This company has been one of the worst offenders, treating its employees and contractors like slaves on a Roman galley, while they sit in their togas enjoying grapes fed to them by beautiful blonde women. I mean the CEOs are making millions and millions while their employees are only able to buy a nice car and a nice house and send their kids to a nice college. It isn't fair!
I hate corporations. I mean, all the do is sit around and hire people and pay them good money to perform services and make goods, which they turn around and sell for decent prices! I mean, who do they think they are? If I want good products and the latest toys at a good price, why do I have to go to evil corporations to get them? And why do they make obscene profits on my willingness to buy and their employees willingness to work! Is there any justice in the world? Somewhere, somehow, Bushitler and Cheney are involved in this. I smell Rove behind the curtains.
We should just ban corporations and everything like them. If you want something, you shouldn't be able to go buy it from someone else, unless that person is going to be selling it at a loss. Make it yourself, dangit! And you shouldn't be able to work with other people, even if you pay them. That's not right! What are we, slaves, to be paid for our valuable labor? And you shouldn't be able to sign a contract saying you will provide services to a corporation in exchange for money. If you want money so bad, why don't you just make your own?
In the meantime, let's file frivolous lawsuits against the best corporations around and make them spend their hard-earned cash defending themselves from lunatics like myself. It's only fair!
DOWN WITH CAPITALISM! CORPORATIONS ARE EVIL! SO IS BUSHITLER!
I tend to think of the PostgreSQL replication problem the same way people approach any problem: None of the solutions are endorsed as the "official" answer to the problems (because there is no absolute authority on these issues.) All have their shortcomings. All have their benefits. It's up to you to decide which combination of problems and benefits you want.
PostgreSQL, like Linux, is more like an ecosystem of software, where you can go and pick and choose or even write your own stuff. It's not as diverse or as popular as Linux. As far as database systems go, however, it is the most diverse project out there.
Oracle, on the other hand, is like Stalinist Russia. You can't pick and choose. There's only one model of car. And you have to buy the same bread at the same price at the same time as everyone else. And consumer input? Practically zero.
PostgreSQL's biggest advantage is that it is extensible. The simple testimony to that fact is that there are numerous excellent extensions out there, written for a variety of purposes. Oracle is not, and will never be as long as it is closed source. (Doesn't this sound like Linux vs. Windows to you? It should. PostgreSQL people pride themselves on their openness.)
Finally, one caution I like to give to people who are looking at PostgreSQL. Is it panacea? Of course not. There are problems with it. The problems are different than the problems of Oracle. But they exist. The biggest difference is the culture and the philosophy. So when you choose your database, choose the culture and philosophy you desire or agree with the most, and the software and solutions will come naturally and you'll be much happier in the end. This may mean that you prefer the world of Oracle over PostgreSQL. That's not a decision I can make for you.
Many consider it acceptable to be prejudiced against gays.
Name one. Even I, as a "fundie" as you call it, but as a God-fearing Christian in my words, don't hate people because they are gay, any more than I hate people because they are crooks or dishonest or unbelieving. I hate the sin.
In many nations, women are repressed. Even in the US they often have to overcome rediculous and antiquated notions.
Antiquated notions like... that they are different than men? I believe it is men who are being repressed every bit as much as women. When you tell a little boy that they can't stand up and fight a bully, you are doing the same thing as telling a girl that they can't be who they can be. It's equally terrible.
People executed in the US are disproportinately black.
That's because people who are black commit crime disproportianetly. While we try to treat blacks equally under the law (despite the efforst of so-called good-intentioned liberals who would rather we treat them differently), we can't ever hope that the two populations would begin to behave exactly the same. Ask yourself this: Why are Asians succeeding and blacks failing? Is it because we somehow love the Asians but love the blacks? Don't be absurd. It has everything to do with how they live their lives and nothing to do with what I am doing over here.
The problem will get fixed when we can shut up the apologists and bring in people like Cosby who calls a spade a spade. The truth will set you free right?
Arab-Americans are more likely to be stopped at airports.
If only this were true! But it is not. An Arab is just as likely to get stopped as your 94-year old grandmother.
You people who have been suggesting XML have no idea what the deficiencies of XML are. Remember, there are some tiny programs that need to access files in/etc/. Do you want to inflate the size of these programs by 10x just to read a simple conf file? Or do you want some dependency on an XML library in order to run basic system services? Or would you rather use a dialect of XML that can be parsed easily? If you can't name ten problems for each of these scenarios, you shouldn't be suggesting what to put in/etc.
I would prefer a simple file format (not XML) that can be parsed in very few lines of C code in/etc. No external libraries. No unreadable XML crap. Something simple and easy.
Oh wait! We already have that! If you do a survey of what file formats are actually used, you'll note that they come in a handful of formats. You have your database files (/etc/passwd and friends). You have your simple config files (/etc/resolv.conf) and you have your more complicated ones that are specific to the application (/etc/httpd,/etc/selinux, etc...)
These files all look different because they are built to do different things. What is so difficult about this concept? We have JPEGs and GIFs and PNGs and all kinds of formats for images. We have TXT and SXW and HTML and PDF and PS and DocBook and DVI and Tex and what else for generating text. Why? They all serve different purposes.
Free Software is about choice and diversity. Get over it. We are always going to have choices, and the more choices we have, the better. If that bothers you, go back to Windows where you choose nothing, or go live in Cuba or North Korea.
I'd like to think that I have the same ability because I have spent so much time in front of monitors. But I know a lot of people who have spent many many more years and who still can't see it.
I've marked this one up long ago to one of those weird attributes we're born with or we learn or that is a combination of both. I know that a lot of people thank me for raising their refresh rate, but there are some who can only work at about 60-65Hz and can't stand 75Hz or 80Hz, which is where I am comfortable.
I've also fallen in love with LCD screens. I can finally work without getting tired! Now if only my mind could keep up with my eyes.
I still use a CRT at work and that's led to the pile of notes and graphs and charts I've draqwn up and strewn about my office. I have to take a break from time to time or I can't look at the screen.
But the biggest problem people have is they count on luck and yet fail to even roll the dice!
