How well does the Windows screenreader work? Do you have to get special versions of all the apps to work? How easy is it to make a screenreader aware application in Windows? Please anyone care to answer this?
From following Apple's development of OS X, it seems to me that the idea behind Apple's upcoming Screenreader, is that you wont have to rewrite your applications to take advantage of this...if I remember correctly the capability is already in.
Never using the Windows screenreader myself maybe it works just like Apple intends it to have theirs work.
Though Apple may not be the first to provide it, I'm sure they'll make a good job that it will raise some eye brows. That or Apple is beleagured;-)
Actually Apple could probably have made the iPod mini even smaller, but they have this thing about the interface to the device being usable:-) and also about keeping it cheaper that the regular ipods.
Another completely offtopic thing...i just clicked on the first link in the parent post, saw that the poster had 5 mod points, then i logged in and now i got 5 mod points!
I'm getting paranoid....(clicking ms ads = free mod points?);-)
[yeah it's just pure coincidence, thanks for reading this offtopic codeonezero post:-)]
First off didn't read the article yet...but I can tell you that despite the bad practices of printer manufacturers, using third party stuff could void your warranty.
In this case, we have a tektronix (before xerox bought the printing division) that was damaged because someone moved it before properly letting the wax ink dry.
We had a xerox authorized rep, come and take a look at it, telling us how to try to fix it and telling us she suspected that the problem was two fold. Someone had moved the printer before letting the wax dry out into a solid, so that the wax liquid had gotten into some of the nozzles...and also she said that the damage was probably caused by our use of third party wax ink cartridges.
Something to do with the ink in the tektronic being a patented (term?) chemical mixture meant to work in a certain way when it was heated. Although you can use third party ink for it, it is not the same type of mixture and thus can have unexpected side effects.
So short answer is make sure you know what you are giving up by using third party stuff, as it may end up voiding your warranty and possibly ruining your printer (in this case an expensive $1,000 or so printer).
Sure for a cheap inkjet it probably doesnt matter, as if it breaks it's cheap to replace.
I had this same problem with a couple of games. Most notably, Ray Man 3 for the Mac.
I bought the game for about $50 for my brother. However, it mostly works, if you can deal with the problematic sound bug, which freezes everything at random, bad camera control using the mouse, and the inability to properly set custom keys to stick, among other things....and don't get me started with the Macally Shock II game pad I can't seem to configure to work right for me! (though I think that's Macally's fault)
I'm not very happy with feral (http://www.feral.co.uk)
Halo is another one, where if you use the 1.0 version for mac, and get the health pack, your screen goes completely black for like 10 seconds. Those could be the crucial 10 seconds in which you could just die if the Covenant is chasing after you, and you just stepped in their path because you couldnt see where you are going. I think this has been fixed now, but it was an annoying thing through the game.
Cro-Mag Rally (another mac game) had similar problems on Mac OS X. I even e-mailed the developer and didn't get a very encouraging response. Can't remember what it was or the exact tone...(kind of hard to note the tone through e-mail)
Maybe my problem is that I'm on the mac trying to play games, but from the article this seems to be the trend. I can't remember what other games I've had this problem with but I've gotten into the habit of looking for updates for games as soon as I get them. It fustrates me when it takes a long time for updates to come along.
This is specially fustrating when some games sell at a higher price for a Mac version versus the PC version...
Not to sound like an all knowing leet mac user, but I think bluetooth will be dead when Apple stops including it as an option on the Macs.
Apple by it's nature seems to be a good indicator of what's in. Apparently USB was around for a while, but didn't really pick up until Apple added it to it's machines. Look at Wi-Fi/Airport, Apple was one of the first companies to include it and make it standard.
Ditto with Bluetooth. Them Mac users will jump on anything Apple sugar coats and make it viable:-)
Feel free to correct me if I've made erroneous assertions. Thanks:-)
Just wait for a couple of more viruses/worms to propagate on Windows and screw up people's computers and people will switch.
People have switched over this, I can attest to that, not me of course but I talked to a lady over the weekend who is a writer and uses her computer for just that. Her Windows PC got infected by a virus, not sure which one, but she ended up being fed up. She dropped the PC off to be repaired and went to one of the Apple Stores to buy a Mac.
Now, that's not to say Macs are virus proof, I explained that to her when she told me. She ended up getting a virus scanner just in case.
But the possibility is there, it seems to me that people are looking at the Mac because of security concerns over Windows.
Now if Linux gets a good Desktop that's easy for the end user to set up and use, I think we might just get people switching over just like that:-)
I'd probably still use my Mac though, I like Linux but the Mac does what I need for now, and if not then I look at ports coming in from Linux or BSD:-)
Did anyone else think for a fraction of a second that RDF referred to Steve Jobs' Reality Distortion Field (RDF)?
Scary...
