I wrote:...Tomb Taider... -----
reply was: Is that a game about dead potatoes? ---
Ok, I'm going to go hide somewhere in shame, just as soon as I stop laughing at myself.
Heck, I've said it before..."I laughed, I cried, I posted to slashdot to show my ignorance."
And my typos... {snicker, chuckle...sniffff...bwaaahahaha}
(the people in the lab are looking at me strangely...as I break out into more peals of laughter... thank you, balthan, you've given me the best chuckle I've had all month. And it is my own stupidity.)
Using that as a segue to put this further on topic I have to say I agree with the majority of the posters so far:
You do sound depressed, if it runs in the family then I advise you to get some form of help.
It may however be "doldrums" or a low point. Get away from programming, because "too much of a good thing" *will* burn you out eventually.
take it from a former webmaster who knows all too well.
There were comments of "Get a girlfriend". I did not want to say it for fear of sounding like a complete arse, but, yeah it is a good idea.
I won't lie, I lucked out when I went into CS and found a *female* geek in a "Computer Logic and Architecture" class.
I'll say it was quite a boost to the grades and a bruise to the ego to have GF/classmate/lover who had more smarts and drive than I did.
In pascal and C/C++ we were dead even ability wise, but in assembler...holy s**t she blew me out of the water.
Sorry for the trip down memory lane, but my point is: before you the follow the advice of "get a girlfriend", consider the question of the type of girlfriend to get:
a) I think the vernacular is "Fsck Buddy"
b) Someone to challenge you and perhaps re-ignite you desire for CS
c) Someone to take your mind off of all things 'puterized.
If you ignore all that, cool, but you are smart for asking here because the best advice is given by strangers.
So as a stranger who has gone through what you are going through now, I say:
1) Finish your degree (you're almost there).
2) Take a break and vegatate for a week (don't think if possible)
3) If you can travel, do so. If you can't afford it, go over to the CIS/MIS dept's...you'll get the same feeling of being in a different world just from hanging around (no offense to CIS/MIS peeps).
However, at the risk of showing my ignorance to the hotrod/street racer scene what I was looking for was; does my post/argument fall apart at any juncture?
I based my analogy on these premises:
Joe Consumer would watch this movie.
(after all, I did too, but as a screener, heh)
JC *most likely* would be a gearhead to some degree.
(Admittadly I was a 'late-bloomer' gearhead wise, so *my* understanding is technically simplistic)
The RPM or 'revs' analogy has been beaten to death (to put it mildly) but degenerates into too technical a debate for Joe Consumer to follow reguardless of it being cars/computers.
(seriously when you say pipelines, l1, l2, trace-cache, sdr/ddr/rd-ram...you get a look of ?WTF? or eyes glaze over or both).
You'd be surprised how many people actually "get-it" when put to them in this way.
Quite simply, most guys, at the very least, appreciate the history of the classic/muscle car, the power, the beauty or just pop a chubby because of what it *is/represents*.
It breaks it down to a simple and visual representation of: P4/Ghz/hi-revs ~= AMD/lower Ghz/med-rev+Hp.
I suppose "we" are looking for a *perfect, simple, clear* example.
When, maybe if, we find it. AMD needs to *use it and _Advertise_*, already!
Heck, *if* my example was good enuf to stand slashdot and legal scrutiny (as well) I'd say to AMD "take it, use it, get 50% market share, then talk to me, 'kay?"
...aside from the fact I'm getting old and don't have a lot of time to waste searching for this stuff over Gnutella/bearshare/morpheus/etc and waiting forever for a file to download.
Cripes, I must be a dinosaur because I still use news servers and the occasional bout on IRC for fills.
I, personally, love it when someone (usually younger than I) says "I got a DivX of {insert name} last nite off of {insert client}".
"Oh, really", is my reply "I got a DivX of {movie a, b, and the first part of c} and a vcd of {movie d and e} last nite".
The looks of sheer bewilderment I get are too funny to describe at times (even from ppl I know to have cable modems).
Just goes to prove the old saying; "it is not the size of the wand (or 'pipe') but the magic in it".
Don't get me wrong, these clients do have their uses, I've used them but I just don't currently have a use/need for them.
Dang...my train of thought slipped the track a little.
I can't wait to see some of these maps and superimpose them over some of the thermographic maps I have available...no reason but investigation and curiosity.
MPAA, RIAA, SSSCA, DMCA (or DCMA if you are a sony employee reading this), PATRIOT....
Now those are things that give me nightmares.
Besides, as a former veteran I've probably been vaccinated for diseases like smallpox, bubonic plague and common sense, you know things that have not existed in the government/military for years.
If you are hungry for knowledge, slashdot is an all you can eat shmorgasboard...woof!
(Still scanning all the pdfs)
Man 'o man this brings back memories.
I remember a discussion on architecture a while back when I was a newbie about which was better; the invariable "CISC vs RISC" discussion that degenerated into a flame war of mac vs pc.
(being a newbie at the time, that was an introduction to what a flame war was. Glad I had the sense to lurk and listen.)
As the discussion raged on with benchmarks of floating point and integer, FLOPS, expandability, usability and so forth, an Alpha user spoke up.
I forget the exact words but it went something like this:
"I've been reading this thread with great amusement for some time, because *everyone* in it points to a single benchmark run one at a time. On the machine I am posting from I run a NNTP server that transfers about 3G a day, an FTP server that does even more serving internally and externally, I'm a mirror for (I forget who he said) and, keep in mind, before posting to this forum, I was playing Quake @ 50fps. When you can do half of what I am doing on your pc's and mac's or even *touch* my frame rate, then we'll talk."
