"How many college students do you know that use a spread sheet or database (access)???"
Spread sheet? Almost all of them. I know fewer people who use PowerPoint than who use Excel, particularly on a regular basis. Those people I know who didn't use excel used something as a substitute--Mesa or OO.o.
Of course, I majored in mathematics at an engineering university, but the point remains that spreadsheets are an enormously useful and popular app, especially among college students.
"Experience thinkers go well beyond your primitive and immature logic. It is well known that in a universe of practically infinite time that all numbers less than infinity might as well be 1."
No no no.
First of all, if an event happens an infinite number of times the probability might as well be one--somewhere in that set of infinite times.
Unfortunately, we don't have an infinite series of events. The only one we can demonstrate is... this one. There is not, to my knowledge, any evidence of alternate universes (thus the existence of other such events is a matter of faith), and even within this universe the life span on this universe is not infinite--it both started and has a terminus (heat death, for all intents and purposes).
The problem with "monkeys with typewriters" theories is that we often have no evidence that an infinite (or even a sufficiently large) number of monkeys exist and they almost never have an infinite amount of time to work.
""" If two lines are drawn which intersect a third in such a way that the sum of the inner angles on one side is less than two right angles, then the two lines inevitably must intersect each other on that side if extended far enough. This postulate is equivalent to what is known as the parallel postulate. """
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/EuclidsPostulates.h tm l
>You can spend time on/. and not do it yourself?...because I consider my time on/. better spent on/. than working with a group of people who appear to be hostile towards their user base (whether such is actually the case is irrelevant) on a product I don't and--unless it comes a very long way from where it is now and even then--will probably never use?
I appreciate what the people at NeoOffice/J are doing and the time they put into producing this software, but it is up to them to make their product desirable to me, not up to me to make their product desirable to others.
...and if I purchase music through them how much money goes to the artist?
First impressions from a MacOS X User
on
AbiWord 2.2 Unleashed
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Before we begin, let me emphasize that I have no strong need for a word processor, using various LaTeX tools when I need something high level and professional, and only keep a word processor around for opening other people's documents and quick/small work. When I do use one, Mellel is generally my word processor of choice.
I don't use MS Word.
A word processor for me has to integrate pretty seamlessly with the operating system--it has to look and feel like a MacOS X application--so I focused on where AbiWord falls short of that mark in this review.
Using it on a 12" PowerBook:
* It initially takes up an enormous amount of screen real-estate, with the main window stretching down into my dock where I have to move the window to get to it.
* Korean input was a little funky compared to normal MacOS X entry. It showed up okay, but the intermediate steps don't display.
* The same appears to be true of all special character/multi-key entry (such as option-e e to generate an accented e). The end result shows up fine, but the intermediary display for what I am doing is nonexistent.
* The initial display of the tool palette is largely redundant with the tool bars.
* Slow when on a highish processor load. I type text and it hesitates a moment before displaying it. This is noticeably worse than the rest of the system under the same load.
* Some standard command keys do not work as they should (e.g., command-t). Others are just strange (command-. is "paste unformatted").
* Highlighting is strange, reversing the color of the highlighted text. It also feels slow and clunky.
* On the plus side, it now seems to use the system dictionary for spelling, which is a Good Thing™.
* It doesn't support drag-and-drop from the desktop or to other apps.
* It doesn't always like pasting PDF clips copied out from other documents (namely TeXShop).
* Nonstandard save dialogue that gives options "No" [space] "Yes" and "Cancel" with the default going to "Cancel."
Solid, they've made a lot of improvement since I last used it (particularly on MacOS X), but it isn't there yet.
The 68040 uses an entirely different instruction set and has a different processor architecture from what *any* of the code in MacOS X is compiled for.
It would be impossible to run MacOS X on a 68040 on it *without* some form of emulation.
a) If they can't balance a checkbook, then they probably shouldn't be voting for someone to balance a nation's economy.
b) The Best Solution™ is for it to be automated. You push the buttons/screen, and it automatically inserts the count, preferably in a way that a computer can check to automatically verify the checksum.
Approval voting doesn't give you a certain number of points to spread around, it simply lists the candidates and can be checked "yes or no' for each candidate.
Thus, if you *really* want Kerry, you can still only give him one vote, if you *really* don't want Bush, you can only withhold from him one vote.
More importantly, you can do that without "wasting the vote" on a third party: Let's say that I want Badnarik to win, but--more to the point--I want Bush to lose and can live with Kerry, who I consider more likely to defeat Bush. Under approval voting, I vote "yes" for both Badnarik and Kerry.
This doesn't represent my preference for Badnarik over Kerry, but it is a much more robust system than "point allocation," Borda voting, or "first past the post" that are too prone to tactical voting. It is also very simple, easy to implement, easy to explain, and people who try and cast a vote as if it were the current system will still cast a valid ballot.
We've been dealing with this for years in the computer world using checksums. I don't see why that wouldn't work here.
For instance, let's say we have a punch card ballot with a machine operating it. It marks each person you wanted to vote for, then it marks *the number of people voted for*.