Yes offtopic i guess...sorry:-)
City of Los Angeles, already uses www.ci.la.ca.us, which I believe is way better that www.la or whatever. They also have www.cityofla.org
A much better TLD for businesses in Los Angeles would be to have something like www.business-name.la.ca.us
Also aren't TLDs like www.la for countries?
Frankly as a resident of Los Angeles, I am insulted by this.
In fact I should be getting a discount since I'm in LA!!:)
Also do they even check if you're actually in LA?
I don't know if Mayor Hahn and the city council might be upset or happy about this. But they might not be able to do much about it, since probably the city government has no jurisdiction over the TLD.
I hope the settlement is hard cash and not Windows XP licenses;)
ideally efficient maybe, effective in real world
on
Making Change
·
· Score: 1
Although this seems ideally efficient, in application it probably isnt.
I'm no expert but this reminds me of an asktog.com article where Tog explains how for a person using a microwave to cook something for 1 minute and 11 seconds is faster than setting 1 minute and 10 seconds on the microwave.
Why? Because on the keypad its just easier to type 111 instead of 110 as it takes extra time to move down and find the 0
Similarly (or not), having an 18 cent coin or whatever, is not going to be any more efficient than the current 1, 5, 10, 25 four-coin system.
The extra math is just going to confuse the hell out of people who are used to counting by 5 and 10.
With all of these name conflict why don't they go with maybe the same meaning of Firebird and Phoenix but maybe in another language, where they can be more creative and have a lesser chance of coming up with name conflicts?
Maybe go with Quenya (Middle-Earth Language, from Lord of the Rings/Tolkien)
Pardon my poor quenya but i pulled the following together from word stems of bird and fire from this English-Quenya dictionary (RTF file)
Naraiwe in quenya which if i got it correctly is firebird/phoenix. It has the meaning, certainly sounds cool and i doubt there some other project out there using this name.
Ok so searching google shows up some guy with naraiwe as his nickname, well he's not a project!!
My point stands:)
Apple is 27 years old today...
on
Apple Fools Day
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Well I guess no one has yet noticed or remembered but Apple was incorporated on April 1, 1976
I think we can thank the Woz for that:)
You know Woz was the biggest prankster of the two or so it seems.
See Link below for info: http://www.lowendmac.com/time/index.shtml -Esteban
Back in 1998 I got a Student WWDC pass but, because the WWDC was the week of finals I had no hope of getting there.
If this change continues in later years I think it might be a big boost to more student participation at the WWDC (who will mostly be off in June i think, or at least not have finals around that time), which will probably be good long term for Apple's Developer Community.
I can't wait for Panther! (10.3) Quick someone post som Panther rumors!!
I've been waiting for something like this since I was in my Physics lab class playing with magnets flux and copper coil.
If true this could be awesome:)
Wouldnt there be a problem with devices with magnetic drives though? I'm guessing either those devices have to be shielded, or they have to be devices not using magnetic drives (say compactflash cards, or optical drives...) ?
I'm gonna have to wait to get home and look up that Scientific American issue...I can't seem to find it on their web site... If someone does please post.
I'm not a physics major so I might be wrong on them being gravity waves. So verification would be good.
As the COBE satellite first confirmed in 1992, the microwave cloud is laced with ripples and splotches -- lumps in the cosmic gravy -- from which galaxies and other cosmic structures would ultimately form.
According to theory, these lumps are born as microscopic fluctuations during the first instant of time and then
amplified into sound waves as the universe expands and matter and energy slosh around.
That should be "amplified into gravity waves" i think... I seem to remember reading this description in Scientific American...and yeah its gravity not sound waves.
Ok, this is great news. I hope Apple decides to use this chip. I could just see dual ppc 970 Power Macs running at 2.5Ghz x 2:) Why stop there maybe they'll go quad, and that would be awesome:)
I just hope apple doesnt go back to using single chip on their high end systems...its ok if they do use one chip for say the iMac, *book line but the Power Macs should stay with dual if they end up using this chip.
Ok so one comment I remember from my High School Honors English Lit teacher was something like "just because it's written like that in a newspaper by the author of the article, doesnt meant its gramatically correct...just another reason why you should make sure to note it's a quote from the article and not you."
So the forementioned article on Grade inflation makes this comment clearer.
Also I remember reading that Asimov to some extend was criticizing this kind of trend/attitude in the Foundation series, reflecting his view of what he perceived was happening in the US and elsewhere. You know every generation being more decadent than the last thus leading to the fall of the Galactic Empire.
Ok so that was sci fi but Asimov probably had some points after all good sci fi is partially about warning us of possible futures.
Slashdot Mirror
How well does the Windows screenreader work? Do you have to get special versions of all the apps to work? How easy is it to make a screenreader aware application in Windows?
;-)
Please anyone care to answer this?
