but he is naive in the extreme to think that MS would allow a third party implementation of a "standard" that they designed.
I don't see how MS can do anything to stop it. At least nothing they couldn't use against KDE or Gnome. You think MS doesn't have patents that Konqueror doesn't infringe on.
Yet whenever the issue of file formats comes up, hundreds of slashdotters say "why not just use RTF? RTF is a standard, and well supported"
I've always been of the opinion that Mono was a misguided waste of development time and talent -- precisely because Microsoft could (and would) torpedo it before it became a real threat
So you're saying that unless you work for Microsoft, you shouldn't be a programmer? Because *every* aspect of computing competes with Microsoft.
Your idiotic statements could've be made 10 years ago about Linux... and you would've been wrong then too.
What?! Oh I see, it's Icaza's fault that MS is trying to patent technology so vague that it even affects Apache.
Or are you saying that nothing is worth doing because someone may try and patent it later?
First of all, this patent only applies to "web services". Mono is so much more than that.
Second of all, Mono was started before this patent was filed, and it hasn't been accepted yet. Say what you will about the patent office, they still reject 75% of all patent applications.. why are you so sure this one will go through?
If you have to load the CD driver after the OS is installed, how would you go about making a bootable rescue CD for when the OS gets corrupted?
It depends on the OS I suppose. The Windows 2000 install cd has a rescue mode, but I don't know how well that works. RedHat CDs have it too.. but those are really last-ditch solutions.
Plus practically every major computer manufacturer ships a Factory Restore CD.. which is for terminally ill machines.
If you plan ahead, you can prepare an advanced rescue CD.
For Linux, I use the Linuxcare Bootable Toolbox http://lbt.linuxcare.com It's basically a full linux distro that fits on a businesscard CD. I love it.. it has full network support (including 802.11b support) and it boots directly into X11.
I don't know of any Windows equivilents, but I wouldn't be suprised if there were some.
Most device drivers can still fit onto one floppy disk, and thus the comparitive cost of CD vs floppy media would make it stupid to burn 1M of data onto a 650M CD.
You've got it backwards. CDs are much cheaper than floppies... making it stupid to spend more money for 1M versus less money for 650M. Who cares if you only use 1% of the CD, it's still cheaper.
Secondly, floppies are still perfect rescue disk media:
Wrong. They're horrible rescue media because they're LESS reliable than harddrives. How many people have corrupted rescue disks? I bet most of the people here. Why not get a rescue CD instead? It even has room for tons of rescue tools.
And what about all of those install disks I still get?
What install disks?
Hard Drive manufacturers still have their disk setup programs based on a floppy disk install.
Those programs are only used for ancient bioses.. the bios in Dells "floppy-less" PC won't require the use of hard drive bootloaders. I haven't needed one in nearly 10 years.
Everyone seems to be assuming that those losses can only be attributed to selling a ton of xboxes (at a loss.)
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2129749,0 0. html says differently.
Osha now expects Xbox-related revenue for Nvidia's fourth quarter, which ended 26 January, to total $40m on 800,000 units, down from previous estimates of $85m on 1.7 million units.
According to that, they shipped less than *half* of the number of xboxes they expected to ship in the 4th quarter.
But the text doesn't seem to be a real subtitle. It's too large to be a standard DVD caption text
There is no standard DVD caption text.. every player does it differently.
To get the screenshots, he probably ran it on a software DVD player. MPlayer has fairly large fonts (and they're customizable) http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/im ages/shot09.jpg
The binary isn't illegal. Distributing it is. Take the GPL license for example.. it only governs redistribution. You can pretty much ignore the GPL if you don't distribute binaries. For example, You can munge it deep inside your proprietary code, as long as it's for personal use.
So someone compiling two differently licensed sources together to create one binary isn't illegal as long as it's for personal use.
Some licenses are incompatible, even if they're all opensource. So what mplayer did was redistribute all the source, but you couldn't compile it together and redistribute it because of the license incompatibilities.
Distributing license-incompatible source together isn't illegal because it's not "linking". License incompatibilities don't come into effect until you link them together.
MPlayer does NOT have a license that says you can't redistribute binaries, but since compiling mplayer would link together incompatible licenses, that binary cannot be distributed without breaking the GPL.
So debian was free to redistribute binaries, as long as they didn't create binaries that linked in incompatible sources.
