I'm playing computer games (mind you! computer not video games) since the early eighties.
And I seriously doubt that Complex Games(TM) are a recent development. I played and loved Ultima IV
on my C64. And if that was not complex, what is it then? Think of the first Microsoft Flight Simulator for instance.
That said, I'm not an exclusive player of these games. I like playing both types. And I think there are games that are both, simple and complex in one.
I wondered about the debate over 'use' and 'crouch' keys. In my opinion that does not divide games in simple, as in easy to pickup and just play for a while, and complex (we need at least an hour to get into that one). Complexity of interface and functions is not a good indicator for this. If this was the case then a game like
Paradroid would be a simple game. Which is it not. Because you have to invest some time and strategic thinking even to get somewhere in this game, let alone beat one level.
While I agree with the need of a biosphere and gravity for astronauts I disagree with the rest.
Turning back to rockets? I don't think so.
Rockets can fail too. Ariane 5 is the best example.
Dusting off Saturn; I don't know how many flights the Saturn system had, but I wager that over hundred flights will certainly show a (fatal?) weakness in every system. All we can do is respond to that.
Then his argument for manned spaceflight
and against robots: Scientific experiments can only be conducted by human beings. I beg to differ. Certainly, robots are not as versatile
as human beings, but for experiments they're enough. Heck, the whole spacecraft could be just a big robot. Let's face it: the shuttle crew is there to study humans in space. For the only benefit that is: bring humans into space. And maybe to other planets. That's it. Everything else could be done by robots.
So, do we really need humans in space? Apparently this leads to only one conclusion: to colonialize space. This is the sole reason for this gigantic effort. I could argue that we do not need humans in space. We cannot cope with our problems here on our homeworld. How are we supposed to deal with more problems in outer space? Carry war and depletion there? First we should do our homework here before setting sights for other horizons.
However I admit that I like human spaceflight like the next geek. I have the books by Asimov, Cherryh, etc. to prove it. Even a Benford. But ditching the shuttle because it failed twice in over a hundred flights is not the right answer, in my opinion. It has to be revised that's clear. And there has to be research for alternatives. Supersonic planes, etc.
If cost is the only argument, then drop human spaceflight altogether.
My question is to the knowledgable out there:
Can the SSH-suite be extended in such a way that it detects the presence of the TPM on board and use it for its own good?
And now for my comment:
This (I mean the article) is good news in my opininon. Instead of reviling new technology because the original intentions were focused on something bad, look for ways to embrace it and use it for other means. Means that are good. Or, if that fails, develop countermeasures. Just taking the stance "that's just evil" does not help anyone.
Okay, why not? Make your test character, and when you're finally found out what to really do, delete your test char and make a new one!
Sounds good?
This is the first piece I read that's by Mr Koster. I don't know the man, I didn't play EverQuest. I did play UO. (And was disgusted by the lack of customer support.)
But what he has written is sound.
Eventually it boils down to resources. Storage and attention per customer. This decision is entirely appropriate. What people fail to realize is that even the namespace is some kind of resource. You wanna name your character Han Solo? Bad luck, you can't. And your million predecessors didn't either. (Not that I think that Han Solo will be valid name choice in the game.) Mules take away names. And that's only a tiny part of it.
I've got a cel1100/512MB for playing computer games only. Not one so-called office application (not even a word processor) graced my peecees. Ever. I'm running Win98SE. Holding off XP as long as I can. However, if a game in the future absolutely requires XP, then I'll bite. Probably.
I've got an iMac too. Mostly for e-mails and sometimes web. It runs on MacOS X.1.5. (Curse you Apple for demanding $140 for an OS upgrade!)
Only thing that I'm missing for OSX is a decent newsreader like Forte Agent.
As soon as cool games will be released for Mac, I'm going to say the Windows platform Good Bye and move on. I changed to PCs in the first place because Ultima Underworld was an exclusive PC release. Before that it was an Amiga, and before that a C64...
Why should the market provide a better ruler than a law? I know that a law is prejudiced. But I have not seen any proof that a real-world market will prevent biased decisions..
Considerations what is better -- open source or not -- let aside. Laws for buying software (or any other products) where public or governmental institutions are concerned is always a good idea. And be it only to prohibit lobbying.
[...]
Anything else? Oh yeah. Don't ever give out your account information, if applicable. They will find your virtual body being defiled by virtual bums in a virtual alley.
He's right. As soon as I run downloaded software
I'm giving up full control over my system.