To say the discussion ended abruptly would be an understatement.
As a point of reference it was about 1994 or so and the pentium was maybe at the 100Mhz mark. 3G of data when 500M was an "increadible" amount of space. Getting Quake up to 30fps on your average pc was darn near impossible to mere mortals (much less a newbie such as myself at the time).
After that, well, Alphas have always been awe inspiring because then, like now (reading the specs) these processors are beasts!
And SMP systems that are becoming common today, well, Alphas and Suns were the only ones I was aware of (at the time) capable of such things...or were more common than their mac/pc counterparts.
Aw, man, I've gone on long enough, sorry about that.
/me wipes away a tear. {sniff}
Thanks to all the posters of the specs, it is going to be a few days until I can wipe this stupid grin off my face.
I read my post again and you are correct, in part, about the hot air.
I would have elaborated, however, I had to take care of a corrupted user account on an NT domain being run by a SAMBA server. Redhat 6.X distro that was set up very well, but has its quirks, as do some of the NT boxes.
So, as I said, you are correct that I did not support my argument. I apologise and wish I could have edited the comment for later, but hit submit instead. Rather stupid of me, I suppose.
The answer to your question is:
The campus I work at is moving to Oracle.
My boss said to get it, despite my minor protests that support for Microsoft's SQL server has been/will be dropped on campus.
The GIS apps we use:
a) work only with Microsoft's browser's scripting
b) the SQL server I am building in the future only works (if I remember correctly) with Microsoft's SQL server (or works best with, I'd have to re-read the documentation, again).
I suppose forced is rather strong and inaccurate.
Steered like a piece of cattle is a little more apropos. (Moo?)
Man, I hate you...sheeshe...forcing me to *think for myself* it's so...*difficult* sometimes!
(sheepish grin...that was slightly sarcastic, too, wasn't it? I gotta stop doing that).
As far as not giving examples in my own case, thanks for calling me on it.
But, no example of Microsoft leveraging its dominant market positing, erecting barriers to entry, seemingly inhibiting competition at every turn, creating contracts that lock out competitors, the "bootloader incident", the "extensions incident" and a host of other things brought up (and left out of the trial)?
All I can say is you play an excellent devil's advocate or have no knowledge of what the trial was all about.
Cheers, Zico, you gave me a much needed "mental excercise".
For some odd reason I kept thinking of the phrase I heard in a training seminar: "common sense is seldom common practice".
I give myself as an example of a unix geek running an NT lab and the DOJ snatching defeat from the jaws of victory at the last second.
It all makes perfect sense when you keep that phrase in mind.
Among the utilites mentioned like snort, no one has hit on the actual fingerprinting utilities out there like nmap, nbtscan and something like portsentry.
I forget off the top of my head if portsentry has scriptable events, if it does then the possibility of having a "guarddog" type box would be interesting.
For instance, if attack is detected portsentry and it does its thing by putting the offending adderss in/ect/hosts.deny and rereads hosts.deny and passes the address off to nmap or nbtscan to figure out what the box is running.
Nothing beats calling up an ISP and saying "you have a windows/linux/whatever box probing for webservers/mailservers/(insert service) and is attempting to execute a vulnerability of that service".
Nmap and Nbtscan are excellent utilities, but from using them and playing around, nmap is more of a discovery tool, nbtscan is more of a retalitory tool. Or, at the very least they both can be used as such.
I know from personal experience that nbtscan's default setting (normal, aggressive, insane) is enough to knock a box off of a network.
I scanned my cable modem...had to power down to get back up and knocked my boss off even with his knowledge...only a complete power down would bring the box back on the network.
If you can have a "honeypot" why not a "watchdog" box for computer security?
Has the "security/watchdog" been done before?
The EU said that Microsoft may have used illegal practices to extend its dominance in personal computers into server markets.
Nooo... Ya think?
Ok, I'll admit to flagellating between impressed and suspicious of Microsoft's server products XP. They are both usable and succeptable in just about all definitions of the terms.
As I look around the room, I've got an NT box between my legs (no comments, pls) and 2 redhat server to my left and in back of me and a 2000 server and soon to be SQL box...dominant,no, but encroaching.
I dunno, all server platforms have their place, but the leveraging vs merit and proven ability still disturbs me when considering a majority of Microsoft's products.
And this from someone who as been described as "the most moral person I know, but the least ethical" by his own mother.
Most back handed compliment I've ever had in my life that I take to mean, I know a snake when I see one and will try to protect others from said snake. (meaning my ethics ~= Microsoft's at times, ouch, that hurts to say).
I think in some respects the DOJ was tripped at the finish line...but I think the EU may just be the one to break the tape and show the U.S. how it should be done.
for a "C and L chip"? Heck, if the introduction of a "V" chip for violence was a thought, it should follow (via my leap of logic, mind you) that a 'commercial' and 'logo' chip should also be introduced.
At least on/. you can turn off the pretty pictures if you so desire or use lynx or turn off all grfx (gasp, can we *do that*?) in your browser of choice.
It almost makes me wish that TV's had multiple resolutions...that way if the logo's were superimposed over the video at say "tv's 800x600, then at 1024x768 all we have to do is use a PVR to crop out the 'garbage', yes?"
Some people might think of me as a heretic for suggesting that the web in not really an entertainment medium, that is what TV is for.
But, my argument still holds 'water' with the odd leak even though I've downloaded "Enterprise" episodes I've missed off of Usenet.
