Good question. Sometimes the documentation is written badly, and sometimes the person replacing you is just not capable enough, even with painstakingly written detailed documentation. That's why there needs to be a process of continual documentation review (just like there is for code review), and a continual process of cross-training at the same time. Usually, the companies that don't do cross-training consistently are the same companies that don't do documentation consistently. Those two practices reinforce each other.
Try Google Chrome in Incognito mode (assuming you don't allow your Chrome extensions to run in Incognito mode, which personally I do not). If you still don't get ads, even with Chrome in Incognito (I personally get four when I type your example), may be they're being blocked through your host file, through your company's firewall, or through something like Peerguardian. If you don't remember modifying your host file, may be you used some spyware removal tool like Spywareblaster that did it for you.
In any case, Google Instant does show sponsored links on the side (although, we believe you, it obviously doesn't show on your screenshot).
And by the way, Google Instant is super useful to me at least, but then again I wouldn't type 'big horse breeding'. If I had such an interest, I'd usually start it with 'horse breeding' (without the single quote marks of course), and then if I wanted to fine-tune my results, I'd add the qualifier at the end just like this: 'horse breeding big'. Personally, I rarely think of using a qualifier unless I've already looked at the initial search results, that may not be the best way, but that's the way I've been used to searching for things even before Google Instant came along (but then may be, that's just me, your search behavior may be different).
And if Google Instant is useful to me at least, it only stands to reason that its instant ads might be useful to me as well (assuming I could see them, because like everyone else here I usually only search for things with my adblocker turned on). And no, it's not the google sponsored links on the search results page that I try to avoid (although, those are still part of the collateral damage of my adblocker), aside from the banner advertisements from other ad networks which are the worst, it's usually the google sponsored links that are smack in the middle of an article, a blog post, or a forum post, that break my search flow, that also do annoy me.
As long as Stewart was given a small paint ball gun and Colbert was given an arsenal of rocket launchers and guns with explosive rounds. I'd also give Stewart the ability to throw his own shoes, while I'd give Colbert a Samurai sword and some deadly throwing knives.
And of course, some of the innocent celebs would have the ability to fight back, and to go on a rampage of their own, just to make sure Team Colbert doesn't win all the time.
What about the Cell Phone Empowerment Act of 2007? Did that ever pass?? And what about States like California, Arizona, Rhodes Island, and Illinois? Don't they have some pretty strong recent cell phone consumer protection laws?
which phone has a 3x better GPU? I'm genuinely curious. What benchmarks?
The GPU of the iPhone 4 can render 28 million triangles per second. The GPU of the Samsung Galaxy S can do 90 million triangles per second. Both those phones are using the same Samsung processor, the Hummingbird (even if Apple is calling it something else), so don't get any idea about the iPhone 4 having a faster processor in this case (but an inferior GPU), you couldn't even make that point if you wanted to.
As for a bigger screen, how big do you want? I think some of the 5" devices are a little bit big. I'd rather not go back to wearing a beltclip from 1996 for my phone, thanks.
Give it to me as big as the iPhone 4, except without the large ridiculous border around it. Go into a store, compare some of the high end HTC Android phones with your iPhone 4, and I think you'll reluctantly see what I'm talking about.
it's not a coincidence that nearly all other phones on the planet are smaller than that.
Of course not, but the parent was arguing about why some of the Android phones were some of the most expensive ones on the market (even more expensive than the iPhones). So it stands to reason "that nearly all other [smaller] phones on the planet" are not necessarily an indication of anything, aside from the obvious that they're probably cheaper than the ones with larger screens. In any case, my original point remains. Make me a phone as big as the iPhone 4, but without the ridiculous large border around it.
Super-AMOLED is fail, and even Samsung is moving away from it now.
I'll need a citation from you. The two latest Galaxy Tablets are using LCD screens, granted, but that's because they have much larger screens to cover and the supply chain (even the one that Samsung owns) wouldn't be able to keep up for Christmas. Otherwise, everything else that I've found so far shows the opposite, so I'll assume that you must know something new that contradicts the mainstream technical press. The Samsung Super-AMOLED screens are amazingly awesome compared to the iPhone 4 screen, or even the large HTC screens.