(This is about older versions of mplayer anyway.. the current versions of mplayer can and do have binaries being distributed)
Yes, but you can't smoke while on the patch. You can't ween yourself off of the habit, you have to literally quit cold turkey while on the patch, which is obviously hard for some people.
(As as side note, I quit cold turkey. I got a bad sore throat one year, and it hurt to smoke, so I stopped.. and haven't smoked since)
Smoking (with Nicotine or without) has to be the most idiotic practice anybody had invented. If you smoke, you get all of these wonderful benefits:
Lets just face it. You stink. Your car stinks, your house stinks, your breath stinks. You just stink.
The added expense of paying $5 per pack to smoke
You get to outside in the cold rain or snow, or summer heat, and huddle around acting "cool"
Playing on the computer is an idiotic practice too.
Lets just face it. You're fat. Your health is crap, your heart is weak.
The added expense of paying thousands of dollars for the computer and the internet access.
You get to sit inside all day and all night, in front of a glowing CRT, just to type posts on slashdot.
Blindsided how? How can someone be blindsided by something you have to invite into your house?
Well, I meant it in terms of developers (see below)
If compatibility is not the point, then why make it.NET compatible at all?
Because it's easy. You really have to go out of your way to make things incompatible (after all, the ECMA specs are fairly thorough, and just following them makes things fairly compatible). This may or may not be true in the future.
flies in the face of those who say that Mono: can lure Windows developers, can interoperate with Windows, can promote reuse
Not necessarily. I obviously can't speak for everyone.. but I think it's far more important that C# exist on linux. Binary compatibility isn't nearly as important as language compatability. Code reuse and luring developers for Windows all depend more on the availably of C# on Linux than the ability to run.Net binaries.
Developers are going to learn C#. Many of them are going to like it. They're going to be wondering why Linux doesn't have a C# compiler (or not really wondering, but more like complaining:). Whether or not C# applications compiled under linux will run on Windows (or viceversa) without a recompile isn't nearly as important as the ability to compile those C# applications under linux in the first place.
So, to sum up:
Things are binary compatible right now because it's fairly trivial to do so.
I think being able to develop software using C# under linux is important.
If MS decides to make things incompatible for the sake of incompatiblity, things will really be no different than the gcc and VC++ incompatiblities.
Re:Unbelievably depressing?
on
Immortal Code
·
· Score: 1
The writer didn't really acknowledge this - those two people who spent their lives working on Dragon Dictate wound up completely hosed, and can't hack on their lifes' work anymore. I mean, *ouch*!
If there was one story that advocated open source, this was it.
Well, be a lot afraid. Microsoft is tricking you into writing native apps for GNU/Linux and making them dependent on the WINDOWS API (Windows.Forms are part of the new Windows API). . . and the mono guys have fallen for it hook line and sinker (and are helping).
Oh Please.. talk about knee jerk reaction. I bet you say the same thing about Wine.. and Codeweavers will destroy linux.
Most people recommend you use Gtk# over SWF because Gtk# is more crossplatform. The only reason there are people working on SWF support is because there is a huge demand for it.
Are you saying that we should ignore the demands of users? That because a technology comes from microsoft, we should ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist? That's just stupid and NIH syndrome to a massive degree.
I'd much rather have mono fail than to ignore.Net completely and then be blindsided. I am a mono developer, and who are you to tell me what to spend my time on?
Who cares if MS changes the specs to make mono incompatible? We still have mono.. we still have an ECMA and soon-to-be ISO standard. The point of.Net is NOT to be crossplatform, but to provide a nice programming environment. If Mono isn't compatible with.Net then so be it.. it doesn't make Mono any less desirable as a development platform.
First, in re: the NET Act, what is the "retail value" of an out-of-print title? My assumption is that it is zero, otherwise the record co., in this case CBS/Sony, would market it.
I think you've really got something there. It wouldn't take much to convince a jury and a judge that the value of those mp3s is $0.00 simply because it's out of print.