Correct me if I am wrong, but Usenet and "the Web" are seperate entities, seperate protocols used over TCP/IP, no?
Is it so far of a stretch to say the same about local stations, versus normal cable versus digital cable?
Or, to be more succinct: The less garbage I see on my screen the better (TV or Web).
And if the networks are so worried about their viewership getting lost in all those channels, how about helping to make the local/national "tv guides" actually be _accurate_ for a change.
I get the feeling that the TV networks think they are losing viewers and don't know why, but the viewers are saying "we hate these logos".
Everyone is talking and no one is listening.
/me shakes head sadly
Then again, in a similar incident with win98, Microsoft actuall *asked* beta testers if they'd like to have I.E. integrated into the OS.
Over 75% said no to I.E. integration...we all know how well that went.
I know I'll wind up sounding like a broken record (a what?), but "history...repeat...history..repeat..."
"Trailer Trash" which is what non Mac OS/QT Pro users must be named.
(I'm not trolling or posting flamebait, people, I made that oddball connection and am still grinning. I hope someone sees the humor in it too).
There is actuall a way to save the trailer even if the ability is disabled...I'll see what I can do about making it into a DivX (now that OS X.1 has ffmpeg to watch DivX's).
Not really, but I laughed at the "ability to make other polygons dead"...that was cute.
I cringed because I had this discussion before with an editor before.
3d, 3D, 3-d all mean (ok, to me) 3 dimensional.
3rd means third, but I was told by this person that to "the average reader 3d means third".
The fact that I laughed at this person did not endear me to them, nor pointing them to 3dfx.com helped much either.
But, I digress.
I thought Rune was a good game, personally.
If my memory is correct, it uses the Unreal (tourney?) Engine.
Good game play and interesting idea in melee combat, but tedious at times.
I did like some of the minor humorous bits sprinkled in. (the fscking lizards on one level gave me a laugh)
The grfx, I have to admit were excellent...remember the original Unreal's first level of looking down the waterfall to the valley below? Even at 640x480 it was absolutely stunning. This is how most of Rune is...just stunning.
I never had the chance to play Rune online, but I have heard it is quite amusing.
So far in my online experience the best replay values so far for online/offline game playing are any Quake (Q3 above all) and a tie between Kingpin and Descent (especially Descent 2) and Carmageddon2.
Personally I think Rune was a Heretic/Hexen wanna be...almost. Sure you could throw hatchets, but it needed more projectile weapons (crossbow (heretic), spear, sling {F.A.K.K2}...something).
Rune like Oni was a good game, but it was such a radical departure from the norm it did not 'trip a lot of people's triggers, literally and figuratively' in the way that Thief did as an "anti-shooter".
I guess it was *too* different, if that is possible.
Considering the last time a topic such as this compared the Intel's best P4 to AMD's best Athlon.
The Car/Engine analogy was used to no end and many valid points were made, but noboday really put it into a conclusive and easy to understand "package" that the Average Joe User could understand.
Recall, if you will, the movie "The Fast and the Furious" as the analogy of Intel vs AMD saga.
Remember the scene at the end with the race between the souped up Honda and the Toranado?
Intel's P4 is akin to the Honda, as it has a lot of "high-RPM's" and "high-tech" under the hood (i.e. 2.X Ghz and Rambus et al).
The Athlon is like the Toranado(?) and American Muscle car that had the "High Torque" and "lower-tech" that relied on brute force (i.e. 'superior' FPU and Large cache and the blower is similar to DDR-SDRAM in a way).
The end result of the race at the end of the movie was that they (for the most part) tied.
The current Intel/AMD debate is very similar, in that you have all this high RPM/low torque (intel) vs old school High Torque/mid RPM's (AMD).
I just checked the register.co.uk and he still seems to be employed there?
Almost sound like a BOFH gag:
User: I need more space in XXXX account.
BOFH: Ok, I just freed up 8M of space.
User: Great, now I have 16M.
BOFH: No, now you have 8M free.
User: Arrrr......!
BOFH: (click).
Do not turn to the Dark Side of the Force...but, hey, the Aqua side ain't so bad!
Really, in the current economic climate, all the monkeys should have been thrown out of the high-tech jobs, leaving only clueful people.
Well, what you said is the working theory, anyway.
Having worked in the corporate world and the academic world this is the furthest from the truth. The people with a clue, ethics, responsability, talent, skills or value customers are usually the first on the chopping block.
After all, the managers making those 5 and 6 figure salaries have to remain employed so they can continue the (vicous) cycle.
Cynical? Oh, yeah, been there, been IT, seen it happen too many times.
Could apple be any different? That is a tough one to answer. I would have to say no, but to a lesser extent, perhaps.
Why to a lesser extent? For the simple reason that Steve Jobs and Lee Iacocoa (sp?) understood two things about running a company/taking over one:
First get everybody on board with a plan to succede/improve morale.
Second (and this is the kickass part) when you clean house *never, ever* get rid of your workers.
Clean up/fire your middle and upper management levels.
This solves 2 problems (imagine a pyramid):
1) when most layoffs happen they happen to the "base of the pyramid". What happens when you weaken the "foundation" of a company/structure.
Yeah, it falls down or does irrepairable damage.
2)Wiping out the middle section brings those "at the top" closer to the base. Most executive understand the "how and what" of a business, but understanding the "who and why" is what keeps thing "moving forward".
If I remember correctly, Lee I was first, and Jobs subscribed to the idea...it may have come from a/. link when Jobs returned to Apple.