If I cannot analyze the software running on my
system, or have not written it myself I have to
trust the programmers that they do it right.
Given the trend in copyright law development
my influence over the system is pushed back to
the user interface. What's lying beyond is not
my domain anymore.
There are only two options left:
Write software myself.
Don't run any software, that is not trusted
by me.
I realize, that the reply I reply to is written
partly in jest. But there is a truth behind this.
Remember, the computer is an automaton with
exchangeable behaviour. Running different programs
on "my" computer makes it a different machine.
Okay, I admit, this was a bit of an emotion piece.
I do not really hate Microsoft as a
company, but I hate how they do their
thing.
As an example: my Apple experience is
still fresh (have this computer for just eight
months), but I'm already delighted.
I got the 10.0 - 10.2 upgrade for almost
nothing and the Developer kit, which I used
already to build some small apps with, for
free.
For Windows I tried to hold off from 'upgrades',
as long as possible. Only to be forced to get
it anyway because otherwise some hardware device
driver for my graphics card, or soundcard
would not be 'certified' anymore for my old
OS version. I successfully skipped ME.
But I wonder what next game will force me to
buy XP?
I spent roughly over $1000 on Microsoft products
just to keep my system afloat and running, and be able
to sample new games' demos.
And apart from DirectX, there is not even
added functionality that I use. (Well, even
DirectX comes on the game CD included)
In the heyday
of the C64 and Amiga this wasn't even necessary.
Are you implying Microsoft will dwindle and be a 'normal' player in the market in the future?
I think nobody can state this with certainty.
There are too many variables in the 'equation'.
So to speak.
For once there is the.NET campaign.
While the idea of a common development
platform accessible by almost any language
(that has a compiler for it) is brilliant; --
The thought of Microsoft controlling the
Intermediate Language (some sort
of Esperanto for developers, only one-way)
gives me the shudders. I mean: instead of
processor manufacturers giving out
C-compilers for their architectures, Microsoft
could dictate to processor manufacturers,
which instructions would be supported or
not. Okay, this is only a worst case scenario.
I'm probably way off here.. hopefully.;)
Windows will not go away so easily.
If Microsoft is successful pushing.NET, maybe they could also introduce
their own version of a network protocol stack,
that could gradually replace IP. Again, this
is wildly speculative. But none the less, it
could be possible.
Back to Topic: Bundestux.de has made some quite
bold statements. I don't know if this will
help them. On the other hand, if they act too
timid they'd be ignored for sure. While I like
the idea. If they reach their goal, it could
backlash: dedicated MS Windows users will
feel discriminated. That's for sure.
Unfortunately I don't know a solution. Maybe they
should leave the choice to the members of
parliament themselves. If some decide to
use Windows, or Linux, or MacOS in their own
offices, let them.
What do I hate about Microsoft?
And why do I hate Microsoft? I mean,
I bought (legally, no pirating) licenses for
DOS5, DOS6, DOS6.22, Win3.1, Win95,
Win95b, Win95OSR2, Win98, Win98SE!
I have the handbooks and keys to prove it!
In the last 10 years I assembled about five
PCs and installed all these OS's by hand.
Granted, I've also installed FreeBSD and got
a stack of FreeBSD versions (from 1.0 till 3.1).
And the computer I'm typing this on is an
iMac (not the new one) running OSX.2.
But I'm a sucker for computer games,
especially for the PC, and Windows is the
platform where most of my coveted games
are running on.
So why do I hate Microsoft?
Because they almost force me to
'upgrade'! Which is a misnomer, because I
have to acquire a new license each time.
As I perceive it, they use their OS and their
applications as leverage. Like a knife where
its handle and blade is replaced turn by turn.
They introduce new features in their next
office package. Because Windows has to
run this, they introduce a new Windows version to cope with these new features.
Then they have to improve the new Windows
version, because it is always buggy
on a new release. This, of course, leads to
a new Office version, which interfaces with
the improved Windows version better. And
nobody can stay behind. Everybody has to
keep the pace, because newer versions of
MS Word have a hard time reading documents written with older versions of
MS Word.
This is especially true with environments
like parliament offices, where I think document exchange is important. It is certainly
possible to exchange documents between
different versions of MS Word, but I think MS
is speculating on lazyness and peer pressure
here. ("please upgrade, I'm sick of manually
converting your old stuff to read it...")
And I have to tag along. Despite not even
using any Office package! I'm using my PCs
for gaming only! To make matters
worse, the next big thing is published by
Microsoft itself: Dungeon Siege. ARRGH!