I'm not even going to bother breaking down your ChromeOS v. Android comparison.
Good, because this wasn't even a point I was arguing, nor was it relevant to the main points, I was just clarifying the difference for the parent (and many of the other posters on Slashdot) who seem to think that Android and Chrome OS are somehow completely interchangeable (And yes, before someone says it, you can put an Android OS on a Netbook originally designed for Windows, but being able to do so doesn't mean that it's actually a good idea).
And many devices are difficult to even run an unlocked copy of Android
Even with a locked Android phone, I can still do things that an iPhone user couldn't possibly dream of doing because his phone is so locked down. And besides, not all Android phones are like that, some get rooted right away.
on which defeats the entire benefit of having the source.
Not if you're a developer, if you're doing anything complex, having access to the source can significantly cut down your development time.
And comparable Android devices are no cheaper, and often are even more expensive, than an iDevice.
And for good reason, superior hardware is expensive. For instance, Steve Jobs was given the chance to make the iPhone 4 with a Super-AMOLED screen, a bigger screen, and with a GPU three times faster. He just chose not to have those. Now, the Android devices, that have superior hardware, are definitely more expensive. That's certainly true enough, but you should only blame Steve Jobs for skimping on hardware.
I'm looking for a good Android tablet to develop on but there Google seems to be unsure if they want to push Android or Chrome OS.
To develop on?? Developing what? Right now, I do not know of any good tablets that are good for development purposes. In any case, your statement is true enough about Google not wanting to push Android on tablets yet, but don't think it's because of Chrome OS. Chrome OS can only run on netbooks/tablets that require a lot of power, active cooling, and plenty of swap memory space. And Android is just the opposite, it uses passive cooling, less power, and has no swap memory. In other words, Chrome OS and Android are **not** interchangeable. It would be like somebody comparing the OS on an iPad with the OS of a Mac Book Pro. Each requires a very different architecture and a very different way of programming. And neither architecture is going away anytime soon.
I'm not talking supporting USB and SD, which are anti-features IMO
And what do you think of having a phone with a replaceable battery, is that an anti-feature too?
Obviously they haven't a lot of experience with the nice way Google makes it difficult to hack around on other devices they sell such as the Google Search Appliances (which I have).
Are you kidding me? The Google Search Appliance was never directed at people who could roll their own solution. If they could roll their own solution, why even bother with an expensive time-limited Enterprise-level appliance anyway?
Have you tried reading on a Samsung Super AMOLED screen? It's supposed to be much crisper and much more battery friendly. I've tried it on games, but not ebooks. For games, it's fantastic, way better than the iPhone 4. I just wonder if it's the same for reading.
Either that, or they have the beginning of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome on their right hand/wrist. For me at least, switching to the left hand (and doing a couple of other things) was what saved me from it.
That being said, I agree. There is a great deal of difference between doing something because you're forced to, and doing something because you want to. And pissing off 10% of your existing market may not be the soundest business strategy for a game developer. After all, gamers are not always the most mature people in the world. If you piss them off, they'll give you bad reviews, lower ratings, and plenty of hate on game forums. So if you're going to piss them off, at least try to do it for a good reason.
This may also be a Washington State policy problem. For data breaches involving California residents, your company gets immunity if you disclose the data breach to the victims/Californians concerned. In Washington State, there is no such incentive (as far as I'm aware). And if you suspect a crime was committed by one of your employees, you better contact the authorities, before you do anything that might possibly tarnish that employees reputation (mistakes have been known to happen).
That being said, your main point about the "Do No Evil" policy still stands. The real policies of corporations are to "Make Money" and "Cover Your Ass", not to be a do-gooder at the expense of those two priorities.
Where (or when) did you get a snapshot of those numbers? Iran (which completely blocks wikileaks) has 111 pages, not just 11 (thought, I do agree, 111 pages is still too low). And Italy has 99 pages, not just 3.