Very good interview.
Of course I've always said a "Phd/manager saying 'in theory' is akin to a used car salesman saying 'trust me' ".
I guess in my snide cynicism I found humor in your altruistic logic
I beg to differ. consider the placement of the apple menu in 9.2 vs X.1.
If I "slam" the cursor in the upper left area and click, I get this:
in os 9 a menu drops down.
in os X, nothing happens until I move about 10 pixels to the right....arugh!
Why is this bad/annoying? Because with 'Muscle Memory" when using the mouse I don't have to think, just get "close enough" to do the job.
And the Dock, as Dixie_Flatline pointed out has several good elements (and some annoying ones too). Yes, things shift around, but counter to that is that the are (initially) very large...easy to hit.
Heck, even in OS 9 I *still* look for the dock on occasion.
Close/min/max buttons being on the "wrong" side, per se, is balanced with the red/yellow/green coloration and X, -, + if you don't get the hint (or are color blind).
Some of these things Tog has pointed out about Aqua and the Dock and I might go re-read it. the "why the dock sucks" was one that I agreed with 85% with, now, maybe not so much as initially.
Will there ever be a perfect interface?
I doubt it.
Will there ever be an intuitive interface.
Again, I doubt it.
Will there ever be a perfect, intuitive interface?
Yes, if you choose one of those two adjective.
"For the Birds" was funny...I liked the part with the larger "stork" bird hanging upside down by his toes as the 2 "instigators" were pecking at the stork's toes. The looks on the faces of 1 or 2 of the little birds that "see it coming" when/if the stork lets go of the wire.
Heh, I've seen that look before...like when Flic knocks over the offering...the eyes get real big and the "OooHhhh, Noooo" escapes.
(I found it funny because a recovery disk I used one time did its job *too* well...fdisked 2 drives in a heart beat....I said "ooohh, nooo" just like Flic did. Art imitates life, eh?)
Monsters, Inc. was a very watchable movie and I do recommend it, but it was not as funny as I thought it was going to be.
It was more of a "smirk and chuckle" than a "laugh hysterically" film.
Billy Crystal's voice was a decent choice, but a less grating voice would have been better.
Nathan Lane springs to mind (Timone, from the Lion King). BC and NL have the same vocal qualities, but Lane comes off smoother than Crystal, I think.
The rendering of the characters was excellent and I kept looking for a "beauty shot" like in Shrek (The lady dragon scenes and when Shrek is yelling at the donkey and you see the air moving over the donkey's fur... that kind of detail)
I'm fairly shure those kinds of details are there and maybe I missed them....Oh, wait, the close op of Sully on the closet door trolley (the kind like those found in a dry cleaner?) as he moves through the air. Dang, maybe I'll see it again.
Personally, I wonder what are some of the best voice and screen actors out there.
Goodman is one, Anthony Hopkins is another who should be added to some of these films as well. Hopkins voice on the tapes in "Hannibal" (and in the movie, too) carries such a presence of *evil* much in the same way Goodman's voice carries a feeling of conviviality/joviality and friendlieness.
And Frank Oz's talents did not go unnoticed...if only I could place the voices he applied to which characters. That is a tough one.
Any ideas?
Overall a good movie. I did wish there was more "scenes" like in the trailers and teasers.
A little more for the adult audience due to the "chemistry" that Goodman and Crystal have.
Watch the trailer, then the movie and the "outer Magnolia?, that's outer Mongolia...." bit.
I guess "Who's on First?" spoiled me, sight, sound and voice gags where even if you miss one or two of the pieces it is still funny, reguardless.
Ok, I've have to ask...did things change around again in XP like it did from NT to 2000?
For example, I use key combos and some times quick right clicks and letter keys to get where I am going or need to do.
In Win98 and NT (95 as well) I could hit the right mouse button and "e" for explorer, or r for properties (or "windows key" + E for explorer).
In 2000 (tell me if it is the same in XP, please) if I right click and hit e...nothing that I expect because it is now "x"... also on the several win 2000 installs I had at work hitting "windows key + e" would either give explorer OR some funky, large "open/search" dialog box that reminded me of wordperfect 8's open/save dialogue box.
Wierd...talk about ruining a reasonably consistant interface.
To me it almost seems like making ctrl+c == cut,
ctrl+x == paste and ctrl+v == copy.
No reason, just because kind of "logic".
Really, now, what is the reasoning behind keeping "hotkeys" the same (or shortcuts/menus, for that matter) thru 3 versions only to change it in current versions?
I had to "unlearn" a *lot* of quick contextual menu shortcuts that were invaluable to me.
Now it is *all wrong or different*.
Silly to most, I think, but aggrivated me to no end.
Slashdot Mirror
I wrote:...Tomb Taider...
-----
reply was: Is that a game about dead potatoes?
---
Ok, I'm going to go hide somewhere in shame, just as soon as I stop laughing at myself.
Heck, I've said it before..."I laughed, I cried, I posted to slashdot to show my ignorance."
And my typos... {snicker, chuckle...sniffff...bwaaahahaha}
(the people in the lab are looking at me strangely...as I break out into more peals of laughter... thank you, balthan, you've given me the best chuckle I've had all month. And it is my own stupidity.)
Using that as a segue to put this further on topic I have to say I agree with the majority of the posters so far:
You do sound depressed, if it runs in the family then I advise you to get some form of help.
It may however be "doldrums" or a low point. Get away from programming, because "too much of a good thing" *will* burn you out eventually.
take it from a former webmaster who knows all too well.