The author most writes that (1) Linux is free, and that (2) Sony is evil in protecting it's intellectual property and asks(3) why would a company be so stupid to do so, and concludes that(4) in the end, there is freedom.
Just to clarify a bit (I've read the article)
The author with no word states that "Sony is evil". He explains the situation. There is no judgement. Look closely, what you maybe perceive as such is entirely your own.
Linux is free. So what? That does not make it "good" (versus "evil" profit) per se. It is always what you do with it, or with copyright in general, what defines it as good or bad. Law is neutral, how you follow law or use the holes of a law is the point.
The "conclusion" is none that I can follow. What you think about the author is entirely your own business. What the author wrote could be completely wrong, I cannot prove its validity. However, in human society there is always a minimum of trust. So I trust that, what he wrote is correct.
And I hadn't known this beforehand.
Now I was considering buying this kit. However, after this article I'm only considering it, because I can get a keyboard, hard-disk, and ethernet adapter in one set.
Anyway, as far as I remember, this track was on the W2 expansion cd "Beyond The Dark Portal" only. Unfortunately Blizzard stopped making audio tracks on game cds since they released Starcraft. This also applies for the Battle.net edition of W2. My original no-part-of-a-collection W2 cd is a real treasure to me.
As far as I know W3 will be OSX ready. (Correct me if I'm wrong here)
Anyway - what about a carbonized version of Warcraft II? Like they did for Starcraft? That would be nice. Or (tada) a carbonized version of Diablo II? That would be really nice!
And, refering to this, is there a remedy for the Ati Rave problems? The last update (for 9.2) didn't change a thing. The game has still frequent little pauses in hardware accelerated mode on my otherwise freshly set up iMac.
However I can make neither heads nor tails with it. I tried to load it into ProjectBuilder. Doesn't compute. I tried it on my iMac with OSX.1.2 and the December developer package.
I understand that at the time when Q2 was released OSX was still a rumour. Unfortunately I'm not expert enough to do this myself. Hell, I think I would even be able to port this to FreeBSD. Anyway, maybe someone can show the interested how to go on about this.
I'd certainly like to play Q2 on my iMac; I have the complete Q2 series for my PC.
Slashdot Mirror
I still refuse to use a printer at home!
And it hurts every time.
Who will be the first?
-Arnulf
While Dark McBride and Chris Sontag shoot their mouths off, the community develops tools to finally make something clearer. :)
-Arnulf
I'm playing computer games (mind you! computer not video games) since the early eighties. And I seriously doubt that Complex Games(TM) are a recent development. I played and loved Ultima IV on my C64. And if that was not complex, what is it then? Think of the first Microsoft Flight Simulator for instance.
That said, I'm not an exclusive player of these games. I like playing both types. And I think there are games that are both, simple and complex in one.
I wondered about the debate over 'use' and 'crouch' keys. In my opinion that does not divide games in simple, as in easy to pickup and just play for a while, and complex (we need at least an hour to get into that one). Complexity of interface and functions is not a good indicator for this. If this was the case then a game like Paradroid would be a simple game. Which is it not. Because you have to invest some time and strategic thinking even to get somewhere in this game, let alone beat one level.
Just my two Eurocents.
While I agree with the need of a biosphere and gravity for astronauts I disagree with the rest.
Turning back to rockets? I don't think so. Rockets can fail too. Ariane 5 is the best example.
Dusting off Saturn; I don't know how many flights the Saturn system had, but I wager that over hundred flights will certainly show a (fatal?) weakness in every system. All we can do is respond to that.
Then his argument for manned spaceflight and against robots: Scientific experiments can only be conducted by human beings. I beg to differ. Certainly, robots are not as versatile as human beings, but for experiments they're enough. Heck, the whole spacecraft could be just a big robot. Let's face it: the shuttle crew is there to study humans in space. For the only benefit that is: bring humans into space. And maybe to other planets. That's it. Everything else could be done by robots.
So, do we really need humans in space? Apparently this leads to only one conclusion: to colonialize space. This is the sole reason for this gigantic effort. I could argue that we do not need humans in space. We cannot cope with our problems here on our homeworld. How are we supposed to deal with more problems in outer space? Carry war and depletion there? First we should do our homework here before setting sights for other horizons.
However I admit that I like human spaceflight like the next geek. I have the books by Asimov, Cherryh, etc. to prove it. Even a Benford. But ditching the shuttle because it failed twice in over a hundred flights is not the right answer, in my opinion. It has to be revised that's clear. And there has to be research for alternatives. Supersonic planes, etc.
