quality is pretty low and you still don't get much of a decent feature set. I'm still wondering why no one puts an ethernet jack on a DVD player and the ability to stream the DVD with live transcoding so that you can watch discs on any device that is networked. Oh well... like the RIAA, the MPAA will never "get it".
What the hell does this mean? Did SCO try to pull a fast one and get stopped? Or is SCO attempting to give up because they know they don't have a case but the judge is putting their feet to the fire? Seriously, what's with the legal mumbo-jumbo on /.? We aren't legal professionals. Just give it to us in plain english for god's sake!
Why do you think I posted it? ;P When I troll, (I am not really a troll) it is always my hope that the myriad responses will get modded up as +n Funny.
Stop it! It's starting to sound like OOP all over again! Agggghhhh my brain hurts!!! ;p
Only REAL women can freeze light. ;P
Microsoft will never put a dent in the audience of people made up of people like me.
:)
I'm not your average user or admin. I'm an artist first and a computer guy second. Therefore, I need maximum flexibility in the tools that I use. Microsoft Windows cannot provide this because until recently, they've ignored the art community and instead focused solely on business. They've also ignored the needs of people who want to do more with their computer than just buy software and install it. Some people try to belittle this audience as "computer hobbiest" and relegate them to a very small group who do little to further technology. But the, so called, hobbiests are the people who cause technology revolutions. Steve Wozniak did it with the Apple Computer. Linus Torvalds with the Linux kernel. And people like Adam Curry with iPodder.
Microsoft and it's supporters make the mistake of thinking that people like us aren't worth supporting by making a truly flexible and hackable OS + applications. The most important people in technology are the tweakers. The people who will take something apart and rebuild it so it's faster, better or just more fun. Microsoft doesn't allow for that and has therefore lost me as a customer/user. And even when I did use Windows full time all I ever did was gripe about how much it sucked and prevented me from doing what I wanted to do. Linux changed all that.
I've not had good experience with Sun support, especially where iPlanet Mess is concerned.
...I can play Unreal 2k4 and Doom 3 with my ATI Radeon All-in-wonder. It's not X.org's fault though. It's ATI's fault because they are idiot arrogant bastards who won't release specs. I have two of those cards and they are sitting in boxes because there is no really good X driver that supports 3D acceleration. I've had to go over to the dark side and buy NVidia cards (they are the dark side because they killed off 3DFX who WAS Linux friendly). That's my only option though. Either that or just don't play the games. As it is right now, I only have one Windows box at home and it's probaby going to disappear in about a year. (Thanks to the Fedora crew!)
I can't wait to see idiot racists get pissed when they find out great-great-great-great-great-great-grandma was asian, african or even GASP semite. As much as people don't want to know... the truth needs to be told, we're all mutts. There is no "master race".
Sir. I fail to see how .Net (not the TLD) and IDE drive interphaces have anything to do with one another. But I digest...
.Net offer? A single platform which is really just a hodgepodge of old APIs that have been reorganized and renamed into catchy new names. It is obvious that most developers are abandoning .Net simply because it still falls under the limita[tt]ions of the APIs it is based on. There was a notable developer who wrote a column on .Net who recently ended his column by saying that .Net offers nothing new over older APIs and in fact still shows many of the ill-thought signatures of Visual Basic development! Is that what you really want to bank your life on? Is there anyone with a sane mind who would invest their development into a platform that is nothing more than Visual Basic with a few APIs borrowed from other MS languages? I think not. .Net will fail where Firefox will take the world by storm. Firefox is, was and always shall be forevermore the platfrom to end all platforms! There will be a loud crack of thunder in the skies of IT and a rain of cleansing shall pour down upon the keyboards of developers everywhere!!! And the Fox in the sky shall also say unto them, "Put down the Paxil laced Kool-Ade that the Gates has given you and drink from the fresh rain of enlightment that cometh from the sky of Mozilla"! Then a wheel shall appear in the sky resembling that of the Netscape Navigator and it shall be told to all that this is as it was foretold in the book of development! And Stallman shall rise in the clouds sourrounded by cherubs singing verses and his mouth shall open and he will utter forth, "I am the 1 and the 0"! And so shall it be. Go forth in peace and spread the word of Firefox. For thou hast been annointed.