There were comments of "Get a girlfriend". I did not want to say it for fear of sounding like a complete arse, but, yeah it is a good idea.
I won't lie, I lucked out when I went into CS and found a *female* geek in a "Computer Logic and Architecture" class.
I'll say it was quite a boost to the grades and a bruise to the ego to have GF/classmate/lover who had more smarts and drive than I did.
In pascal and C/C++ we were dead even ability wise, but in assembler...holy s**t she blew me out of the water.
Sorry for the trip down memory lane, but my point is: before you the follow the advice of "get a girlfriend", consider the question of the type of girlfriend to get:
a) I think the vernacular is "Fsck Buddy"
b) Someone to challenge you and perhaps re-ignite you desire for CS
c) Someone to take your mind off of all things 'puterized.
If you ignore all that, cool, but you are smart for asking here because the best advice is given by strangers.
So as a stranger who has gone through what you are going through now, I say:
1) Finish your degree (you're almost there).
2) Take a break and vegatate for a week (don't think if possible)
3) If you can travel, do so. If you can't afford it, go over to the CIS/MIS dept's...you'll get the same feeling of being in a different world just from hanging around (no offense to CIS/MIS peeps).
Cheers and best wishes, dude!
GISboy.
oh, is that where Tomb Taider came from?
(GISboy ducks and runs)
Very interesting replies I must admit.
However, at the risk of showing my ignorance to the hotrod/street racer scene what I was looking for was; does my post/argument fall apart at any juncture?
I based my analogy on these premises:
Joe Consumer would watch this movie.
(after all, I did too, but as a screener, heh)
JC *most likely* would be a gearhead to some degree.
(Admittadly I was a 'late-bloomer' gearhead wise, so *my* understanding is technically simplistic)
The RPM or 'revs' analogy has been beaten to death (to put it mildly) but degenerates into too technical a debate for Joe Consumer to follow reguardless of it being cars/computers.
(seriously when you say pipelines, l1, l2, trace-cache, sdr/ddr/rd-ram...you get a look of ?WTF? or eyes glaze over or both).
You'd be surprised how many people actually "get-it" when put to them in this way.
Quite simply, most guys, at the very least, appreciate the history of the classic/muscle car, the power, the beauty or just pop a chubby because of what it *is/represents*.
It breaks it down to a simple and visual representation of: P4/Ghz/hi-revs ~= AMD/lower Ghz/med-rev+Hp.
I suppose "we" are looking for a *perfect, simple, clear* example.
When, maybe if, we find it. AMD needs to *use it and _Advertise_*, already!
Heck, *if* my example was good enuf to stand slashdot and legal scrutiny (as well) I'd say to AMD "take it, use it, get 50% market share, then talk to me, 'kay?"
{grin}
Cheers,
GISboy
...aside from the fact I'm getting old and don't have a lot of time to waste searching for this stuff over Gnutella/bearshare/morpheus/etc and waiting forever for a file to download.
Cripes, I must be a dinosaur because I still use news servers and the occasional bout on IRC for fills.
I, personally, love it when someone (usually younger than I) says "I got a DivX of {insert name} last nite off of {insert client}".
"Oh, really", is my reply "I got a DivX of {movie a, b, and the first part of c} and a vcd of {movie d and e} last nite".
The looks of sheer bewilderment I get are too funny to describe at times (even from ppl I know to have cable modems).
Just goes to prove the old saying; "it is not the size of the wand (or 'pipe') but the magic in it".
Don't get me wrong, these clients do have their uses, I've used them but I just don't currently have a use/need for them.
Dang...my train of thought slipped the track a little.
I can't wait to see some of these maps and superimpose them over some of the thermographic maps I have available...no reason but investigation and curiosity.
...get dirty pictures *off* the internet, but to the MPAA or RIAA this would be a dirty picture *of* the internet.
MPAA, RIAA, SSSCA, DMCA (or DCMA if you are a sony employee reading this), PATRIOT....
Now those are things that give me nightmares.
Besides, as a former veteran I've probably been vaccinated for diseases like smallpox, bubonic plague and common sense, you know things that have not existed in the government/military for years.
If you are hungry for knowledge, slashdot is an all you can eat shmorgasboard...woof!
(Still scanning all the pdfs)
Man 'o man this brings back memories.
I remember a discussion on architecture a while back when I was a newbie about which was better; the invariable "CISC vs RISC" discussion that degenerated into a flame war of mac vs pc.
(being a newbie at the time, that was an introduction to what a flame war was. Glad I had the sense to lurk and listen.)
As the discussion raged on with benchmarks of floating point and integer, FLOPS, expandability, usability and so forth, an Alpha user spoke up.
I forget the exact words but it went something like this:
"I've been reading this thread with great amusement for some time, because *everyone* in it points to a single benchmark run one at a time. On the machine I am posting from I run a NNTP server that transfers about 3G a day, an FTP server that does even more serving internally and externally, I'm a mirror for (I forget who he said) and, keep in mind, before posting to this forum, I was playing Quake @ 50fps. When you can do half of what I am doing on your pc's and mac's or even *touch* my frame rate, then we'll talk."
To say the discussion ended abruptly would be an understatement.
As a point of reference it was about 1994 or so and the pentium was maybe at the 100Mhz mark. 3G of data when 500M was an "increadible" amount of space. Getting Quake up to 30fps on your average pc was darn near impossible to mere mortals (much less a newbie such as myself at the time).
After that, well, Alphas have always been awe inspiring because then, like now (reading the specs) these processors are beasts!