If cost is the only argument, then drop human spaceflight altogether.
My question is to the knowledgable out there:
Can the SSH-suite be extended in such a way that it detects the presence of the TPM on board and use it for its own good?
And now for my comment:
This (I mean the article) is good news in my opininon. Instead of reviling new technology because the original intentions were focused on something bad, look for ways to embrace it and use it for other means. Means that are good. Or, if that fails, develop countermeasures. Just taking the stance "that's just evil" does not help anyone.
Is there no difference between same and similar?
Now I got the answer: They didn't!
Especially since computer science is riddled with articles with references longer than the article itself...
Okay, why not? Make your test character, and when you're finally found out what to really do, delete your test char and make a new one! Sounds good?
This is the first piece I read that's by Mr Koster. I don't know the man, I didn't play EverQuest. I did play UO. (And was disgusted by the lack of customer support.) But what he has written is sound.
Eventually it boils down to resources. Storage and attention per customer. This decision is entirely appropriate. What people fail to realize is that even the namespace is some kind of resource. You wanna name your character Han Solo? Bad luck, you can't. And your million predecessors didn't either. (Not that I think that Han Solo will be valid name choice in the game.) Mules take away names. And that's only a tiny part of it.
The man is right.
I've got an iMac too. Mostly for e-mails and sometimes web. It runs on MacOS X.1.5. (Curse you Apple for demanding $140 for an OS upgrade!) Only thing that I'm missing for OSX is a decent newsreader like Forte Agent.
As soon as cool games will be released for Mac, I'm going to say the Windows platform Good Bye and move on. I changed to PCs in the first place because Ultima Underworld was an exclusive PC release. Before that it was an Amiga, and before that a C64...
I'm using an iMac vintage 2001 regularly. The processor is a G3 @ 600MHz, it has 256 MB RAM.
My first experience was with MacOS 9. Now the default boot is MacOS X.1.5.
It is faster now. And using a slim browser like Chimera does speed some things up. Internet explorer is still slow in startup and display.
I also wrote some small programs with the developer toolkit. Carbon. Compiling is reasonably fast. I can't complain.
I'm not using it for office applications. Also for gaming it's not fast enough (sadly). It's mainly my email and web computer
Why should the market provide a better ruler than a law? I know that a law is prejudiced. But I have not seen any proof that a real-world market will prevent biased decisions..
Considerations what is better -- open source or not -- let aside. Laws for buying software (or any other products) where public or governmental institutions are concerned is always a good idea. And be it only to prohibit lobbying.
That really got me laughing out loud.
-Arnulf
He's right. As soon as I run downloaded software I'm giving up full control over my system.
If I cannot analyze the software running on my system, or have not written it myself I have to trust the programmers that they do it right.
Given the trend in copyright law development my influence over the system is pushed back to the user interface. What's lying beyond is not my domain anymore.
There are only two options left:
I realize, that the reply I reply to is written partly in jest. But there is a truth behind this. Remember, the computer is an automaton with exchangeable behaviour. Running different programs on "my" computer makes it a different machine.
Everytime.
-Arnulf
I do not really hate Microsoft as a company, but I hate how they do their thing.
As an example: my Apple experience is still fresh (have this computer for just eight months), but I'm already delighted. I got the 10.0 - 10.2 upgrade for almost nothing and the Developer kit, which I used already to build some small apps with, for free.
For Windows I tried to hold off from 'upgrades', as long as possible. Only to be forced to get it anyway because otherwise some hardware device driver for my graphics card, or soundcard would not be 'certified' anymore for my old OS version. I successfully skipped ME. But I wonder what next game will force me to buy XP?
I spent roughly over $1000 on Microsoft products just to keep my system afloat and running, and be able to sample new games' demos. And apart from DirectX, there is not even added functionality that I use. (Well, even DirectX comes on the game CD included) In the heyday of the C64 and Amiga this wasn't even necessary.
I think nobody can state this with certainty. There are too many variables in the 'equation'.
So to speak.
For once there is the .NET campaign.
While the idea of a common development
platform accessible by almost any language
(that has a compiler for it) is brilliant; --
The thought of Microsoft controlling the
Intermediate Language (some sort
of Esperanto for developers, only one-way)
gives me the shudders. I mean: instead of
processor manufacturers giving out
C-compilers for their architectures, Microsoft
could dictate to processor manufacturers,
which instructions would be supported or
not. Okay, this is only a worst case scenario.