Also, it's weird that Kenya and Iceland don't appear in your samples. Kenya and Iceland may not be in the most widely read categories on wikileaks, perhaps no outsider really cares about them I suppose, and perhaps, they don't contain very many pages either, but in both those cases at least, those two countries have profoundly been affected by leaks appearing on wikileaks. In the former, it can be said that wikileaks (in this case, Julian Assange especially) completely changed the course of a Kenyan election, and exposed the many corruptions of a former President/dictator who was trying to regain power. And in the latter case, Iceland, Wikileaks exposed key details about the financial bailout/crisis in Iceland that had been officially censored by the government, that it created such popular uproar in Iceland, that the Iceland government promised that it would never censor anything again, that it completely overhauled its speech laws, passing unanimously, and even agreed to become a haven for free speech (even from foreign powers, not just itself).
What happened here? How come something that was moderated +5 insightful for so long be demoted to -1 flamebait so quickly? Never mind about me, I do realize I shouldn't have phrased my correction as a personal attack, but at least please do verify the insightfulness of the parent post I was replying to -- as you've demoted my post from +5 to -1 and yet have left his insightfulness rating completely unscathed.
Don't worry, they can't apply restrictions retroactively.
May be the judicial branch can't do that, but the legislative branch sure can.
Wasn't the Disney copyright extension applied retroactively, thus placing many other unrelated copyrighted works previously in the public domain back into copyright?
Android-based solutions are already here. ChromeOS isn't. Google should just axe the project and focus on making Android better for these types of devices rather than trying to have two different operating systems.
No, Android and ChromeOS are both optimized to run on very different hardware platforms. One is designed for low energy usage, passive cooling, no swap memory, and plenty of sensors. And the other is designed for high energy usage, active cooling, and plenty of swap memory space. Fundamentally, those two types of hardware profiles are very different.
And unless one type of hardware profile completely replaces the other, and it hasn't yet, Google should continue supporting both types. And who cares if Chrome OS is not ready yet, Google is taking the longterm view on this. Take its 'Google Docs' for instance, it's not ready to challenge Microsoft Office head-on yet, and it may never be, but it's slowly improving and it's already miles ahead of any similar online Office features offered by Microsoft -- so it will be interesting to see what happens in the next couple of years. The same could be done with Chrome OS. Give it two years. Give it five years, or even ten years. Google can wait. Google can afford to wait. It just needs to keep its eyes on the ball.
Is there a way to distinguish which apps are using Flash?
Well yes, according to you -- there is! Take a look at what you just wrote in your original post: "I don't want flash-based apps on my iOS device. They are slower and use more batteries than non-flash-based equivalent apps." [the emphasis in bold is mine]
In other words, whenever you find evidence (in the form of user reviews, or iOS logs, or a personal impression) of an app feeling "slower and using more batteries" than some other equivalent apps, then according to you at least, there is a good chance that the app was made using a flash-based code generator.
And besides, it's not like it matters anyway. If an app is slow, or battery-hungry, even if it was hand-coded right from the start in Objective C from the hands of a gorgeous maiden, the results are the same, the results are what matters, you wouldn't want such a slow and battery-hungry app on your iDevice anyway.
He also seems to specifically target the US and only the US, as if no other country is currently doing dubious shit.
Please stop all that 'poor me'/'poor us'/"it's unfair" whiny victim talk.
For a time, the newly "elected" Kenyan government ***WAS*** his sole and unique target. And if anyone is to blame about you not knowing about how his work impacted the course of history in Kenya -- you only have yourself to blame. It's not like he was making a big secret out of it.
He can be seen inside pointing what looks like a gun of some sort out his windows at the neighbors
But that's the thing, after the invasion of Kuwait, the US went in front of the UN and said that they had satellite pictures clearly showing that Saddam Hussein was amassing troops and tanks in the desert near the border of Saudi Arabia, so as to prepare to invade Saudi Arabia. It turns out that the satellite pictures didn't show any of those troops. And former Secretary of State Powell did say a few years later in the most unambiguous terms that the the satellite imagery at the time were a complete fabrication and a complete lie.