The thing is if you don't try, you can't succeed or fail. If you try and work hard, you have a possibility of success.
If you consider the "game" of starting a company, there are these rules:
(1) It takes time and some money to start a company. (2) The company may fail or succeed after a period of time. (3) If the company succeeds, you are a multi-millionaire, and potentially a billionaire. (4) If the company failes, there are no negative impacts (you already spent the time and money, right?)
This set of rules leads me to the following algorithm for _guaranteed success__:
(1) Don't borrow money to start your company. Use your own money, and spend as little as humanly possible. (Corollary: Make sure you get money before you start to spend it!)
(2) Put all the effort you can while you have the time.
(3) If you fail, try again.
This will lead to inevitable success.
I am still young yet, and I've yet to make the full plunge. My goal right now is to earn a crapload of money and pay off my high-interest debt. I am also looking for some guaranteed money-making side jobs like consulting that are part-time yet good pay. My criteria for a company is that I can develop the initial product while I am working and I can start selling it before I've made the plunge and quit my day job. That way, my company will be funded with the cash it generates.
I don't see how VC enters into the equation anywhere. Plus. I don't have to borrow money or do anything where business failure has any impact on my day job. If worst comes to worst, I can always fall back on my day-job and still feed my family.
You work 12 hours and spend 3 hours on the commute. That's 15 hours. I assume you don't eat breakfast or dinner at work, but you may. But let's say you don't. That leaves 7 hours.
Assume you need abouyt 6-8 hours of sleep a day. Boy, I'm surprised you lasted this long.
You'd better sit down with your boss and have a heart-to-heart. This is going to kill you. You can't do this. Either you have to get a raise so you can move closer to work, or you have to cut back on the hours to a more reasonable 8. Humans aren't machines. We need far more care and uptake and downtime to remain in peak condition.
Boeing did some interesting studies during WWII on maximizing productivity. Guess what they found? 8 hours a day for 5 days a week is the optimal number. That's why throughout the 50s and 60s the jobs were all 9-5. You get more done than 8/6 or 9/5, or what ever you are doing (12/4?) Even firefighters spend a great deal of time sitting around and relaxing and doing non-work things.
Seriously dude. You need to take care of yourself. There's only one of you and if you screw up your body, you don't get a replacement. You die.
My best advice is to go back to the places you know the best, whether it is a region of the US, a particular state, or a locality.
As far as your wife is concerned (I'm assuming she's Japanese), you'll want to get her involved in something so that she meets new people and makes new friends. That is going to be critical, otherwise she'll be asking to go back.
And I'd make sure your finances are in order so that you can live for a while in the US without a job. It may take some time to find the right fit. Otherwise, interview from overseas and come over only when you have a job.
Yes, everyone has a moral responsibility to themselves and those around them. But it's not government's duty to enforce the responsibility we all have.
Let's allow society to figure it out. I am very picky about what games and movies and TV shows I watch. I only choose entertainment from those who understand their moral responsibilities. Everyone else is kept out of my home and out of my head.
I'm going to advocate that people should be morally responsible, but it is morally IRRESPONSIBLE for me to enforce my viewpoints at the point of a gun. That's not the way Jesus worked.
So let's keep government out of this, because we can all handle it on our own.
I'm a rabid Linux fan, and I detest every moment I have to test my work in IE. However, I have to say that what Bill Gates is doing outside of the computing world is nothing short from wonderful.
I have a deep interest in education, in particular, how to solve the problems we are facing without throwing more money at them. So I am heavily involved in the school issues in my neighborhood, and I am organizing people to research things we can be doing to help out the district. What Bill Gates is doing to the education field is nothing short of amazing. Most recently, he said that the current high school system should be scrapped because it is a complete waste of time. I don't know any Linux fans that would disagree with that.
He is also putting his money where his mouth is. I know that we are looking at getting some of his money to implement his plans in our own district, or at least in the final stages of getting the grant. I don't think there is a district in the US that isn't getting some benefit from what he is doing.
And he does more than that. I don't know the specifics, but I know he is working in Africa and South America trying to help raise the living standard from sub-human to at least what we would call "poverty" in the US.
That is what he is getting knighted for, and not for his achievements in amassing a huge amount of wealth. It is how he is using it that really counts.
Now, I also realize that what Bill did to the computing world was nothing short of amazing as well. Before Bill, we were a sub-culture to be derided and spit upon. Now we are cool, and our skills have street-cred. We have Bill Gates to thank for that.
The object being hidden has to be less than the about the wavelength of the light. So, unless you are nanometers in size, you won't be hidden from visible light.
And it only works on one frequency. Meaning, unless you are nanometers in size, and you are in a room with only red light, you won't be hidden.
This isn't that great. I wouldn't read too much into it.
See, a long time ago we had this all figured out. Government OF the people (meaning, the people formed it.) Government BY the people (meaning, the people executed it.) Government FOR the people (meaning, its sole purpose was to serve the people.)
100 years ago, if a hijacker tried to steal something like a plane (well, let's imagine a train instead) they had to do so with enough men and guns and ammo to fight off the people on the train. If they screwed up, they would be shot by the passengers on the train, or even the engineer himself. That's government BY the people.
When gangs formed up that were strong enough to bully people around, the people responded by making an even bigger gang (called a posse) to hunt them down and kill them. If things got out of hand, the military was called in to serve the people and kick the crap out of the perpetrators.
Today. things are a lot different. If I saw a bank robbery in progress, and subdued the robber with my handguns (which I'd be proudly carrying around my hips, 2nd amendment folks), I'd be thrown in jail. If the robber tried to shoot me and I shot back and laid him flat on his back six-feet under, then I would be facing life in prison.
If the hijackers took a plan and I whipped out my 45 and gave them all a new hole, I'd be charged with endangering the life of the crew, murder, or worse.
That's why life sucks around here. Restore our basic freedoms, and we won't need security checks at the airports. We won't need no Homeland Security department (we got all the security right here, in the barrel of my guns.) Heck, we wouldn't even need a national military. If Bush wants to invade a country, he'd have to convince a whole lotta us to follow him into battle. Otherwise, he'd be going it alone.