And SMP systems that are becoming common today, well, Alphas and Suns were the only ones I was aware of (at the time) capable of such things...or were more common than their mac/pc counterparts.
Aw, man, I've gone on long enough, sorry about that.
/me wipes away a tear. {sniff}
Thanks to all the posters of the specs, it is going to be a few days until I can wipe this stupid grin off my face.
Cheers,
GISboy
Comparing processors to cars...my god who would ever do a thing like that ?
Ah, excellent question.
I read my post again and you are correct, in part, about the hot air.
I would have elaborated, however, I had to take care of a corrupted user account on an NT domain being run by a SAMBA server. Redhat 6.X distro that was set up very well, but has its quirks, as do some of the NT boxes.
So, as I said, you are correct that I did not support my argument. I apologise and wish I could have edited the comment for later, but hit submit instead. Rather stupid of me, I suppose.
The answer to your question is:
The campus I work at is moving to Oracle.
My boss said to get it, despite my minor protests that support for Microsoft's SQL server has been/will be dropped on campus.
The GIS apps we use:
a) work only with Microsoft's browser's scripting
b) the SQL server I am building in the future only works (if I remember correctly) with Microsoft's SQL server (or works best with, I'd have to re-read the documentation, again).
I suppose forced is rather strong and inaccurate.
Steered like a piece of cattle is a little more apropos. (Moo?)
Man, I hate you...sheeshe...forcing me to *think for myself* it's so...*difficult* sometimes!
(sheepish grin...that was slightly sarcastic, too, wasn't it? I gotta stop doing that).
As far as not giving examples in my own case, thanks for calling me on it.
But, no example of Microsoft leveraging its dominant market positing, erecting barriers to entry, seemingly inhibiting competition at every turn, creating contracts that lock out competitors, the "bootloader incident", the "extensions incident" and a host of other things brought up (and left out of the trial)?
All I can say is you play an excellent devil's advocate or have no knowledge of what the trial was all about.
Cheers, Zico, you gave me a much needed "mental excercise".
For some odd reason I kept thinking of the phrase I heard in a training seminar: "common sense is seldom common practice".
I give myself as an example of a unix geek running an NT lab and the DOJ snatching defeat from the jaws of victory at the last second.
It all makes perfect sense when you keep that phrase in mind.
Respectfully,
GISboy
Among the utilites mentioned like snort, no one has hit on the actual fingerprinting utilities out there like nmap, nbtscan and something like portsentry.
/ect/hosts.deny and rereads hosts.deny and passes the address off to nmap or nbtscan to figure out what the box is running.
I forget off the top of my head if portsentry has scriptable events, if it does then the possibility of having a "guarddog" type box would be interesting.
For instance, if attack is detected portsentry and it does its thing by putting the offending adderss in
Nothing beats calling up an ISP and saying "you have a windows/linux/whatever box probing for webservers/mailservers/(insert service) and is attempting to execute a vulnerability of that service".
Nmap and Nbtscan are excellent utilities, but from using them and playing around, nmap is more of a discovery tool, nbtscan is more of a retalitory tool. Or, at the very least they both can be used as such.
I know from personal experience that nbtscan's default setting (normal, aggressive, insane) is enough to knock a box off of a network.
I scanned my cable modem...had to power down to get back up and knocked my boss off even with his knowledge...only a complete power down would bring the box back on the network.
If you can have a "honeypot" why not a "watchdog" box for computer security?
Has the "security/watchdog" been done before?
The EU said that Microsoft may have used illegal practices to extend its dominance in personal computers into server markets.
Nooo... Ya think?
Ok, I'll admit to flagellating between impressed and suspicious of Microsoft's server products XP. They are both usable and succeptable in just about all definitions of the terms.
As I look around the room, I've got an NT box between my legs (no comments, pls) and 2 redhat server to my left and in back of me and a 2000 server and soon to be SQL box...dominant,no, but encroaching.
I dunno, all server platforms have their place, but the leveraging vs merit and proven ability still disturbs me when considering a majority of Microsoft's products.
And this from someone who as been described as "the most moral person I know, but the least ethical" by his own mother.
Most back handed compliment I've ever had in my life that I take to mean, I know a snake when I see one and will try to protect others from said snake. (meaning my ethics ~= Microsoft's at times, ouch, that hurts to say).
I think in some respects the DOJ was tripped at the finish line...but I think the EU may just be the one to break the tape and show the U.S. how it should be done.
Here's hoping, anyway.
for a "C and L chip"? Heck, if the introduction of a "V" chip for violence was a thought, it should follow (via my leap of logic, mind you) that a 'commercial' and 'logo' chip should also be introduced.
/. you can turn off the pretty pictures if you so desire or use lynx or turn off all grfx (gasp, can we *do that*?) in your browser of choice.
At least on
It almost makes me wish that TV's had multiple resolutions...that way if the logo's were superimposed over the video at say "tv's 800x600, then at 1024x768 all we have to do is use a PVR to crop out the 'garbage', yes?"
Some people might think of me as a heretic for suggesting that the web in not really an entertainment medium, that is what TV is for.
But, my argument still holds 'water' with the odd leak even though I've downloaded "Enterprise" episodes I've missed off of Usenet.
Correct me if I am wrong, but Usenet and "the Web" are seperate entities, seperate protocols used over TCP/IP, no?
Is it so far of a stretch to say the same about local stations, versus normal cable versus digital cable?
Or, to be more succinct: The less garbage I see on my screen the better (TV or Web).