So if your friends are dubious of your analogy, they certainly should be. This is not the case of large governmental organizations making possible misinterpretations/honest mistakes from time to time in the heat of the moment. And yes, I am sure that those cases of misinterpretation still do happen from time to time (that's simply life). But it's the case of not be able to take supposed "very clear" evidence at face value, because we know that when it comes to entering a war (or entering a conflict if you prefer that watered down term), our government has lied to us in the past, and will certainly lie to us in the future as well. So then, it becomes very difficult for us as mere citizens to distinguish when our government is telling us the truth, simply making an honest mistake, or completely lying to us.
I don't want flash-based apps on my iOS device. They are slower and use more batteries than non-flash-based equivalent apps.
How would you know?? Did you actually load flash-based apps on your iDevice?? And what about Unity-based games? Unity has a plugin that generates Objective C code (just like the new Flash builder tool used to do before it got banned). Can you even tell the difference when a 3D/2D game was made with the Unity game engine, or when it was not?
In fact some of the largest Android game developers have boycott the Android Market.
This interpretation is so misleading, it borders on libel. You're implying that game developers are avoiding the Android platform, when in fact, the actual content of the biased article you're pointing to is just showing the opposite. According to your article, at least one large well known game developer is choosing to port all of its iPhone HD games to Android and choosing to sell them on Android through its ***own*** very large distribution/marketing channel (without going through the Market except for one of its games).
That's hardly what I would call a boycott (especially, since Gameloft hasn't made any such statements). In fact in this particular case, take a look at the relationship that game company has with Samsung. Samsung is pushing Gameloft games like crazy. During the World Cup, in Europe at least, Samsung was pushing 'Real Football 2010' really hard. Now Samsung seems to be pushing 'Asphalt', another very good game of Gameloft (and not just on the Android platform, but also on its bada platform). And I wouldn't be surprised if some of the distribution/marketing agreements Gameloft has with Samsung (or even with a place like Game Stop) precluded them from distributing all of their games on the official Android Marketplace.
And that's the beauty of the Android platform as a Game Developer, if you don't want to put all your eggs in one basket, and be dependent on the changing mood swings and whims of only one ego-maniacal guy (who reserves the right to unilaterally change the terms of his distribution contract with you), you certainly don't have to. And if you have pre-existing relationships with very large game distributors/handset manufacturers/worldwide sports leagues/movie studios, where you'd like to have at least the option of being able to offer them some kind of distribution exclusivity in exchange for money/eye balls/marketing/whatever, Android doesn't prevent any of that.
Now speaking of boycotts, if you really want to know what a real boycott looks like or sounds like, just google iPhone and boycott. I already know of one Professor (a former well known iPhone developer) who tried launching a University-wide boycott against the iPhone (not that he succeeded), I'm pretty sure that you'll find thousands of such cases if you just search for them (not that you will, I'm pretty sure that you'll spend the rest of your day looking for cases, grasping at straws, that can only reinforce your point about developers boycotting Android. Good luck with that one).
Apple, which is generally believed to have the most capable processor in the market today, may be under pressure to roll out a dual-core iPhone next year as well.
This is silly. Apple is using Samsung's processor, an OEM version of the Hummingbird (which is not exclusively sold to Apple by any means). So if anyone has "the most capable [mobile] processor in the market today" (and even that statement could be debated), it's Samsung (certainly not Apple).
Slashdot Mirror
How to we mark an entire story as -1, Flamebait?
I'm not even a fan of Steve Jobs, and yet I was thinking of implementing a more permanent marking myself.
127.0.0.1 pcpro.co.uk # Linkbait
127.0.0.1 slashdot.org # Linkbait
Good question. Sometimes the documentation is written badly, and sometimes the person replacing you is just not capable enough, even with painstakingly written detailed documentation. That's why there needs to be a process of continual documentation review (just like there is for code review), and a continual process of cross-training at the same time. Usually, the companies that don't do cross-training consistently are the same companies that don't do documentation consistently. Those two practices reinforce each other.