From following Apple's development of OS X, it seems to me that the idea behind Apple's upcoming Screenreader, is that you wont have to rewrite your applications to take advantage of this...if I remember correctly the capability is already in.
Never using the Windows screenreader myself maybe it works just like Apple intends it to have theirs work.
Though Apple may not be the first to provide it, I'm sure they'll make a good job that it will raise some eye brows. That or Apple is beleagured
Actually Apple could probably have made the iPod mini even smaller, but they have this thing about the interface to the device being usable :-)
and also about keeping it cheaper that the regular ipods.
If I remember correctly doesnt the Record Industry have to label "protected" CDs?
Would be a good idea if these PC manufacturers labeled their PCs as using BIOS DRM.
That way an informed consumer can make a choice whether or not they want DRM on their system.
Just a thought.
Another completely offtopic thing...i just clicked on the first link in the parent post, saw that the poster had 5 mod points, then i logged in and now i got 5 mod points!
;-)
:-)]
I'm getting paranoid....(clicking ms ads = free mod points?)
[yeah it's just pure coincidence, thanks for reading this offtopic codeonezero post
First off didn't read the article yet...but I can tell you that despite the bad practices of printer manufacturers, using third party stuff could void your warranty.
In this case, we have a tektronix (before xerox bought the printing division) that was damaged because someone moved it before properly letting the wax ink dry.
We had a xerox authorized rep, come and take a look at it, telling us how to try to fix it and telling us she suspected that the problem was two fold. Someone had moved the printer before letting the wax dry out into a solid, so that the wax liquid had gotten into some of the nozzles...and also she said that the damage was probably caused by our use of third party wax ink cartridges.
Something to do with the ink in the tektronic being a patented (term?) chemical mixture meant to work in a certain way when it was heated. Although you can use third party ink for it, it is not the same type of mixture and thus can have unexpected side effects.
So short answer is make sure you know what you are giving up by using third party stuff, as it may end up voiding your warranty and possibly ruining your printer (in this case an expensive $1,000 or so printer).
Sure for a cheap inkjet it probably doesnt matter, as if it breaks it's cheap to replace.
I had this same problem with a couple of games. Most notably, Ray Man 3 for the Mac.
:-)
I bought the game for about $50 for my brother. However, it mostly works, if you can deal with the problematic sound bug, which freezes everything at random, bad camera control using the mouse, and the inability to properly set custom keys to stick, among other things....and don't get me started with the Macally Shock II game pad I can't seem to configure to work right for me! (though I think that's Macally's fault)
I'm not very happy with feral (http://www.feral.co.uk)
Halo is another one, where if you use the 1.0 version for mac, and get the health pack, your screen goes completely black for like 10 seconds. Those could be the crucial 10 seconds in which you could just die if the Covenant is chasing after you, and you just stepped in their path because you couldnt see where you are going. I think this has been fixed now, but it was an annoying thing through the game.
Cro-Mag Rally (another mac game) had similar problems on Mac OS X. I even e-mailed the developer and didn't get a very encouraging response. Can't remember what it was or the exact tone...(kind of hard to note the tone through e-mail)
Maybe my problem is that I'm on the mac trying to play games, but from the article this seems to be the trend. I can't remember what other games I've had this problem with but I've gotten into the habit of looking for updates for games as soon as I get them. It fustrates me when it takes a long time for updates to come along.
This is specially fustrating when some games sell at a higher price for a Mac version versus the PC version...
Thank you for reading my rant
Not to sound like an all knowing leet mac user, but I think bluetooth will be dead when Apple stops including it as an option on the Macs.
:-)
:-)
Apple by it's nature seems to be a good indicator of what's in. Apparently USB was around for a while, but didn't really pick up until Apple added it to it's machines. Look at Wi-Fi/Airport, Apple was one of the first companies to include it and make it standard.
Ditto with Bluetooth. Them Mac users will jump on anything Apple sugar coats and make it viable
Feel free to correct me if I've made erroneous assertions. Thanks
Just wait for a couple of more viruses/worms to propagate on Windows and screw up people's computers and people will switch. People have switched over this, I can attest to that, not me of course but I talked to a lady over the weekend who is a writer and uses her computer for just that. Her Windows PC got infected by a virus, not sure which one, but she ended up being fed up. She dropped the PC off to be repaired and went to one of the Apple Stores to buy a Mac. Now, that's not to say Macs are virus proof, I explained that to her when she told me. She ended up getting a virus scanner just in case. But the possibility is there, it seems to me that people are looking at the Mac because of security concerns over Windows. Now if Linux gets a good Desktop that's easy for the end user to set up and use, I think we might just get people switching over just like that :-)
I'd probably still use my Mac though, I like Linux but the Mac does what I need for now, and if not then I look at ports coming in from Linux or BSD :-)
Did anyone else think for a fraction of a second that RDF referred to Steve Jobs' Reality Distortion Field (RDF)? Scary... Yes offtopic i guess...sorry :-)
And best of all there's no step 3)
;-)
Sounds like an iMac commercial with voice over by Jeff Goldblum
A much better TLD for businesses in Los Angeles would be to have something like www.business-name.la.ca.us
Also aren't TLDs like www.la for countries?