And if the networks are so worried about their viewership getting lost in all those channels, how about helping to make the local/national "tv guides" actually be _accurate_ for a change.
I get the feeling that the TV networks think they are losing viewers and don't know why, but the viewers are saying "we hate these logos".
Everyone is talking and no one is listening.
/me shakes head sadly
Then again, in a similar incident with win98, Microsoft actuall *asked* beta testers if they'd like to have I.E. integrated into the OS.
Over 75% said no to I.E. integration...we all know how well that went.
I know I'll wind up sounding like a broken record (a what?), but "history...repeat...history..repeat..."
"Trailer Trash" which is what non Mac OS/QT Pro users must be named.
(I'm not trolling or posting flamebait, people, I made that oddball connection and am still grinning. I hope someone sees the humor in it too).
There is actuall a way to save the trailer even if the ability is disabled...I'll see what I can do about making it into a DivX (now that OS X.1 has ffmpeg to watch DivX's).
I posted to show my ignorance on slashdot...
Not really, but I laughed at the "ability to make other polygons dead"...that was cute.
I cringed because I had this discussion before with an editor before.
3d, 3D, 3-d all mean (ok, to me) 3 dimensional.
3rd means third, but I was told by this person that to "the average reader 3d means third".
The fact that I laughed at this person did not endear me to them, nor pointing them to 3dfx.com helped much either.
But, I digress.
I thought Rune was a good game, personally.
If my memory is correct, it uses the Unreal (tourney?) Engine.
Good game play and interesting idea in melee combat, but tedious at times.
I did like some of the minor humorous bits sprinkled in. (the fscking lizards on one level gave me a laugh)
The grfx, I have to admit were excellent...remember the original Unreal's first level of looking down the waterfall to the valley below? Even at 640x480 it was absolutely stunning. This is how most of Rune is...just stunning.
I never had the chance to play Rune online, but I have heard it is quite amusing.
So far in my online experience the best replay values so far for online/offline game playing are any Quake (Q3 above all) and a tie between Kingpin and Descent (especially Descent 2) and Carmageddon2.
Personally I think Rune was a Heretic/Hexen wanna be...almost. Sure you could throw hatchets, but it needed more projectile weapons (crossbow (heretic), spear, sling {F.A.K.K2}...something).
Rune like Oni was a good game, but it was such a radical departure from the norm it did not 'trip a lot of people's triggers, literally and figuratively' in the way that Thief did as an "anti-shooter".
I guess it was *too* different, if that is possible.
Ok, Yet Another Lame/Appropriate Analogy:
Considering the last time a topic such as this compared the Intel's best P4 to AMD's best Athlon.
The Car/Engine analogy was used to no end and many valid points were made, but noboday really put it into a conclusive and easy to understand "package" that the Average Joe User could understand.
Recall, if you will, the movie "The Fast and the Furious" as the analogy of Intel vs AMD saga.
Remember the scene at the end with the race between the souped up Honda and the Toranado?
Intel's P4 is akin to the Honda, as it has a lot of "high-RPM's" and "high-tech" under the hood (i.e. 2.X Ghz and Rambus et al).
The Athlon is like the Toranado(?) and American Muscle car that had the "High Torque" and "lower-tech" that relied on brute force (i.e. 'superior' FPU and Large cache and the blower is similar to DDR-SDRAM in a way).
The end result of the race at the end of the movie was that they (for the most part) tied.
The current Intel/AMD debate is very similar, in that you have all this high RPM/low torque (intel) vs old school High Torque/mid RPM's (AMD).
Apple bites user. Says It'll do it again until s/he changes his/her (i)Tune...
Oh, wait! Isn't that how this happened in the first place?
Or
User loses data, Apple gets bit. (Just look at the Aqua apple on the front page...hehe)
BOFH start writing shell scripts for Apple?
I just checked the register.co.uk and he still seems to be employed there?
Almost sound like a BOFH gag:
User: I need more space in XXXX account.
BOFH: Ok, I just freed up 8M of space.
User: Great, now I have 16M.
BOFH: No, now you have 8M free.
User: Arrrr......!
BOFH: (click).
Do not turn to the Dark Side of the Force...but, hey, the Aqua side ain't so bad!
Really, in the current economic climate, all the monkeys should have been thrown out of the high-tech jobs, leaving only clueful people.
/. link when Jobs returned to Apple.
Well, what you said is the working theory, anyway.
Having worked in the corporate world and the academic world this is the furthest from the truth. The people with a clue, ethics, responsability, talent, skills or value customers are usually the first on the chopping block.
After all, the managers making those 5 and 6 figure salaries have to remain employed so they can continue the (vicous) cycle.
Cynical? Oh, yeah, been there, been IT, seen it happen too many times.
Could apple be any different? That is a tough one to answer. I would have to say no, but to a lesser extent, perhaps.
Why to a lesser extent? For the simple reason that Steve Jobs and Lee Iacocoa (sp?) understood two things about running a company/taking over one:
First get everybody on board with a plan to succede/improve morale.
Second (and this is the kickass part) when you clean house *never, ever* get rid of your workers.
Clean up/fire your middle and upper management levels.
This solves 2 problems (imagine a pyramid):
1) when most layoffs happen they happen to the "base of the pyramid". What happens when you weaken the "foundation" of a company/structure.
Yeah, it falls down or does irrepairable damage.
2)Wiping out the middle section brings those "at the top" closer to the base. Most executive understand the "how and what" of a business, but understanding the "who and why" is what keeps thing "moving forward".
If I remember correctly, Lee I was first, and Jobs subscribed to the idea...it may have come from a
Very good interview.