XUL and the Firefox Chrome afford every developer on every platform the ability to build robust and static apps on a widely dispersed and growing platform. I can see a day when all computer programs run on Firefox. And what does
Man am I thirsty.
I sure don't think so. As long as computer systems and their security are incredibly complex mechanisms that only a fraction of the people on the planet can operate, we're going to be in this boat. Sit down and think for a minute. In the past (long before computers) confidential and valuable information or posessions were stored by trusted sources. Banks, legal firms, certain museums, etc... They all were more than capable of protecting valuable information or posessions from theft. The occasional break in would happen, but not anywhere near the frequency that we see computer systems being compromised. And who was responsible for security in those insititutions? Did we have security staff that went to college and were learned in maths and science? Were the lawyers who protected secrets expert lock smiths and did they have break-in drills to hone their security? No.
So how did we survive all those centuries without the need for the kind of security practices we see as a requirement today? I'll [tt]ell you how... the systems that secured the information or posessions were built with security in mind. A bank vault, for instance, isn't going to be made out of glass, ceramic or some other easily penetrable substance (like certain biological orifices). When it came to the legal profession in the past, there were stronger barriers to entry. Those barriers, for the most part, ensured the integrity of the people who entered into the profession. Again, for legal professionals of the past, confidentiality was assured as far as can be since we are all human.
The plain truth that no one wants to acknowledge is that computers are not secure by nature. The OS or hardware platforms all have faults (with the possible exception of OpenVMS on Alphas). What is needed is a completely new hardware and OS platform that is built completely with security in mind. A system where the hardware platform has restrictions built in that only allow proper access through only one channel. Just a vault only has one door, so too should a system, that is storing sensitive data. This should be implemented in hardware BEFORE the OS.
Why isn't this happening? Because it's not profitable enough. There isn't enough demand for this kind of system yet, and there won't be demand until the businesses are made to acknowledge that these kinds of break ins are unacceptable.
There are a lot of communities working on wide area wireless projects and free municipal hot spots. But the biggest problem with a lot of them is that the PR just isn't that good. You can put up all the WiFi and WiMax sigs you want all over the city, but "joe average" is not going to understand. My proof? Just the other day I was talking to a very intelligent professional and I told him about the free hotspot that is located in the "Reading Garden" of the Cleveland Public Library. He was VERY intrigued. (ie. there are potential users out there who would love to get on this thing) But, he then asked me if his modem in his laptop would work with it. Therein lies the problem. As an industry, IT people are very poor at communicating concepts like this to users.
Choosing the name "Wireless" or "WiFi" for short range wireless networks was poor. The average person isn't going to "get it". We would have been better off if they were called "Cordless Internet Bases". This way they would have some clue that this thing isn't long range and requires some kind of reciever with an antenna on it. Just like a Cordless Phone Base. And WiMax should have been called something more like "Cellular High Speed Internet Access". and Cell Phone Modem connections should be called "Cell Phone Dial-up". I think part of the problem is that the marketers like "whiz bang" terms with cool factor appeal. Marketing something as an 802.11b access point lacks any way of making it stylish. But creating a logo and mainstream name that doesn't relate to anything else that is already similar is a bad move too. We need to find a better way...
It looks to me like the days of the Microsoft monopoly are at an end. They are quickly losing market share because they made the mistake of thinking that their monopoly status ensures their hold on most computer users. Their IE 7 release is going to be a little too li[tt]le a little too late. And with .Net falling out of favor with most developers (nay, never having gotten favor in the first place)... I believe that the dark clouds for MS approach.
The open source revolution has fired yet another salvo at the hegemony that is MS. Firefox was the the harbinger and now this new approach of treating Firefox as a platform is going to steal the thunder from under MS for sure. Imagine a day when all applications on your PC are Firefox based web services and they work on ALL platforms. The OS no longer matters to the end user since it's just support for the browser platform. And once those apps are ubiquitous, the move to a better platform (like Linux or *BSD) will be easy. When vendors start offering these alternative OSes per-installed and secured, the end user will have cheaper options with better performance. HP has already lead the charge by selling new systems with FreeDOS on them. Why do they do this? So that the end user is free to install whatever OS they want on the box without paying the MS tax.