It's too late for that, now that the humans have guns, let's give some guns to the insulators so that they can at least fight back.
Try Google Chrome in Incognito mode (assuming you don't allow your Chrome extensions to run in Incognito mode, which personally I do not). If you still don't get ads, even with Chrome in Incognito (I personally get four when I type your example), may be they're being blocked through your host file, through your company's firewall, or through something like Peerguardian. If you don't remember modifying your host file, may be you used some spyware removal tool like Spywareblaster that did it for you.
In any case, Google Instant does show sponsored links on the side (although, we believe you, it obviously doesn't show on your screenshot).
And by the way, Google Instant is super useful to me at least, but then again I wouldn't type 'big horse breeding'. If I had such an interest, I'd usually start it with 'horse breeding' (without the single quote marks of course), and then if I wanted to fine-tune my results, I'd add the qualifier at the end just like this: 'horse breeding big'. Personally, I rarely think of using a qualifier unless I've already looked at the initial search results, that may not be the best way, but that's the way I've been used to searching for things even before Google Instant came along (but then may be, that's just me, your search behavior may be different).
And if Google Instant is useful to me at least, it only stands to reason that its instant ads might be useful to me as well (assuming I could see them, because like everyone else here I usually only search for things with my adblocker turned on). And no, it's not the google sponsored links on the search results page that I try to avoid (although, those are still part of the collateral damage of my adblocker), aside from the banner advertisements from other ad networks which are the worst, it's usually the google sponsored links that are smack in the middle of an article, a blog post, or a forum post, that break my search flow, that also do annoy me.
I'm not sure why this was modded down and the post I was replying to up? Is one of my claims incorrect? Anyone????
As long as Stewart was given a small paint ball gun and Colbert was given an arsenal of rocket launchers and guns with explosive rounds. I'd also give Stewart the ability to throw his own shoes, while I'd give Colbert a Samurai sword and some deadly throwing knives.
And of course, some of the innocent celebs would have the ability to fight back, and to go on a rampage of their own, just to make sure Team Colbert doesn't win all the time.
What about the Cell Phone Empowerment Act of 2007? Did that ever pass?? And what about States like California, Arizona, Rhodes Island, and Illinois? Don't they have some pretty strong recent cell phone consumer protection laws?
which phone has a 3x better GPU? I'm genuinely curious. What benchmarks?
The GPU of the iPhone 4 can render 28 million triangles per second. The GPU of the Samsung Galaxy S can do 90 million triangles per second. Both those phones are using the same Samsung processor, the Hummingbird (even if Apple is calling it something else), so don't get any idea about the iPhone 4 having a faster processor in this case (but an inferior GPU), you couldn't even make that point if you wanted to.
As for a bigger screen, how big do you want? I think some of the 5" devices are a little bit big. I'd rather not go back to wearing a beltclip from 1996 for my phone, thanks.
Give it to me as big as the iPhone 4, except without the large ridiculous border around it. Go into a store, compare some of the high end HTC Android phones with your iPhone 4, and I think you'll reluctantly see what I'm talking about.
it's not a coincidence that nearly all other phones on the planet are smaller than that.
Of course not, but the parent was arguing about why some of the Android phones were some of the most expensive ones on the market (even more expensive than the iPhones). So it stands to reason "that nearly all other [smaller] phones on the planet" are not necessarily an indication of anything, aside from the obvious that they're probably cheaper than the ones with larger screens. In any case, my original point remains. Make me a phone as big as the iPhone 4, but without the ridiculous large border around it.
Super-AMOLED is fail, and even Samsung is moving away from it now.
I'll need a citation from you. The two latest Galaxy Tablets are using LCD screens, granted, but that's because they have much larger screens to cover and the supply chain (even the one that Samsung owns) wouldn't be able to keep up for Christmas. Otherwise, everything else that I've found so far shows the opposite, so I'll assume that you must know something new that contradicts the mainstream technical press. The Samsung Super-AMOLED screens are amazingly awesome compared to the iPhone 4 screen, or even the large HTC screens.