We'd have a lot fewer trial lawyers as well. We wouldn't need as many prisons either. And we wouldn't have a problem with wayward politicians, because we'd be the FBI investigating them.
Folks, that's government BY the people. If Mao said that government comes by the barrell of a gun, then we have a whole lot more barrels than the military does. If the pen is mightier than the sword, then we can fight with far more pens than any government can hope to muster.
There's no need to speculate on how a quantum computer will work. We already have working examples, and we already know the generic properties of them. Instead of trying to figure it out on your own, go read the vast amounts of information on the topic available.
The three properties of the QC that are most important:
1. You can set the state of the qubits to whatever you like.
2. You have some transformation that the qubits will go through. This can be arbitrarily complex, and will be the most interesting part of the machine.
2. You can get a really good estimate of the state by doing the operation from the same initial state several times. See, when you go to measure a quantum state, you get one possibility of many. You have to make a lot of measurements to figure out what is really happening.
The best comparison is to think of the single-slit experiments you did in High School physics. You take a parallel light source (sunlight, laser, light from a distance) and have it strike a plate with a very thin slit. Then you hold a piece of paper where the light comes out. You will see bands of light, and some chromatic aberrations (you will see colors).
If you consider a single photon travelling from the light source and approaching the slit, passing "through" the slit, and then travelling off into any one of the finite number of directions, you ask the question: How can we predict which way it will go?
The answer is you can't. You have to do it a lot (like with a beam of light) and you can easily see what the probabilities are from that.
You can probably think of the experiment I described above as a very simple form of a quantum computer. You set the input - the light travelling into the slit. You have the transformation - the slit. And you can read the results by doing it several times.
That's all quantum computing will do for you. It's up to the really smart guys in white lab coats to figure out how to turn that into something useful.
I believe this will all be abstracted away from your eyes, just like today you don't worry about which register your integers is stored in and such. You will merely say, "Run the calculations on this set of data and give me the result" and it will do it before you can blink.
Heck, ordinary people won't even get to own a quantum computer until two things happen: (1) We find a better use for them than hacking into banks and stealing people's identities, and (2) we have built up enough of a reportoire of transformations that some subset of that is actually useful to solve the problems we face in computing today.
But I think the point that RasterMan was claiming is that innovation happens here. It is so fast, that it seems to be complete before it's even discovered.
Here's what Havoc et al are going to do. They are going to get a hold of RasterMan, or at least his code, and examine it thoroughly. Building upon his concepts, they will develop a better solution that will bring RasterMan's ideas into the mainstream world.
The E project may never be accessible to a large crowd. That's not the purpose of E, and you can see it in the tone of RasterMan's post. The E project is around to innovate and push the edge, and experiment. That's a very different goal from the Gnome, KDE, and FreeDesktop projects.
RasterMan should be very happy that his work is going to be used and spread around the entire community. I don't know what more he could've asked for.
This obliterates the concept that Open Source software is just copy-cat software. Yes, we have projects who copy-cat, because they are looking for stability and usability, not innovation. But we also have projects that are trend-setters and the research institutions of our community. While we won't use their software, we should still support them.
This is just like in the real world of science. There are research scientists (like RasterMan.) Nobody ends up using what they do directly. Then there are the engineers (like Havoc) that incorporate the best ideas into a working product that everyone uses. We build on each other's strengths.
So, they create a game with static spawn spots. These monsters give valuable rewards for fighting them. Players learn about the spawn spots. They capitalize on it. It soon turns into a game of who can strike the monster first.
I don't see what the problem is. They created the rules, and this is a logical progression. Why don't they remove the static spawning from the game, or make it random, or make these monsters tougher, or stop handing out rewards for camping?
No, what I would do is write a save_game and restore_game method in a universal subclass for all game objects. It will know how to serialized all the objects contained within a game object, and how to read them back out. That way, I only implement the save/restore method once.
I have a suggestion, which it seems people are already following. Why don't we just let the market decide the way things should work?
I think what will happen is the publishers will eventually grant real legal rights to the objects and avatars in that world. The players seem to want this, and seem to understand that this is fair.
If I were into this sort of thing, I would begin forming enterprises that facilitate this. For example, if your avatar owns a lot of expensive things, how about you get an insurance policy that will pay our real dollars in the event the items are lost in certain situations? What about in-game escrow services - avatars who belong to particular groups who have built up a reputation for being responsible in holding items and in-game cash? How about time-share contracts, where items are loaned but only for certain times of the day? What about item rental?
For all the hype China is getting as a supposed new super-power to challenge the US, there is something more fundamental going on there. It didn't start in Tiananmen square, but it is continuing in the rice paddies and town squares.
People in China have developed a distrust for government. This isn't news, because it didn't happen overnight. In the past, government was a partner. The people would give them taxes, their young men, and endure some pretty harsh rules from time to time. In exchange, the government would maintain order, secure a decent living, and protect the people from wandering Mongol hordes. Occasionally the government would clean up corruption or crack down on gangs and networks.
This all started to change when Europe conquered China. No longer could the government protect the people! The people began to look for another way. At about the time of Chiang Kai-Shek, european style democracy was beginning to really take root. The people were beginning to prosper, and beginning to realize their power. They were getting a better picture of the true role of government, as a servant of the people, not as their master. Of course that awakening was interrupted by Mao and his hordes of communists. It would take a long time to begin reawaken the sleeping giant again.
Nowadays, there are no Mongol hordes. The biggest threat China faces is arguably the best thing that could ever happen to China. Why does the government want to put a wall between the US and China when the US can be an extremely valuable trade partner? And not just an economic trade partner, but an intellectual trade partner? The people are beginning to see that communism isn't the answer.
People in China have grown to understand that the cities in the US are paved with gold. Not literally, of course. But there is something that the US is doing that makes their 300 million strong much more wealthy, powerful, and intelligent than China's billions. They are getting a sense of what capitalism is all about. They are growing to appreciate the fundamental rights of man, thank to the beginning of a Christian uprising. They are seeing the weakness in the government, how they require the buy-in of the people or they can't govern.