The end approacheth. I can hear the hooves of the angry peasants as they apprach the gate of Gates' empire with torches and pitchforks. The evil that has gripped the computer world for far too long is surely to be ousted in short order! Victory is at hand!!!
Does anyone know where I can get a good chili dog for lunch in Clevo?
I'd be surprised if my ISP (Speakeasy) signs on for this kind of corporate fascism. I'll make the statement up front that I don't pirate music or movies. But I have high bandwidth usage a lot because I tunnel multiple networks through my home in order to keep connected with family and friends. Many times, they are streaming content that I provide privately over SSL tunnels. So even though my usage is high, I'm not doing anything illegal. An ISP would have to be completely braindead to accept this kind of policy. But I'm sure there will be some major ones that WILL sign on to this criminal behavior. If only to make a statement for their owning corporate parents. What next? Are we going to need licenses to serve out content above a certain bendwidth level? Idiots. They are all complete idiots. I'd like to meet s few in person so I could very physically express my opinion of this garbage on them (err... I mean) too them.
At first I thought this was an Ask Slashdot question that got a little out of hand. ;P
How does someone think they can get away with something like that? This guys exemplifies the worst outcome of capitalism. He wanted money, he had a product (which wasn't his) and he found a buyer, and by god he was going to make a profit! I hope they lock him up in ass raping prison for a decade or two. Someone who thinks they should be able to make money any way they see fit is a dangerous person.
Yup. You're in the visually challenged group of people who don't "get it". Congrats comrade on being a good citizen of the state! Err... I mean, congratulations on being a good American.
(Who needs "in Soviet Russia" when you live in a truly evil empire?)
Because most of America is populated by illogical fools who fear change and don't see the value in practicality when it upsets long held convention. When they were considering color for our bills recently, they only wound up adding a slight hint of color. The reason why? Well, according to what I've read, the decision was made because the U.S. treasury was told by what amounts to a marketing group, that Americans think of money as green. I was livid when I heard this because I'd just come back from Australia and I think they have gorgeous bills (nice colors and a clear plastic section for anti-counterfeiting measures). A lot of idiots here will say that it doesn't matter what color money is as long as it has value, which may be true, but jesus people! Get a fucking sense of style!
Hello braindead individual. It's time to pull out your feeding tube.
Right wing or left wing bias in news media is unwelcome to anyone who actually thinks. The only job that jounralism has is to present the basic information and let people form their own opinions. This is not what happens today. Instead, opinions get presented as facts. And idiots who don't think take these opinions and treat them like the final word from supposed authorities. The sad part is that there is damn little that can be done about it. You really can't trust many sources of information right now because it's become all too easy to turn lies into plausible situations thanks to technology and years of building very cunning strategies to manipulate people with. Couple all that with people who want to control your opinion for a profit motive (yea capitliasm!) and you have a media monster that is unstoppable and uncontrolable.
A lot of people expected the internet to democratize society and the media a good deal. It was supposed to result in the end-user becoming the producer. But then we have the problem of determining how authoritative a source is. ANYONE can put up a blog and claim to have inside information or breaking news. The fakest of the fake get weeded out, but the best bloggers and alternative news sources have a way of making their take on a story both very convoluted and plausible. It's next to impossible to discern between truth and convenient misdirection. You read these blogs and "insider" news sites and then you think, "Hmmm... that sounds right". Then you read the other side and if you're a level headed and unbaised person you think "Hmmmm... that sounds right too". Only one side has to be closer to the truth, but good luck figuring out which. Especially since many of the things discussed involve people and places you will never personally meet or visit. Without being there or seeing something for yourself, you're always at a disadvantage.
News media is screwed by technology and paid strategists. The only way to really know the truth about things is to actually witness everything yourself. However, in many cases you can't because you're not privvy to the information. For example, how many of us could have actually walked into Terri Shiavo's hospital room and attempted to get her to smile or utter a sound? I'd guess that would be a big fat zero. On the other hand we could buy into the other side of the story that says she's been brain dead (like most people here in the U.S.) for a very long time. But that requires faith in the source of that inforrmation. Somewhere in that mess is truth. But I'll be damned if I take a side on that story because there just isn't enough reliable information from either side to convince me one way or the other. I've seen the video of her, I've read the medical reports. Too much dissonance.