Suddenly, it is easy to detect tampering. People can still invalidate the vote, but they can do that when there is only one hole in the card as well by punching another one for another candidate.
That is, of course, assuming that a punch card is actually used. Printed bar codes, etc, are also options.
Apple's marketing research showed that 50% of households had at least one amateur musician in them. Someone who practiced with at least one instrument.
Considering that it is a minimal cost to bundle it with the computer (which is all that they do, not with the OS), why not throw it in as an added nicety for those who might use it?
How many people in the United States have died of terrorism in the last 20 years?
How many people in the United States have died of heart disease?
How many people in the United States have died in car-related accidents?
How many have been murdered?
Re:Hate to toot someone else's horn..
on
No Noise PC Reviewed
·
· Score: 2, Informative
>They do have fans, but they are rarely on during normal use
No kidding. I had owned mine for a year before it ever kicked on and when it did it scared me to death the first time I heard it. "What the hell is THAT?!?!?"
* Does not contain or rely on biometrics. Generally can change, and once copied/forged one can never change the identifying information.
As someone else point out, it would be a pretty poor passport or drivers license that didn't have a photo on it. That's a biometric identification.
Your credit cards have a place for your signature on the back. *That's* a biometric identification as well.
Remember, two out of three is minimal for good security: Something you have, something you are, something you know. Sure, I would never use a retinal scanner or fingerprint reader by itself or in combination with another form of biometric, but combine it with a card or a password and we are getting somewhere--particularly if we have a guard standing there to watch for shenanigans.
What security experts object to is treating the biometric as a silver bullet, not in the use of biometrics in and of themselves.
Alchemy is often unfairly maligned as it essentially *became* chemistry. They were working from a set of assumptions, such as the mutability of the atom through chemical means, that we *now* know to be false, but they had no way of knowing back then.
By the standards of 300 years from now, I'm sure our science will seem downright primitive and "unscientific" in comparison.
Re:Hey, yet another way to make MREs more disgusti
on
Just Add, Umm, Water
·
· Score: 2, Funny
There was already a reason they are called Meals Refused by Ethiopians...
Slashdot Mirror
What is this, the "if I don't know the answer I'll just make stuff up" school of trolling?
Have you tried Aabel (for multivariate work) or Prism?
"How many college students do you know that use a spread sheet or database (access)???"
Spread sheet? Almost all of them. I know fewer people who use PowerPoint than who use Excel, particularly on a regular basis. Those people I know who didn't use excel used something as a substitute--Mesa or OO.o.
Of course, I majored in mathematics at an engineering university, but the point remains that spreadsheets are an enormously useful and popular app, especially among college students.
"Experience thinkers go well beyond your primitive and immature logic. It is well known that in a universe of practically infinite time that all numbers less than infinity might as well be 1."
No no no.
First of all, if an event happens an infinite number of times the probability might as well be one--somewhere in that set of infinite times.
Unfortunately, we don't have an infinite series of events. The only one we can demonstrate is... this one. There is not, to my knowledge, any evidence of alternate universes (thus the existence of other such events is a matter of faith), and even within this universe the life span on this universe is not infinite--it both started and has a terminus (heat death, for all intents and purposes).
The problem with "monkeys with typewriters" theories is that we often have no evidence that an infinite (or even a sufficiently large) number of monkeys exist and they almost never have an infinite amount of time to work.
Was Henry Ford innovative?
Let's pick a little less trivial than identity.
h tm l
Euclid's Fifth postulate, for example:
"""
If two lines are drawn which intersect a third in such a way that the sum of the inner angles on one side is less than two right angles, then the two lines inevitably must intersect each other on that side if extended far enough. This postulate is equivalent to what is known as the parallel postulate.
"""
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/EuclidsPostulates.
>Forget the WMA, most iRiver players are FREE OF DRM.
Most of my library is encoded in 192 kbps AAC and is completely free of DRM.
>You can spend time on /. and not do it yourself? ...because I consider my time on /. better spent on /. than working with a group of people who appear to be hostile towards their user base (whether such is actually the case is irrelevant) on a product I don't and--unless it comes a very long way from where it is now and even then--will probably never use?
I appreciate what the people at NeoOffice/J are doing and the time they put into producing this software, but it is up to them to make their product desirable to me, not up to me to make their product desirable to others.
...and if I purchase music through them how much money goes to the artist?
Before we begin, let me emphasize that I have no strong need for a word processor, using various LaTeX tools when I need something high level and professional, and only keep a word processor around for opening other people's documents and quick/small work. When I do use one, Mellel is generally my word processor of choice.
I don't use MS Word.
A word processor for me has to integrate pretty seamlessly with the operating system--it has to look and feel like a MacOS X application--so I focused on where AbiWord falls short of that mark in this review.
Using it on a 12" PowerBook:
* It initially takes up an enormous amount of screen real-estate, with the main window stretching down into my dock where I have to move the window to get to it.
* Korean input was a little funky compared to normal MacOS X entry. It showed up okay, but the intermediate steps don't display.
* The same appears to be true of all special character/multi-key entry (such as option-e e to generate an accented e). The end result shows up fine, but the intermediary display for what I am doing is nonexistent.