I encourage you to talk with visiting scholars from China who are getting their graduate degrees in our universities. They understand the real problems China faces, the real struggles they are fighting. But they also have come to see what really makes America what it is. They are probably going to be a compassionate capitalist. Yes, people should work hard to make as much money as they can. But that money should be used to employ other people or for charity. It's the duty of the rich to care for the poor.
They see Japan, South Korea, Phillipines, and other countries, and wonder why, after 400 years of contact with Europe, hasn't China become like them. Yet Japan and South Korea are such small, weak countries in comparison historically. Why do they prosper so much? Why can South Korea boast a military that threatens even China?
I watched on TV as an older women openly challenged the town mayor, a strong party member. Her grievances were just - the government displaced her and made promises they didn't keep. The look on the officials face as the cameras taped the final confrontation was one of fear. He saw that that poor, uneducated woman was far more powerful than he ever could be, because she was right. She learned that when you are fighting for a just cause, even if it is in your own self-interest, you can win. The message is getting out. People are learning.
This internet-cafe closing thing will have absolutely zero negative effect on the progression of Chinese government to a true democracy. If anything, it will be more fuel to add towards true reform and freedom for the people.
The pundits who are left-leaning say "Watch out for China! They will do what Saddam and Stalin could not do!" That is just wishful thinking. These are probably the same people saying ter
The problem is the terrorists aren't attacking us because we are treating them poorly. No, they are attacking us to convert us to Islam and to punish us for being infidels and not obeying shari'a.
Go read some of the manifestos and declarations put out by Osama bin Laden and the blind sheik. They are more concerned with the fact that we charge interest and treat women equally than that we go into their countries and murder their children (even if it were true.)
Let me just detail that what is happening today isn't new at all. We've seen events like 9/11 in the past several hundred years on many occasions, sponsored by Muslem terrorists.
* The Europeans embarked on the crusades to rebuild holy Christian sites destroyed by Muslem fanatics in Jerusalem. That, and to put an end to the constant Muslem invasions of Europe.
* Muslem fanatics have been persecuting, murdering, torturing, raping, pillaging, and enslaving Europeans since they have been able to. If they ever stopped, it was because of their military defeats and the killing of their leaders. No amount of negotiation, barter, or capitulation has ever been successful.
* Even today, the king of Spain has sworn an oath to fight all Muslems. This is in response to the Muslem invasion of Spain. The country of Spain once understood the threat of Moslem terrorists, and swore to defeat it permanently.
* The Barbary Pirates were in fact Muslem fanatics and terrorists. After diplomatic parrying, the US went as far as to pay tribute to them. In the end, we built up the first US navy to crush them. After that, the US has refused to negotiate with terrorists. Our policy has been to meet force with more force.
You are right. "corpus" is a body, which is where we get the words "corpse" from.
"Corporate" or "incorporate" means to form a body. Legally, a corporation has the rights of a human, but that is a modern invention. Historically, a corporation was a way that a new "body" could be formed of many different people. The articles of incorporation detail how the body is run, how decision are made, what the purpose of the body is, etc...
Every organization that comes together and has rules for how the organization is run is a corporation in that sense of the word. You'll note that sometimes "organization", "association", "body", "assembly" can be used to mean the same thing.
In the market, for-profit corporations are formed by investors who want to take their capital (time, talents, cash, resources) and turn it into something more. You've heard of "synergy" right? That's the idea that the combination of the parts is greater than the sum of the parts. As the corporation matures, they don't expect much in return. When the corporation is complete, they expect to get regular payments on their investments. Should the corporation fail its purpose, they expect to be able to salvage whatever capital they can from the effort.
Rich people don't do like Scrooge McDuck and swim in their piles of cash. Instead, they drain their coffers and invest it hoping to get even more cash. Or they give it away to their favorite charities. Rich people can't stand seeing money lying around doing nothing much like nerds can't stand seeing a computer turned off doing nothing.
You've forgotten the reason why Microsoft existed in the first place: To *make* a lot of people a heckuva lot of money.
If Microsoft sees no future in its business, it will liquidate its assets and pay off its investors. Sure, it has billions, but if it can't find a way to turn those billions into trillions, then it will be sold and the capital invested somewhere else. This is the core of capitalism.
Companies are the sum of its investors, and nothing more. They can come and go pretty much as they wish. What do you think "corporation" means? It means something made out of many parts, those parts being actual people and their fortunes.
Companies don't collapse. They are abandoned. That is what is happening to Microsoft *right now*, and he sees it.
(1) Refrigerators and air conditioners would be a lot more efficient and cheaper too. They would be safer as well.
(2) Places where fire is dangerous can install the fire extinguishers that use CFCs, saving hundreds if not thousands of lives. If such a system were installed in the World Trade Center, the building would not have burned and it would not have collapsed. Of course, if they had finished the installation of asbestos, it would not have fallen either, but government strikes again, and now thousands are dead because of it!
If this is true, why do we have birds today? We used DDT very, very heavily back in the days.
I looked up the DDT scare and it was claimed it threatened one species of bird that was on the verge of extinction. Even then it wasn't proven that it was the cause. After all, every chicken rancher know that birds need calcium to build a good eggshell. If they don't have enough, the shell is weak. Perhaps the birds near the city had a hard time finding calcium? Oh no, that would only make too much sense! Let's ban DDT instead!
We treated the Indians poorly, but they were doing worse to themselves.
Let's start with human sacrifice, daily, of their enemies. Have we done anything like this? I'm sorry, but using germ warfare hardly compares to cutting the heart out of a living human.
Let's move on to the constant wars among the Indians. Unlike Americans, which fought wars to defend themselves, Indians fought war for fun. We took their land from them because they attacked us first. Did we distinguish between the peaceful ones and not so peaceful? Not very well. I would've preferred the Cherokee stay put, and if you read your history books, so did the Supreme Court.
We treat the Indians like kings nowadays. We pay them a King's ransom every year, we allow them to operate above the law, and we look past their problems in adopting our society.
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That's right! Stick it to 'em!