I'm probably way off here.. hopefully. ;)
Windows will not go away so easily. If Microsoft is successful pushing .NET, maybe they could also introduce
their own version of a network protocol stack,
that could gradually replace IP. Again, this
is wildly speculative. But none the less, it
could be possible.
Back to Topic:
Bundestux.de has made some quite bold statements. I don't know if this will help them. On the other hand, if they act too timid they'd be ignored for sure. While I like the idea. If they reach their goal, it could backlash: dedicated MS Windows users will feel discriminated. That's for sure.
Unfortunately I don't know a solution. Maybe they should leave the choice to the members of parliament themselves. If some decide to use Windows, or Linux, or MacOS in their own offices, let them.
What do I hate about Microsoft? And why do I hate Microsoft? I mean, I bought (legally, no pirating) licenses for DOS5, DOS6, DOS6.22, Win3.1, Win95, Win95b, Win95OSR2, Win98, Win98SE! I have the handbooks and keys to prove it! In the last 10 years I assembled about five PCs and installed all these OS's by hand. Granted, I've also installed FreeBSD and got a stack of FreeBSD versions (from 1.0 till 3.1). And the computer I'm typing this on is an iMac (not the new one) running OSX.2.
But I'm a sucker for computer games, especially for the PC, and Windows is the platform where most of my coveted games are running on.
So why do I hate Microsoft?
Because they almost force me to 'upgrade'! Which is a misnomer, because I have to acquire a new license each time. As I perceive it, they use their OS and their applications as leverage. Like a knife where its handle and blade is replaced turn by turn.
They introduce new features in their next office package. Because Windows has to run this, they introduce a new Windows version to cope with these new features. Then they have to improve the new Windows version, because it is always buggy on a new release. This, of course, leads to a new Office version, which interfaces with the improved Windows version better. And nobody can stay behind. Everybody has to keep the pace, because newer versions of MS Word have a hard time reading documents written with older versions of MS Word.
This is especially true with environments like parliament offices, where I think document exchange is important. It is certainly possible to exchange documents between different versions of MS Word, but I think MS is speculating on lazyness and peer pressure here. ("please upgrade, I'm sick of manually converting your old stuff to read it ...")
And I have to tag along. Despite not even using any Office package! I'm using my PCs for gaming only! To make matters worse, the next big thing is published by Microsoft itself: Dungeon Siege. ARRGH!
The author with no word states that "Sony is evil". He explains the situation. There is no judgement. Look closely, what you maybe perceive as such is entirely your own.
Linux is free. So what? That does not make it "good" (versus "evil" profit) per se. It is always what you do with it, or with copyright in general, what defines it as good or bad. Law is neutral, how you follow law or use the holes of a law is the point.
The "conclusion" is none that I can follow. What you think about the author is entirely your own business. What the author wrote could be completely wrong, I cannot prove its validity. However, in human society there is always a minimum of trust. So I trust that, what he wrote is correct.
And I hadn't known this beforehand.
Now I was considering buying this kit. However, after this article I'm only considering it, because I can get a keyboard, hard-disk, and ethernet adapter in one set.
Have a nice day!
Anyway, as far as I remember, this track was on the W2 expansion cd "Beyond The Dark Portal" only. Unfortunately Blizzard stopped making audio tracks on game cds since they released Starcraft. This also applies for the Battle.net edition of W2. My original no-part-of-a-collection W2 cd is a real treasure to me.
"Do that again and you'll pull back a stump!"
(Coincidentally the name is Sinatra spelled backwards ... Honni soit qui mal y ponse)
Anyway - what about a carbonized version of Warcraft II? Like they did for Starcraft? That would be nice. Or (tada) a carbonized version of Diablo II? That would be really nice!
And, refering to this, is there a remedy for the Ati Rave problems? The last update (for 9.2) didn't change a thing. The game has still frequent little pauses in hardware accelerated mode on my otherwise freshly set up iMac.
Any Ati driver for Mac developers reading this?
Oh well, I still have D2 installed on my PC...
However I can make neither heads nor tails with it. I tried to load it into ProjectBuilder. Doesn't compute. I tried it on my iMac with OSX.1.2 and the December developer package.
I understand that at the time when Q2 was released OSX was still a rumour. Unfortunately I'm not expert enough to do this myself. Hell, I think I would even be able to port this to FreeBSD. Anyway, maybe someone can show the interested how to go on about this.
I'd certainly like to play Q2 on my iMac; I have the complete Q2 series for my PC.