I'm not even going to bother breaking down your ChromeOS v. Android comparison.
Good, because this wasn't even a point I was arguing, nor was it relevant to the main points, I was just clarifying the difference for the parent (and many of the other posters on Slashdot) who seem to think that Android and Chrome OS are somehow completely interchangeable (And yes, before someone says it, you can put an Android OS on a Netbook originally designed for Windows, but being able to do so doesn't mean that it's actually a good idea).
And many devices are difficult to even run an unlocked copy of Android
Even with a locked Android phone, I can still do things that an iPhone user couldn't possibly dream of doing because his phone is so locked down. And besides, not all Android phones are like that, some get rooted right away.
on which defeats the entire benefit of having the source.
Not if you're a developer, if you're doing anything complex, having access to the source can significantly cut down your development time.
And comparable Android devices are no cheaper, and often are even more expensive, than an iDevice.
And for good reason, superior hardware is expensive. For instance, Steve Jobs was given the chance to make the iPhone 4 with a Super-AMOLED screen, a bigger screen, and with a GPU three times faster. He just chose not to have those. Now, the Android devices, that have superior hardware, are definitely more expensive. That's certainly true enough, but you should only blame Steve Jobs for skimping on hardware.
I'm looking for a good Android tablet to develop on but there Google seems to be unsure if they want to push Android or Chrome OS.
To develop on?? Developing what? Right now, I do not know of any good tablets that are good for development purposes. In any case, your statement is true enough about Google not wanting to push Android on tablets yet, but don't think it's because of Chrome OS. Chrome OS can only run on netbooks/tablets that require a lot of power, active cooling, and plenty of swap memory space. And Android is just the opposite, it uses passive cooling, less power, and has no swap memory. In other words, Chrome OS and Android are **not** interchangeable. It would be like somebody comparing the OS on an iPad with the OS of a Mac Book Pro. Each requires a very different architecture and a very different way of programming. And neither architecture is going away anytime soon.
I'm not talking supporting USB and SD, which are anti-features IMO
And what do you think of having a phone with a replaceable battery, is that an anti-feature too?
Obviously they haven't a lot of experience with the nice way Google makes it difficult to hack around on other devices they sell such as the Google Search Appliances (which I have).
Are you kidding me? The Google Search Appliance was never directed at people who could roll their own solution. If they could roll their own solution, why even bother with an expensive time-limited Enterprise-level appliance anyway?
most of them leave it logged in when they go home
If your coworker leaves his computer logged in and his facebook open, it's your obligation to start modifying his profile and posting cool updates.
Have you tried reading on a Samsung Super AMOLED screen? It's supposed to be much crisper and much more battery friendly. I've tried it on games, but not ebooks. For games, it's fantastic, way better than the iPhone 4. I just wonder if it's the same for reading.
Either that, or they have the beginning of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome on their right hand/wrist. For me at least, switching to the left hand (and doing a couple of other things) was what saved me from it.
That being said, I agree. There is a great deal of difference between doing something because you're forced to, and doing something because you want to. And pissing off 10% of your existing market may not be the soundest business strategy for a game developer. After all, gamers are not always the most mature people in the world. If you piss them off, they'll give you bad reviews, lower ratings, and plenty of hate on game forums. So if you're going to piss them off, at least try to do it for a good reason.
This may also be a Washington State policy problem. For data breaches involving California residents, your company gets immunity if you disclose the data breach to the victims/Californians concerned. In Washington State, there is no such incentive (as far as I'm aware). And if you suspect a crime was committed by one of your employees, you better contact the authorities, before you do anything that might possibly tarnish that employees reputation (mistakes have been known to happen).
That being said, your main point about the "Do No Evil" policy still stands. The real policies of corporations are to "Make Money" and "Cover Your Ass", not to be a do-gooder at the expense of those two priorities.
Don't worry, it's not like anyone is planning to go to New Zealand. Faking a move to New Zealand can be just as good as faking ones own death.