This company has been one of the worst offenders, treating its employees and contractors like slaves on a Roman galley, while they sit in their togas enjoying grapes fed to them by beautiful blonde women. I mean the CEOs are making millions and millions while their employees are only able to buy a nice car and a nice house and send their kids to a nice college. It isn't fair!
I hate corporations. I mean, all the do is sit around and hire people and pay them good money to perform services and make goods, which they turn around and sell for decent prices! I mean, who do they think they are? If I want good products and the latest toys at a good price, why do I have to go to evil corporations to get them? And why do they make obscene profits on my willingness to buy and their employees willingness to work! Is there any justice in the world? Somewhere, somehow, Bushitler and Cheney are involved in this. I smell Rove behind the curtains.
We should just ban corporations and everything like them. If you want something, you shouldn't be able to go buy it from someone else, unless that person is going to be selling it at a loss. Make it yourself, dangit! And you shouldn't be able to work with other people, even if you pay them. That's not right! What are we, slaves, to be paid for our valuable labor? And you shouldn't be able to sign a contract saying you will provide services to a corporation in exchange for money. If you want money so bad, why don't you just make your own?
In the meantime, let's file frivolous lawsuits against the best corporations around and make them spend their hard-earned cash defending themselves from lunatics like myself. It's only fair!
DOWN WITH CAPITALISM! CORPORATIONS ARE EVIL! SO IS BUSHITLER!
I tend to think of the PostgreSQL replication problem the same way people approach any problem: None of the solutions are endorsed as the "official" answer to the problems (because there is no absolute authority on these issues.) All have their shortcomings. All have their benefits. It's up to you to decide which combination of problems and benefits you want.
PostgreSQL, like Linux, is more like an ecosystem of software, where you can go and pick and choose or even write your own stuff. It's not as diverse or as popular as Linux. As far as database systems go, however, it is the most diverse project out there.
Oracle, on the other hand, is like Stalinist Russia. You can't pick and choose. There's only one model of car. And you have to buy the same bread at the same price at the same time as everyone else. And consumer input? Practically zero.
PostgreSQL's biggest advantage is that it is extensible. The simple testimony to that fact is that there are numerous excellent extensions out there, written for a variety of purposes. Oracle is not, and will never be as long as it is closed source. (Doesn't this sound like Linux vs. Windows to you? It should. PostgreSQL people pride themselves on their openness.)
Finally, one caution I like to give to people who are looking at PostgreSQL. Is it panacea? Of course not. There are problems with it. The problems are different than the problems of Oracle. But they exist. The biggest difference is the culture and the philosophy. So when you choose your database, choose the culture and philosophy you desire or agree with the most, and the software and solutions will come naturally and you'll be much happier in the end. This may mean that you prefer the world of Oracle over PostgreSQL. That's not a decision I can make for you.
Many consider it acceptable to be prejudiced against gays.
Name one. Even I, as a "fundie" as you call it, but as a God-fearing Christian in my words, don't hate people because they are gay, any more than I hate people because they are crooks or dishonest or unbelieving. I hate the sin.
In many nations, women are repressed. Even in the US they often have to overcome rediculous and antiquated notions.
Antiquated notions like... that they are different than men? I believe it is men who are being repressed every bit as much as women. When you tell a little boy that they can't stand up and fight a bully, you are doing the same thing as telling a girl that they can't be who they can be. It's equally terrible.
People executed in the US are disproportinately black.
That's because people who are black commit crime disproportianetly. While we try to treat blacks equally under the law (despite the efforst of so-called good-intentioned liberals who would rather we treat them differently), we can't ever hope that the two populations would begin to behave exactly the same. Ask yourself this: Why are Asians succeeding and blacks failing? Is it because we somehow love the Asians but love the blacks? Don't be absurd. It has everything to do with how they live their lives and nothing to do with what I am doing over here.
The problem will get fixed when we can shut up the apologists and bring in people like Cosby who calls a spade a spade. The truth will set you free right?
Arab-Americans are more likely to be stopped at airports.
If only this were true! But it is not. An Arab is just as likely to get stopped as your 94-year old grandmother.
You people who have been suggesting XML have no idea what the deficiencies of XML are. Remember, there are some tiny programs that need to access files in /etc/. Do you want to inflate the size of these programs by 10x just to read a simple conf file? Or do you want some dependency on an XML library in order to run basic system services? Or would you rather use a dialect of XML that can be parsed easily? If you can't name ten problems for each of these scenarios, you shouldn't be suggesting what to put in /etc.
/etc. No external libraries. No unreadable XML crap. Something simple and easy.
/etc/selinux, etc...)
I would prefer a simple file format (not XML) that can be parsed in very few lines of C code in
Oh wait! We already have that! If you do a survey of what file formats are actually used, you'll note that they come in a handful of formats. You have your database files (/etc/passwd and friends). You have your simple config files (/etc/resolv.conf) and you have your more complicated ones that are specific to the application (/etc/httpd,
These files all look different because they are built to do different things. What is so difficult about this concept? We have JPEGs and GIFs and PNGs and all kinds of formats for images. We have TXT and SXW and HTML and PDF and PS and DocBook and DVI and Tex and what else for generating text. Why? They all serve different purposes.
Free Software is about choice and diversity. Get over it. We are always going to have choices, and the more choices we have, the better. If that bothers you, go back to Windows where you choose nothing, or go live in Cuba or North Korea.
Choice is good!
I'd like to think that I have the same ability because I have spent so much time in front of monitors. But I know a lot of people who have spent many many more years and who still can't see it.
I've marked this one up long ago to one of those weird attributes we're born with or we learn or that is a combination of both. I know that a lot of people thank me for raising their refresh rate, but there are some who can only work at about 60-65Hz and can't stand 75Hz or 80Hz, which is where I am comfortable.
I've also fallen in love with LCD screens. I can finally work without getting tired! Now if only my mind could keep up with my eyes.
I still use a CRT at work and that's led to the pile of notes and graphs and charts I've draqwn up and strewn about my office. I have to take a break from time to time or I can't look at the screen.
But the biggest problem people have is they count on luck and yet fail to even roll the dice!