Cross examining the label, "Why is this CD out of print?" "Because it wouldn't be financially benefitial to print it" "Are you saying that it would cost more to print the CD than it would make?" "Yes"
Then while questioning you, "I understood you burned these mp3s to a CD?" "Yes" "How much did that cost you?" "50 cents" "It cost you 50 cents to create this CD?" "Yes"
In summation, "You've heard testimony that it would cost more to print the CD than they'd make selling it. My client printed this CD for 50 cents. These mp3s are worth less than 50 cents.. I'd say my client is guilty! Guilty of stealing 50 cents. I implore the jury to right this injustice, and demand that my client pay back that 50 cents to the record label"
If the retail outlets had the popular CDs on the shelf but also had a CD burner and on-line access to the complete back catalogue they could supply any album on-demand at very little cost (to them).
Remember Blockbuster Music? They had a plan to do this. They would store all the songs in wav format on a central computer, then you would use a kiosk to order your CD, which would be burned and the cd insert printed while you wait.
The RIAA wouldn't let this happen. http://www.augustachronicle.com/stories/0 60697/tec h_plugin.html
Sam Goody used to do something similar with tapes in the 80s. They had a huge book with thousands upon thousands of songs in it. You'd flip through the book looking up songs, and write their ID numbers on a form. 30 minutes later, you'd have a tape with all the songs you wanted on it. I still have 2 of those custom tapes.
About 70 percent of all the queries were either identical, or repeat requests for addresses within the same domain. It is as if a telephone user were dialing directory assistance to get the phone numbers of certain businesses, and repeating the directory-assistance calls again and again.
This is somewhat of an invalid metaphor for both the way dns works, and the way computer caching works.
It's also a misinterpretation of the data. The duplicates aren't all coming from the same domain, they're all looking up servers on the same domain.
They're not redundant because they're all coming from different servers. Those idiots at the university are going "look at all these requests for slashdot.org! Talk about redundant!" not understanding that that there are thousands of dns servers requesting the dns.. and DNS entries expire, so they cannot be cached forever.
After all, a little note that says "Microsoft is selling sensitive information about the software running on US Government servers to other governments" sent to the right people can do wonders for Government policy.
Slashdot Mirror
but he is naive in the extreme to think that MS would allow a third party implementation of a "standard" that they designed.
I don't see how MS can do anything to stop it. At least nothing they couldn't use against KDE or Gnome. You think MS doesn't have patents that Konqueror doesn't infringe on.
Yet whenever the issue of file formats comes up, hundreds of slashdotters say "why not just use RTF? RTF is a standard, and well supported"
RTF was invented by MS.
I've always been of the opinion that Mono was a misguided waste of development time and talent -- precisely because Microsoft could (and would) torpedo it before it became a real threat
So you're saying that unless you work for Microsoft, you shouldn't be a programmer? Because *every* aspect of computing competes with Microsoft.
Your idiotic statements could've be made 10 years ago about Linux... and you would've been wrong then too.
"Why bother trying.. MS is bigger than me."
And a scolding is in order for Icaza and gang.
What?! Oh I see, it's Icaza's fault that MS is trying to patent technology so vague that it even affects Apache.
Or are you saying that nothing is worth doing because someone may try and patent it later?
First of all, this patent only applies to "web services". Mono is so much more than that.
Second of all, Mono was started before this patent was filed, and it hasn't been accepted yet. Say what you will about the patent office, they still reject 75% of all patent applications.. why are you so sure this one will go through?
If you have to load the CD driver after the OS is installed, how would you go about making a bootable rescue CD for when the OS gets corrupted?
It depends on the OS I suppose. The Windows 2000 install cd has a rescue mode, but I don't know how well that works. RedHat CDs have it too.. but those are really last-ditch solutions.
Plus practically every major computer manufacturer ships a Factory Restore CD.. which is for terminally ill machines.
If you plan ahead, you can prepare an advanced rescue CD.
For Linux, I use the Linuxcare Bootable Toolbox
http://lbt.linuxcare.com
It's basically a full linux distro that fits on a businesscard CD. I love it.. it has full network support (including 802.11b support) and it boots directly into X11.
I don't know of any Windows equivilents, but I wouldn't be suprised if there were some.
Most device drivers can still fit onto one floppy disk, and thus the comparitive cost of CD vs floppy media would make it stupid to burn 1M of data onto a 650M CD.
You've got it backwards. CDs are much cheaper than floppies... making it stupid to spend more money for 1M versus less money for 650M. Who cares if you only use 1% of the CD, it's still cheaper.
Secondly, floppies are still perfect rescue disk media:
Wrong. They're horrible rescue media because they're LESS reliable than harddrives. How many people have corrupted rescue disks? I bet most of the people here. Why not get a rescue CD instead? It even has room for tons of rescue tools.