So I don't know who's telling the truth - Apple or the Japanese security guards. It could go either way.
You mean, you don't know who's telling the truth - a Japanese gossip magazine which peddles Mina Asakura's porn, or Steve Jobs.
I agree, that's a tough call. I'm beginning to lean toward the gossip magazine on this one.
Where (or when) did you get a snapshot of those numbers? Iran (which completely blocks wikileaks) has 111 pages, not just 11 (thought, I do agree, 111 pages is still too low). And Italy has 99 pages, not just 3.
Also, it's weird that Kenya and Iceland don't appear in your samples. Kenya and Iceland may not be in the most widely read categories on wikileaks, perhaps no outsider really cares about them I suppose, and perhaps, they don't contain very many pages either, but in both those cases at least, those two countries have profoundly been affected by leaks appearing on wikileaks. In the former, it can be said that wikileaks (in this case, Julian Assange especially) completely changed the course of a Kenyan election, and exposed the many corruptions of a former President/dictator who was trying to regain power. And in the latter case, Iceland, Wikileaks exposed key details about the financial bailout/crisis in Iceland that had been officially censored by the government, that it created such popular uproar in Iceland, that the Iceland government promised that it would never censor anything again, that it completely overhauled its speech laws, passing unanimously, and even agreed to become a haven for free speech (even from foreign powers, not just itself).
What happened here? How come something that was moderated +5 insightful for so long be demoted to -1 flamebait so quickly? Never mind about me, I do realize I shouldn't have phrased my correction as a personal attack, but at least please do verify the insightfulness of the parent post I was replying to -- as you've demoted my post from +5 to -1 and yet have left his insightfulness rating completely unscathed.
Don't worry, they can't apply restrictions retroactively.
May be the judicial branch can't do that, but the legislative branch sure can. Wasn't the Disney copyright extension applied retroactively, thus placing many other unrelated copyrighted works previously in the public domain back into copyright?
Android-based solutions are already here. ChromeOS isn't. Google should just axe the project and focus on making Android better for these types of devices rather than trying to have two different operating systems.
No, Android and ChromeOS are both optimized to run on very different hardware platforms. One is designed for low energy usage, passive cooling, no swap memory, and plenty of sensors. And the other is designed for high energy usage, active cooling, and plenty of swap memory space. Fundamentally, those two types of hardware profiles are very different.
And unless one type of hardware profile completely replaces the other, and it hasn't yet, Google should continue supporting both types. And who cares if Chrome OS is not ready yet, Google is taking the longterm view on this. Take its 'Google Docs' for instance, it's not ready to challenge Microsoft Office head-on yet, and it may never be, but it's slowly improving and it's already miles ahead of any similar online Office features offered by Microsoft -- so it will be interesting to see what happens in the next couple of years. The same could be done with Chrome OS. Give it two years. Give it five years, or even ten years. Google can wait. Google can afford to wait. It just needs to keep its eyes on the ball.
Is there a way to distinguish which apps are using Flash?
Well yes, according to you -- there is! Take a look at what you just wrote in your original post: "I don't want flash-based apps on my iOS device. They are slower and use more batteries than non-flash-based equivalent apps." [the emphasis in bold is mine]
In other words, whenever you find evidence (in the form of user reviews, or iOS logs, or a personal impression) of an app feeling "slower and using more batteries" than some other equivalent apps, then according to you at least, there is a good chance that the app was made using a flash-based code generator.
And besides, it's not like it matters anyway. If an app is slow, or battery-hungry, even if it was hand-coded right from the start in Objective C from the hands of a gorgeous maiden, the results are the same, the results are what matters, you wouldn't want such a slow and battery-hungry app on your iDevice anyway.
He also seems to specifically target the US and only the US, as if no other country is currently doing dubious shit.
Please stop all that 'poor me'/'poor us'/"it's unfair" whiny victim talk.