The thing is if you don't try, you can't succeed or fail. If you try and work hard, you have a possibility of success.
If you consider the "game" of starting a company, there are these rules:
(1) It takes time and some money to start a company.
(2) The company may fail or succeed after a period of time.
(3) If the company succeeds, you are a multi-millionaire, and potentially a billionaire.
(4) If the company failes, there are no negative impacts (you already spent the time and money, right?)
This set of rules leads me to the following algorithm for _guaranteed success__:
(1) Don't borrow money to start your company. Use your own money, and spend as little as humanly possible. (Corollary: Make sure you get money before you start to spend it!)
(2) Put all the effort you can while you have the time.
(3) If you fail, try again.
This will lead to inevitable success.
I am still young yet, and I've yet to make the full plunge. My goal right now is to earn a crapload of money and pay off my high-interest debt. I am also looking for some guaranteed money-making side jobs like consulting that are part-time yet good pay. My criteria for a company is that I can develop the initial product while I am working and I can start selling it before I've made the plunge and quit my day job. That way, my company will be funded with the cash it generates.
I don't see how VC enters into the equation anywhere. Plus. I don't have to borrow money or do anything where business failure has any impact on my day job. If worst comes to worst, I can always fall back on my day-job and still feed my family.
You work 12 hours and spend 3 hours on the commute. That's 15 hours. I assume you don't eat breakfast or dinner at work, but you may. But let's say you don't. That leaves 7 hours.
Assume you need abouyt 6-8 hours of sleep a day. Boy, I'm surprised you lasted this long.
You'd better sit down with your boss and have a heart-to-heart. This is going to kill you. You can't do this. Either you have to get a raise so you can move closer to work, or you have to cut back on the hours to a more reasonable 8. Humans aren't machines. We need far more care and uptake and downtime to remain in peak condition.
Boeing did some interesting studies during WWII on maximizing productivity. Guess what they found? 8 hours a day for 5 days a week is the optimal number. That's why throughout the 50s and 60s the jobs were all 9-5. You get more done than 8/6 or 9/5, or what ever you are doing (12/4?) Even firefighters spend a great deal of time sitting around and relaxing and doing non-work things.
Seriously dude. You need to take care of yourself. There's only one of you and if you screw up your body, you don't get a replacement. You die.
http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-123.htm
Taken with a grain of salt, it is still important to consider. How many "missing links" were definitively such?
My best advice is to go back to the places you know the best, whether it is a region of the US, a particular state, or a locality.
As far as your wife is concerned (I'm assuming she's Japanese), you'll want to get her involved in something so that she meets new people and makes new friends. That is going to be critical, otherwise she'll be asking to go back.
And I'd make sure your finances are in order so that you can live for a while in the US without a job. It may take some time to find the right fit. Otherwise, interview from overseas and come over only when you have a job.
Yes, everyone has a moral responsibility to themselves and those around them. But it's not government's duty to enforce the responsibility we all have.
Let's allow society to figure it out. I am very picky about what games and movies and TV shows I watch. I only choose entertainment from those who understand their moral responsibilities. Everyone else is kept out of my home and out of my head.
I'm going to advocate that people should be morally responsible, but it is morally IRRESPONSIBLE for me to enforce my viewpoints at the point of a gun. That's not the way Jesus worked.
So let's keep government out of this, because we can all handle it on our own.
I'm a rabid Linux fan, and I detest every moment I have to test my work in IE. However, I have to say that what Bill Gates is doing outside of the computing world is nothing short from wonderful.
I have a deep interest in education, in particular, how to solve the problems we are facing without throwing more money at them. So I am heavily involved in the school issues in my neighborhood, and I am organizing people to research things we can be doing to help out the district. What Bill Gates is doing to the education field is nothing short of amazing. Most recently, he said that the current high school system should be scrapped because it is a complete waste of time. I don't know any Linux fans that would disagree with that.
He is also putting his money where his mouth is. I know that we are looking at getting some of his money to implement his plans in our own district, or at least in the final stages of getting the grant. I don't think there is a district in the US that isn't getting some benefit from what he is doing.
And he does more than that. I don't know the specifics, but I know he is working in Africa and South America trying to help raise the living standard from sub-human to at least what we would call "poverty" in the US.
That is what he is getting knighted for, and not for his achievements in amassing a huge amount of wealth. It is how he is using it that really counts.
Now, I also realize that what Bill did to the computing world was nothing short of amazing as well. Before Bill, we were a sub-culture to be derided and spit upon. Now we are cool, and our skills have street-cred. We have Bill Gates to thank for that.
The object being hidden has to be less than the about the wavelength of the light. So, unless you are nanometers in size, you won't be hidden from visible light.
And it only works on one frequency. Meaning, unless you are nanometers in size, and you are in a room with only red light, you won't be hidden.
This isn't that great. I wouldn't read too much into it.
See, a long time ago we had this all figured out. Government OF the people (meaning, the people formed it.) Government BY the people (meaning, the people executed it.) Government FOR the people (meaning, its sole purpose was to serve the people.)
100 years ago, if a hijacker tried to steal something like a plane (well, let's imagine a train instead) they had to do so with enough men and guns and ammo to fight off the people on the train. If they screwed up, they would be shot by the passengers on the train, or even the engineer himself. That's government BY the people.
When gangs formed up that were strong enough to bully people around, the people responded by making an even bigger gang (called a posse) to hunt them down and kill them. If things got out of hand, the military was called in to serve the people and kick the crap out of the perpetrators.
Today. things are a lot different. If I saw a bank robbery in progress, and subdued the robber with my handguns (which I'd be proudly carrying around my hips, 2nd amendment folks), I'd be thrown in jail. If the robber tried to shoot me and I shot back and laid him flat on his back six-feet under, then I would be facing life in prison.
If the hijackers took a plan and I whipped out my 45 and gave them all a new hole, I'd be charged with endangering the life of the crew, murder, or worse.
That's why life sucks around here. Restore our basic freedoms, and we won't need security checks at the airports. We won't need no Homeland Security department (we got all the security right here, in the barrel of my guns.) Heck, we wouldn't even need a national military. If Bush wants to invade a country, he'd have to convince a whole lotta us to follow him into battle. Otherwise, he'd be going it alone.