It's a case of too many questions and everyone with an agenda (which is to keep you blinded to certain facts). This is the case with every major news story that impacts you indirectly. You can chose to take a side (which is stupid these days) or you can deeply research things on your own (which many of us don't have time for) or you can just ignore it all and hole up in your house. These days, I read a lot and then decide that there is no truth in the media for either side. There are bits and pieces but they are hand picked and packaged to fit the ideologies that the U.S. and many other parts of the world have been manipulated into siding with.
Gore's plan sounds interesting on the surface, but it will likely be too much work for the majority of Americans who despise the act of thinking and prefer to have their ideas spoon fed to them. There is no generation that is interested in multiple simultaneous media mostly because most people don't want to be made to think. Most people don't want to be aware of just how bad things are for some people. It's too disappointing and frightening because it makes the world that surround you personally very fragile. If you make people aware of the fragility of their comfortable lives, they will attack you just like Gollum attacks when someone tries to keep him from his "precious". Sad. Really, really sad.
...but, I swear when I read the headline that they meant that crack (as in crack cocaine) was found in the shuttle tank. I was trying to figure out how someone who would have crack would even gain access to where the shuttle tanks are kept. I also got this mental image of a seedy character dropping a few rocks into this very large, very smooth metal container. Considering how much bad luck we've had with the shuttle projects, I wouldn't be surprised if there was a good deal of drug use happening there though. Probably not crack.
Yeah... there ARE "THOSE" people to take into account. [shudder]
Plain, honest English only works if you're not a congenital mental defective. The questions you pose indicate much bigger issues than just computer literacy.
Microsoft has a recommended maintenance path. And yes... the sales people are sorely lacking in informing their customers about this. Microsoft should crack the whi[ even harder and make sure that any business selling their products are required to inform their customers about Windows Update and offer services to configure it for the customer at no charge.
You can easily replace "hard drive" with "computer" and the user should understand.
Zombie is just a colloquialism at this point within the "net community". Even the lowest on the food chain "get " the concept even if they've never heard it before.
The "Why does this have to be so hard? Can't you just do it for me? You know computers, right" gripes are just indicative of the fact that computers are not simple machines like I stated originally. I'd tell people who said that to get a Mac or an appliance.
Personally, I use Cygwin OpenSSH and VNC to provide my family and friends with remote assistance. They connect to my SSH server with the click of an icon and it establishes a reverse tunnel so I can access their machines with VNC. Last week, I got a call from my father-in-law who had some really screwy thing happen with his WordPerfect window. He couldn't describe the problem with enough detail and he has difficulty with the layered window concept, so I told him to just double click the two icons on his quick launch bar and then I got in with VNC from my Linux box. His problem was solved in about 5 minutes. For those of us with the ability, it's better to build your own support package with Free/Open tools (come on, it's easy!) and then provide that to your family and friends. You'll rarely have to leave your house to help them.
...write the warnings in plain, honest English:
Subject: New computer virus is attacking all home computers that run Windows and that have internet access.
Q. Are you affected?
A. You may be affected if your system is a Windows system purchased after 8/1/2000 and you haven't done any Microsoft recommended maintenance on it.
Q. What can happen if I get infected?
A. This virus will allow the programmer who wrote the virus to open all confidential information stored on your computer's hard drive. This includes personal e-mail, all history of web sites that you've visited (yes, even THOSE websites), any personal documents you may have created (word processor, spread sheet, database, photos, etc...). It also turns your computer into a "zombie" that is used to send junk e-mail (spam).
Q. What happens if I ignore this problem?
A. The people responsible for creating this virus may gain the ability to delete or destroy all of your confidential data. If your system is being used as a "zombie" to send junk e-mail, your internet sevice may cut you off until the problem is resolved.
Q. How do I know if I am infected?
A. Consider paying a professional to check your system for you. If you are infected, the cost of bringing your system back to a secure and usable condition may be very high. After that expense, consider it the cost of learning that it's cheaper to prevent the problem to begin with by maintaining your system. You get oil changes for your car, right? You cleanse your toilet bowl, correct? same thing... Maintina your computer either by learning how to do it, or paying someone to do it for you.
Computers are not simple machines. This problem is here for a good long while until the approach shfts.