For a time, the newly "elected" Kenyan government ***WAS*** his sole and unique target. And if anyone is to blame about you not knowing about how his work impacted the course of history in Kenya -- you only have yourself to blame. It's not like he was making a big secret out of it.
He can be seen inside pointing what looks like a gun of some sort out his windows at the neighbors
But that's the thing, after the invasion of Kuwait, the US went in front of the UN and said that they had satellite pictures clearly showing that Saddam Hussein was amassing troops and tanks in the desert near the border of Saudi Arabia, so as to prepare to invade Saudi Arabia. It turns out that the satellite pictures didn't show any of those troops. And former Secretary of State Powell did say a few years later in the most unambiguous terms that the the satellite imagery at the time were a complete fabrication and a complete lie.
So if your friends are dubious of your analogy, they certainly should be. This is not the case of large governmental organizations making possible misinterpretations/honest mistakes from time to time in the heat of the moment. And yes, I am sure that those cases of misinterpretation still do happen from time to time (that's simply life). But it's the case of not be able to take supposed "very clear" evidence at face value, because we know that when it comes to entering a war (or entering a conflict if you prefer that watered down term), our government has lied to us in the past, and will certainly lie to us in the future as well. So then, it becomes very difficult for us as mere citizens to distinguish when our government is telling us the truth, simply making an honest mistake, or completely lying to us.
I don't want flash-based apps on my iOS device. They are slower and use more batteries than non-flash-based equivalent apps.
How would you know?? Did you actually load flash-based apps on your iDevice?? And what about Unity-based games? Unity has a plugin that generates Objective C code (just like the new Flash builder tool used to do before it got banned). Can you even tell the difference when a 3D/2D game was made with the Unity game engine, or when it was not?
In fact some of the largest Android game developers have boycott the Android Market.
This interpretation is so misleading, it borders on libel. You're implying that game developers are avoiding the Android platform, when in fact, the actual content of the biased article you're pointing to is just showing the opposite. According to your article, at least one large well known game developer is choosing to port all of its iPhone HD games to Android and choosing to sell them on Android through its ***own*** very large distribution/marketing channel (without going through the Market except for one of its games).
That's hardly what I would call a boycott (especially, since Gameloft hasn't made any such statements). In fact in this particular case, take a look at the relationship that game company has with Samsung. Samsung is pushing Gameloft games like crazy. During the World Cup, in Europe at least, Samsung was pushing 'Real Football 2010' really hard. Now Samsung seems to be pushing 'Asphalt', another very good game of Gameloft (and not just on the Android platform, but also on its bada platform). And I wouldn't be surprised if some of the distribution/marketing agreements Gameloft has with Samsung (or even with a place like Game Stop) precluded them from distributing all of their games on the official Android Marketplace.
And that's the beauty of the Android platform as a Game Developer, if you don't want to put all your eggs in one basket, and be dependent on the changing mood swings and whims of only one ego-maniacal guy (who reserves the right to unilaterally change the terms of his distribution contract with you), you certainly don't have to. And if you have pre-existing relationships with very large game distributors/handset manufacturers/worldwide sports leagues/movie studios, where you'd like to have at least the option of being able to offer them some kind of distribution exclusivity in exchange for money/eye balls/marketing/whatever, Android doesn't prevent any of that.
Now speaking of boycotts, if you really want to know what a real boycott looks like or sounds like, just google iPhone and boycott. I already know of one Professor (a former well known iPhone developer) who tried launching a University-wide boycott against the iPhone (not that he succeeded), I'm pretty sure that you'll find thousands of such cases if you just search for them (not that you will, I'm pretty sure that you'll spend the rest of your day looking for cases, grasping at straws, that can only reinforce your point about developers boycotting Android. Good luck with that one).
Apple, which is generally believed to have the most capable processor in the market today, may be under pressure to roll out a dual-core iPhone next year as well.
This is silly. Apple is using Samsung's processor, an OEM version of the Hummingbird (which is not exclusively sold to Apple by any means). So if anyone has "the most capable [mobile] processor in the market today" (and even that statement could be debated), it's Samsung (certainly not Apple).