* The initial display of the tool palette is largely redundant with the tool bars.
* Slow when on a highish processor load. I type text and it hesitates a moment before displaying it. This is noticeably worse than the rest of the system under the same load.
* Some standard command keys do not work as they should (e.g., command-t). Others are just strange (command-. is "paste unformatted").
* Highlighting is strange, reversing the color of the highlighted text. It also feels slow and clunky.
* On the plus side, it now seems to use the system dictionary for spelling, which is a Good Thing™.
* It doesn't support drag-and-drop from the desktop or to other apps.
* It doesn't always like pasting PDF clips copied out from other documents (namely TeXShop).
* Nonstandard save dialogue that gives options "No" [space] "Yes" and "Cancel" with the default going to "Cancel."
Solid, they've made a lot of improvement since I last used it (particularly on MacOS X), but it isn't there yet.
" Athlon64, 512MB RAM and an ATI 9600 Mobile. I bought a 15" AlBook with an ATI 9700/128MB RAM."
128 MB with WoW *and* MacOS X? You should have at *least* 512 MB, preferably more.
The 68040 uses an entirely different instruction set and has a different processor architecture from what *any* of the code in MacOS X is compiled for.
It would be impossible to run MacOS X on a 68040 on it *without* some form of emulation.
exp( pi*i ) + 1 = 0
phi^n = F(n) * phi + F(n-1)
\Delta p \Delta x \ge \frac{h}{4\pi}
\frac{ \partial^2 f }{ \partial x^2 } + \frac{ \partial^2 f }{ \partial y^2 } + \frac{ \partial^2 f }{ \partial z^2 } = 0
What was the cost of the operating system on top of that?
* You are comparing a single processor machine with a duel processor machine (compare an Opteron).
* Your case is not comparable, the G5 case (and internal design) is much nicer.
* Your RAM type doesn't match what the motherboard supports.
* DIY vs. Pre-built.
a) If they can't balance a checkbook, then they probably shouldn't be voting for someone to balance a nation's economy.
b) The Best Solution™ is for it to be automated. You push the buttons/screen, and it automatically inserts the count, preferably in a way that a computer can check to automatically verify the checksum.
That's not approval voting.
Approval voting doesn't give you a certain number of points to spread around, it simply lists the candidates and can be checked "yes or no' for each candidate.
Thus, if you *really* want Kerry, you can still only give him one vote, if you *really* don't want Bush, you can only withhold from him one vote.
More importantly, you can do that without "wasting the vote" on a third party: Let's say that I want Badnarik to win, but--more to the point--I want Bush to lose and can live with Kerry, who I consider more likely to defeat Bush. Under approval voting, I vote "yes" for both Badnarik and Kerry.
This doesn't represent my preference for Badnarik over Kerry, but it is a much more robust system than "point allocation," Borda voting, or "first past the post" that are too prone to tactical voting. It is also very simple, easy to implement, easy to explain, and people who try and cast a vote as if it were the current system will still cast a valid ballot.
We've been dealing with this for years in the computer world using checksums. I don't see why that wouldn't work here.
For instance, let's say we have a punch card ballot with a machine operating it. It marks each person you wanted to vote for, then it marks *the number of people voted for*.
Suddenly, it is easy to detect tampering. People can still invalidate the vote, but they can do that when there is only one hole in the card as well by punching another one for another candidate.
That is, of course, assuming that a punch card is actually used. Printed bar codes, etc, are also options.
Apple's marketing research showed that 50% of households had at least one amateur musician in them. Someone who practiced with at least one instrument.
Considering that it is a minimal cost to bundle it with the computer (which is all that they do, not with the OS), why not throw it in as an added nicety for those who might use it?
How many people in the United States have died of terrorism in the last 20 years?
How many people in the United States have died of heart disease?
How many people in the United States have died in car-related accidents?
How many have been murdered?
>They do have fans, but they are rarely on during normal use
No kidding. I had owned mine for a year before it ever kicked on and when it did it scared me to death the first time I heard it. "What the hell is THAT?!?!?"
* Does not contain or rely on biometrics. Generally can change, and once copied/forged one can never change the identifying information.
As someone else point out, it would be a pretty poor passport or drivers license that didn't have a photo on it. That's a biometric identification.
Your credit cards have a place for your signature on the back. *That's* a biometric identification as well.
Remember, two out of three is minimal for good security: Something you have, something you are, something you know. Sure, I would never use a retinal scanner or fingerprint reader by itself or in combination with another form of biometric, but combine it with a card or a password and we are getting somewhere--particularly if we have a guard standing there to watch for shenanigans.
What security experts object to is treating the biometric as a silver bullet, not in the use of biometrics in and of themselves.
Alchemy is often unfairly maligned as it essentially *became* chemistry. They were working from a set of assumptions, such as the mutability of the atom through chemical means, that we *now* know to be false, but they had no way of knowing back then.
By the standards of 300 years from now, I'm sure our science will seem downright primitive and "unscientific" in comparison.
There was already a reason they are called Meals Refused by Ethiopians...
Tell me, how much of that goes to the artists?