Of course I've always said a "Phd/manager saying 'in theory' is akin to a used car salesman saying 'trust me' ".
I guess in my snide cynicism I found humor in your altruistic logic
I could have sworn I saw this here (maybe as a sig, dunno).
"At the current rate of development of the windows/dos environment Microsoft will eventually invent unix."
So, what, another 15 more years or so?
Will it be called the GallBatesmer *nix distro?
2. Muscle memory doesn't work with the mouse
I beg to differ. consider the placement of the apple menu in 9.2 vs X.1.
If I "slam" the cursor in the upper left area and click, I get this:
in os 9 a menu drops down.
in os X, nothing happens until I move about 10 pixels to the right....arugh!
Why is this bad/annoying? Because with 'Muscle Memory" when using the mouse I don't have to think, just get "close enough" to do the job.
And the Dock, as Dixie_Flatline pointed out has several good elements (and some annoying ones too). Yes, things shift around, but counter to that is that the are (initially) very large...easy to hit.
Heck, even in OS 9 I *still* look for the dock on occasion.
Close/min/max buttons being on the "wrong" side, per se, is balanced with the red/yellow/green coloration and X, -, + if you don't get the hint (or are color blind).
Some of these things Tog has pointed out about Aqua and the Dock and I might go re-read it. the "why the dock sucks" was one that I agreed with 85% with, now, maybe not so much as initially.
Will there ever be a perfect interface?
I doubt it.
Will there ever be an intuitive interface.
Again, I doubt it.
Will there ever be a perfect, intuitive interface?
Yes, if you choose one of those two adjective.
Just a thought.
"For the Birds" was funny...I liked the part with the larger "stork" bird hanging upside down by his toes as the 2 "instigators" were pecking at the stork's toes. The looks on the faces of 1 or 2 of the little birds that "see it coming" when/if the stork lets go of the wire.
Heh, I've seen that look before...like when Flic knocks over the offering...the eyes get real big and the "OooHhhh, Noooo" escapes.
(I found it funny because a recovery disk I used one time did its job *too* well...fdisked 2 drives in a heart beat....I said "ooohh, nooo" just like Flic did. Art imitates life, eh?)
Monsters, Inc. was a very watchable movie and I do recommend it, but it was not as funny as I thought it was going to be.
It was more of a "smirk and chuckle" than a "laugh hysterically" film.
Billy Crystal's voice was a decent choice, but a less grating voice would have been better.
Nathan Lane springs to mind (Timone, from the Lion King). BC and NL have the same vocal qualities, but Lane comes off smoother than Crystal, I think.
The rendering of the characters was excellent and I kept looking for a "beauty shot" like in Shrek (The lady dragon scenes and when Shrek is yelling at the donkey and you see the air moving over the donkey's fur... that kind of detail)
I'm fairly shure those kinds of details are there and maybe I missed them....Oh, wait, the close op of Sully on the closet door trolley (the kind like those found in a dry cleaner?) as he moves through the air. Dang, maybe I'll see it again.
Personally, I wonder what are some of the best voice and screen actors out there.
Goodman is one, Anthony Hopkins is another who should be added to some of these films as well. Hopkins voice on the tapes in "Hannibal" (and in the movie, too) carries such a presence of *evil* much in the same way Goodman's voice carries a feeling of conviviality/joviality and friendlieness.
And Frank Oz's talents did not go unnoticed...if only I could place the voices he applied to which characters. That is a tough one.
Any ideas?
Overall a good movie. I did wish there was more "scenes" like in the trailers and teasers.
A little more for the adult audience due to the "chemistry" that Goodman and Crystal have.
Watch the trailer, then the movie and the "outer Magnolia?, that's outer Mongolia...." bit.
I guess "Who's on First?" spoiled me, sight, sound and voice gags where even if you miss one or two of the pieces it is still funny, reguardless.
I saw some sniping over interfaces (OS X vs XP) and have to say that:
Aqua is a flowing interface (ok, you can't drown in it) but first glance does assault and please at the same time.
XP's interface is Luna and it ticks along slower than 2000's...Luna-ticks...{snicker}
(luna has many ticks...would they then be Politicks?)
"Donkey. Two things: SHUT....UP" Shrek.
Ok, I've have to ask...did things change around again in XP like it did from NT to 2000?
...nothing that I expect because it is now "x" ... also on the several win 2000 installs I had at work hitting "windows key + e" would either give explorer OR some funky, large "open/search" dialog box that reminded me of wordperfect 8's open/save dialogue box.
For example, I use key combos and some times quick right clicks and letter keys to get where I am going or need to do.
In Win98 and NT (95 as well) I could hit the right mouse button and "e" for explorer, or r for properties (or "windows key" + E for explorer).
In 2000 (tell me if it is the same in XP, please) if I right click and hit e
Wierd...talk about ruining a reasonably consistant interface.
To me it almost seems like making ctrl+c == cut,
ctrl+x == paste and ctrl+v == copy.
No reason, just because kind of "logic".
Really, now, what is the reasoning behind keeping "hotkeys" the same (or shortcuts/menus, for that matter) thru 3 versions only to change it in current versions?
I had to "unlearn" a *lot* of quick contextual menu shortcuts that were invaluable to me.
Now it is *all wrong or different*.
Silly to most, I think, but aggrivated me to no end.
Deep down Microsoft believes "information wants to be free".
Unfortunately there was never any express, written, or implied statement about *who's* information was going to be "free".
(My first slasdot post. Be gentle)