We'd have a lot fewer trial lawyers as well. We wouldn't need as many prisons either. And we wouldn't have a problem with wayward politicians, because we'd be the FBI investigating them.
Folks, that's government BY the people. If Mao said that government comes by the barrell of a gun, then we have a whole lot more barrels than the military does. If the pen is mightier than the sword, then we can fight with far more pens than any government can hope to muster.
There's no need to speculate on how a quantum computer will work. We already have working examples, and we already know the generic properties of them. Instead of trying to figure it out on your own, go read the vast amounts of information on the topic available.
The three properties of the QC that are most important:
1. You can set the state of the qubits to whatever you like.
2. You have some transformation that the qubits will go through. This can be arbitrarily complex, and will be the most interesting part of the machine.
2. You can get a really good estimate of the state by doing the operation from the same initial state several times. See, when you go to measure a quantum state, you get one possibility of many. You have to make a lot of measurements to figure out what is really happening.
The best comparison is to think of the single-slit experiments you did in High School physics. You take a parallel light source (sunlight, laser, light from a distance) and have it strike a plate with a very thin slit. Then you hold a piece of paper where the light comes out. You will see bands of light, and some chromatic aberrations (you will see colors).
If you consider a single photon travelling from the light source and approaching the slit, passing "through" the slit, and then travelling off into any one of the finite number of directions, you ask the question: How can we predict which way it will go?
The answer is you can't. You have to do it a lot (like with a beam of light) and you can easily see what the probabilities are from that.
You can probably think of the experiment I described above as a very simple form of a quantum computer. You set the input - the light travelling into the slit. You have the transformation - the slit. And you can read the results by doing it several times.
That's all quantum computing will do for you. It's up to the really smart guys in white lab coats to figure out how to turn that into something useful.
I believe this will all be abstracted away from your eyes, just like today you don't worry about which register your integers is stored in and such. You will merely say, "Run the calculations on this set of data and give me the result" and it will do it before you can blink.
Heck, ordinary people won't even get to own a quantum computer until two things happen: (1) We find a better use for them than hacking into banks and stealing people's identities, and (2) we have built up enough of a reportoire of transformations that some subset of that is actually useful to solve the problems we face in computing today.
But I think the point that RasterMan was claiming is that innovation happens here. It is so fast, that it seems to be complete before it's even discovered.
Here's what Havoc et al are going to do. They are going to get a hold of RasterMan, or at least his code, and examine it thoroughly. Building upon his concepts, they will develop a better solution that will bring RasterMan's ideas into the mainstream world.
The E project may never be accessible to a large crowd. That's not the purpose of E, and you can see it in the tone of RasterMan's post. The E project is around to innovate and push the edge, and experiment. That's a very different goal from the Gnome, KDE, and FreeDesktop projects.
RasterMan should be very happy that his work is going to be used and spread around the entire community. I don't know what more he could've asked for.
This obliterates the concept that Open Source software is just copy-cat software. Yes, we have projects who copy-cat, because they are looking for stability and usability, not innovation. But we also have projects that are trend-setters and the research institutions of our community. While we won't use their software, we should still support them.
This is just like in the real world of science. There are research scientists (like RasterMan.) Nobody ends up using what they do directly. Then there are the engineers (like Havoc) that incorporate the best ideas into a working product that everyone uses. We build on each other's strengths.
So, they create a game with static spawn spots. These monsters give valuable rewards for fighting them. Players learn about the spawn spots. They capitalize on it. It soon turns into a game of who can strike the monster first.
I don't see what the problem is. They created the rules, and this is a logical progression. Why don't they remove the static spawning from the game, or make it random, or make these monsters tougher, or stop handing out rewards for camping?
No, what I would do is write a save_game and restore_game method in a universal subclass for all game objects. It will know how to serialized all the objects contained within a game object, and how to read them back out. That way, I only implement the save/restore method once.
I have a suggestion, which it seems people are already following. Why don't we just let the market decide the way things should work?
I think what will happen is the publishers will eventually grant real legal rights to the objects and avatars in that world. The players seem to want this, and seem to understand that this is fair.
If I were into this sort of thing, I would begin forming enterprises that facilitate this. For example, if your avatar owns a lot of expensive things, how about you get an insurance policy that will pay our real dollars in the event the items are lost in certain situations? What about in-game escrow services - avatars who belong to particular groups who have built up a reputation for being responsible in holding items and in-game cash? How about time-share contracts, where items are loaned but only for certain times of the day? What about item rental?
For all the hype China is getting as a supposed new super-power to challenge the US, there is something more fundamental going on there. It didn't start in Tiananmen square, but it is continuing in the rice paddies and town squares.
People in China have developed a distrust for government. This isn't news, because it didn't happen overnight. In the past, government was a partner. The people would give them taxes, their young men, and endure some pretty harsh rules from time to time. In exchange, the government would maintain order, secure a decent living, and protect the people from wandering Mongol hordes. Occasionally the government would clean up corruption or crack down on gangs and networks.
This all started to change when Europe conquered China. No longer could the government protect the people! The people began to look for another way. At about the time of Chiang Kai-Shek, european style democracy was beginning to really take root. The people were beginning to prosper, and beginning to realize their power. They were getting a better picture of the true role of government, as a servant of the people, not as their master. Of course that awakening was interrupted by Mao and his hordes of communists. It would take a long time to begin reawaken the sleeping giant again.
Nowadays, there are no Mongol hordes. The biggest threat China faces is arguably the best thing that could ever happen to China. Why does the government want to put a wall between the US and China when the US can be an extremely valuable trade partner? And not just an economic trade partner, but an intellectual trade partner? The people are beginning to see that communism isn't the answer.
People in China have grown to understand that the cities in the US are paved with gold. Not literally, of course. But there is something that the US is doing that makes their 300 million strong much more wealthy, powerful, and intelligent than China's billions. They are getting a sense of what capitalism is all about. They are growing to appreciate the fundamental rights of man, thank to the beginning of a Christian uprising. They are seeing the weakness in the government, how they require the buy-in of the people or they can't govern.