Frankly as a resident of Los Angeles, I am insulted by this. In fact I should be getting a discount since I'm in LA!! :)
Also do they even check if you're actually in LA?
I don't know if Mayor Hahn and the city council might be upset or happy about this. But they might not be able to do much about it, since probably the city government has no jurisdiction over the TLD.
I hope the settlement is hard cash and not Windows XP licenses ;)
Although this seems ideally efficient, in application it probably isnt.
I'm no expert but this reminds me of an asktog.com article where Tog explains how for a person using a microwave to cook something for 1 minute and 11 seconds is faster than setting 1 minute and 10 seconds on the microwave.
Why? Because on the keypad its just easier to type 111 instead of 110 as it takes extra time to move down and find the 0
Similarly (or not), having an 18 cent coin or whatever, is not going to be any more efficient than the current 1, 5, 10, 25 four-coin system.
The extra math is just going to confuse the hell out of people who are used to counting by 5 and 10.
With all of these name conflict why don't they go with maybe the same meaning of Firebird and Phoenix but maybe in another language, where they can be more creative and have a lesser chance of coming up with name conflicts?
Maybe go with Quenya (Middle-Earth Language, from Lord of the Rings/Tolkien)
Pardon my poor quenya but i pulled the following together from word stems of bird and fire from this English-Quenya dictionary (RTF file)
Naraiwe in quenya which if i got it correctly is firebird/phoenix. It has the meaning, certainly sounds cool and i doubt there some other project out there using this name.
Ok so searching google shows up some guy with naraiwe as his nickname, well he's not a project!!
My point stands :)
Well I guess no one has yet noticed or remembered but Apple was incorporated on April 1, 1976
:)
I think we can thank the Woz for that
You know Woz was the biggest prankster of the two or so it seems.
See Link below for info:
http://www.lowendmac.com/time/index.shtml
-Esteban
I sure hope its not some sick joke by the Copyright Office :)
..
:)
Like have them get us all riled up about complaining only to go with recomendations by the MPAA or RIAA.
Doh!!! Not another bad april fools joke
Hehe
This is great.
;)
Back in 1998 I got a Student WWDC pass but, because the WWDC was the week of finals I had no hope of getting there.
If this change continues in later years I think it might be a big boost to more student participation at the WWDC (who will mostly be off in June i think, or at least not have finals around that time), which will probably be good long term for Apple's Developer Community.
I can't wait for Panther! (10.3)
Quick someone post som Panther rumors!!
Maybe a Pink Panther reference
Argh, if i could only go back in time a few years back and patent the idea when i had it... Damn it cool though :)
I've been waiting for something like this since I was in my Physics lab class playing with magnets flux and copper coil.
:)
If true this could be awesome
Wouldnt there be a problem with devices with magnetic drives though? I'm guessing either those devices have to be shielded, or they have to be devices not using magnetic drives (say compactflash cards, or optical drives...) ?
Cool...maybe more people should do this :)
/. this might alleviate their problems a bit.
Yeah it sucks but for small sites, who cant take
Yeah offtopic sorry.
I'm gonna have to wait to get home and look up that Scientific American issue...I can't seem to find it on their web site...
If someone does please post.
I'm not a physics major so I might be wrong on them being gravity waves. So verification would be good.
Thanks.
Ok, this is great news. I hope Apple decides to use this chip. I could just see dual ppc 970 Power Macs running at 2.5Ghz x 2 :) Why stop there maybe they'll go quad, and that would be awesome :)
I just hope apple doesnt go back to using single chip on their high end systems...its ok if they do use one chip for say the iMac, *book line but the Power Macs should stay with dual if they end up using this chip.
Oh and the obligatory, karma whoring
"Imagine a Beowulf of these!!!!"
Ok so one comment I remember from my High School Honors English Lit teacher was something like "just because it's written like that in a newspaper by the author of the article, doesnt meant its gramatically correct...just another reason why you should make sure to note it's a quote from the article and not you."
So the forementioned article on Grade inflation makes this comment clearer.
Also I remember reading that Asimov to some extend was criticizing this kind of trend/attitude in the Foundation series, reflecting his view of what he perceived was happening in the US and elsewhere. You know every generation being more decadent than the last thus leading to the fall of the Galactic Empire.
Ok so that was sci fi but Asimov probably had some points after all good sci fi is partially about warning us of possible futures.
- codeonezero