I encourage you to talk with visiting scholars from China who are getting their graduate degrees in our universities. They understand the real problems China faces, the real struggles they are fighting. But they also have come to see what really makes America what it is. They are probably going to be a compassionate capitalist. Yes, people should work hard to make as much money as they can. But that money should be used to employ other people or for charity. It's the duty of the rich to care for the poor.
They see Japan, South Korea, Phillipines, and other countries, and wonder why, after 400 years of contact with Europe, hasn't China become like them. Yet Japan and South Korea are such small, weak countries in comparison historically. Why do they prosper so much? Why can South Korea boast a military that threatens even China?
I watched on TV as an older women openly challenged the town mayor, a strong party member. Her grievances were just - the government displaced her and made promises they didn't keep. The look on the officials face as the cameras taped the final confrontation was one of fear. He saw that that poor, uneducated woman was far more powerful than he ever could be, because she was right. She learned that when you are fighting for a just cause, even if it is in your own self-interest, you can win. The message is getting out. People are learning.
This internet-cafe closing thing will have absolutely zero negative effect on the progression of Chinese government to a true democracy. If anything, it will be more fuel to add towards true reform and freedom for the people.
The pundits who are left-leaning say "Watch out for China! They will do what Saddam and Stalin could not do!" That is just wishful thinking. These are probably the same people saying ter
The problem is the terrorists aren't attacking us because we are treating them poorly. No, they are attacking us to convert us to Islam and to punish us for being infidels and not obeying shari'a.
Go read some of the manifestos and declarations put out by Osama bin Laden and the blind sheik. They are more concerned with the fact that we charge interest and treat women equally than that we go into their countries and murder their children (even if it were true.)
Let me just detail that what is happening today isn't new at all. We've seen events like 9/11 in the past several hundred years on many occasions, sponsored by Muslem terrorists.
* The Europeans embarked on the crusades to rebuild holy Christian sites destroyed by Muslem fanatics in Jerusalem. That, and to put an end to the constant Muslem invasions of Europe.
* Muslem fanatics have been persecuting, murdering, torturing, raping, pillaging, and enslaving Europeans since they have been able to. If they ever stopped, it was because of their military defeats and the killing of their leaders. No amount of negotiation, barter, or capitulation has ever been successful.
* Even today, the king of Spain has sworn an oath to fight all Muslems. This is in response to the Muslem invasion of Spain. The country of Spain once understood the threat of Moslem terrorists, and swore to defeat it permanently.
* The Barbary Pirates were in fact Muslem fanatics and terrorists. After diplomatic parrying, the US went as far as to pay tribute to them. In the end, we built up the first US navy to crush them. After that, the US has refused to negotiate with terrorists. Our policy has been to meet force with more force.
You are right. "corpus" is a body, which is where we get the words "corpse" from.
"Corporate" or "incorporate" means to form a body. Legally, a corporation has the rights of a human, but that is a modern invention. Historically, a corporation was a way that a new "body" could be formed of many different people. The articles of incorporation detail how the body is run, how decision are made, what the purpose of the body is, etc...
Every organization that comes together and has rules for how the organization is run is a corporation in that sense of the word. You'll note that sometimes "organization", "association", "body", "assembly" can be used to mean the same thing.
In the market, for-profit corporations are formed by investors who want to take their capital (time, talents, cash, resources) and turn it into something more. You've heard of "synergy" right? That's the idea that the combination of the parts is greater than the sum of the parts. As the corporation matures, they don't expect much in return. When the corporation is complete, they expect to get regular payments on their investments. Should the corporation fail its purpose, they expect to be able to salvage whatever capital they can from the effort.
Rich people don't do like Scrooge McDuck and swim in their piles of cash. Instead, they drain their coffers and invest it hoping to get even more cash. Or they give it away to their favorite charities. Rich people can't stand seeing money lying around doing nothing much like nerds can't stand seeing a computer turned off doing nothing.
You've forgotten the reason why Microsoft existed in the first place: To *make* a lot of people a heckuva lot of money.
If Microsoft sees no future in its business, it will liquidate its assets and pay off its investors. Sure, it has billions, but if it can't find a way to turn those billions into trillions, then it will be sold and the capital invested somewhere else. This is the core of capitalism.
Companies are the sum of its investors, and nothing more. They can come and go pretty much as they wish. What do you think "corporation" means? It means something made out of many parts, those parts being actual people and their fortunes.
Companies don't collapse. They are abandoned. That is what is happening to Microsoft *right now*, and he sees it.
CFC makes it worse, how?
(1) Refrigerators and air conditioners would be a lot more efficient and cheaper too. They would be safer as well.
(2) Places where fire is dangerous can install the fire extinguishers that use CFCs, saving hundreds if not thousands of lives. If such a system were installed in the World Trade Center, the building would not have burned and it would not have collapsed. Of course, if they had finished the installation of asbestos, it would not have fallen either, but government strikes again, and now thousands are dead because of it!
If this is true, why do we have birds today? We used DDT very, very heavily back in the days.
I looked up the DDT scare and it was claimed it threatened one species of bird that was on the verge of extinction. Even then it wasn't proven that it was the cause. After all, every chicken rancher know that birds need calcium to build a good eggshell. If they don't have enough, the shell is weak. Perhaps the birds near the city had a hard time finding calcium? Oh no, that would only make too much sense! Let's ban DDT instead!
We treated the Indians poorly, but they were doing worse to themselves.
Let's start with human sacrifice, daily, of their enemies. Have we done anything like this? I'm sorry, but using germ warfare hardly compares to cutting the heart out of a living human.
Let's move on to the constant wars among the Indians. Unlike Americans, which fought wars to defend themselves, Indians fought war for fun. We took their land from them because they attacked us first. Did we distinguish between the peaceful ones and not so peaceful? Not very well. I would've preferred the Cherokee stay put, and if you read your history books, so did the Supreme Court.
We treat the Indians like kings nowadays. We pay them a King's ransom every year, we allow them to operate above the law, and we look past their problems in adopting our society.