Can I boot from a USB drive?
Yup.
And what about all of those install disks I still get?
What install disks?
Hard Drive manufacturers still have their disk setup programs based on a floppy disk install.
Those programs are only used for ancient bioses.. the bios in Dells "floppy-less" PC won't require the use of hard drive bootloaders. I haven't needed one in nearly 10 years.
Great, all the people who think X is too bloated as it is will now be crying "No mas!"
Everyone seems to be assuming that those losses can only be attributed to selling a ton of xboxes (at a loss.)
0 0. html
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2129749,
says differently.
Osha now expects Xbox-related revenue for Nvidia's fourth quarter, which ended 26 January, to total $40m on 800,000 units, down from previous estimates of $85m on 1.7 million units.
According to that, they shipped less than *half* of the number of xboxes they expected to ship in the 4th quarter.
Yeah, and then maybe they can toss it all out the window and make all their new apps Brushed Metal too!
But the text doesn't seem to be a real subtitle. It's too large to be a standard DVD caption text
m ages/shot09.jpg
There is no standard DVD caption text.. every player does it differently.
To get the screenshots, he probably ran it on a software DVD player. MPlayer has fairly large fonts (and they're customizable)
http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/i
The binary isn't illegal. Distributing it is. Take the GPL license for example.. it only governs redistribution. You can pretty much ignore the GPL if you don't distribute binaries. For example, You can munge it deep inside your proprietary code, as long as it's for personal use.
So someone compiling two differently licensed sources together to create one binary isn't illegal as long as it's for personal use.
This is what the debian people aren't getting:
Some licenses are incompatible, even if they're all opensource. So what mplayer did was redistribute all the source, but you couldn't compile it together and redistribute it because of the license incompatibilities.
Distributing license-incompatible source together isn't illegal because it's not "linking". License incompatibilities don't come into effect until you link them together.
MPlayer does NOT have a license that says you can't redistribute binaries, but since compiling mplayer would link together incompatible licenses, that binary cannot be distributed without breaking the GPL.
So debian was free to redistribute binaries, as long as they didn't create binaries that linked in incompatible sources.
(This is about older versions of mplayer anyway.. the current versions of mplayer can and do have binaries being distributed)
Was he a smoker?
Obviously not.. because if he was a smoker he'd be getting up and going outside to smoke every hour or so.
Yes, but you can't smoke while on the patch. You can't ween yourself off of the habit, you have to literally quit cold turkey while on the patch, which is obviously hard for some people.
(As as side note, I quit cold turkey. I got a bad sore throat one year, and it hurt to smoke, so I stopped.. and haven't smoked since)
Straight into trap number 1 (Dotnet is not an ECMA standard).
d s/ecma-334 .htm
d s/ecma-335 .htm
ECMA-334 : C# standard
http://www.ecma.ch/publications/standar
ECMA-335 : CLI standard
http://www.ecma.ch/publications/standar
Smoking (with Nicotine or without) has to be the most idiotic practice anybody had invented. If you smoke, you get all of these wonderful benefits:
Lets just face it. You stink. Your car stinks, your house stinks, your breath stinks. You just stink.
The added expense of paying $5 per pack to smoke
You get to outside in the cold rain or snow, or summer heat, and huddle around acting "cool"
Playing on the computer is an idiotic practice too.
Lets just face it. You're fat. Your health is crap, your heart is weak.
The added expense of paying thousands of dollars for the computer and the internet access.
You get to sit inside all day and all night, in front of a glowing CRT, just to type posts on slashdot.
Blindsided how? How can someone be blindsided by something you have to invite into your house?
.NET compatible at all?
.Net binaries.
:). Whether or not C# applications compiled under linux will run on Windows (or viceversa) without a recompile isn't nearly as important as the ability to compile those C# applications under linux in the first place.
Well, I meant it in terms of developers (see below)
If compatibility is not the point, then why make it
Because it's easy. You really have to go out of your way to make things incompatible (after all, the ECMA specs are fairly thorough, and just following them makes things fairly compatible). This may or may not be true in the future.
flies in the face of those who say that Mono: can lure Windows developers, can interoperate with Windows, can promote reuse
Not necessarily. I obviously can't speak for everyone.. but I think it's far more important that C# exist on linux. Binary compatibility isn't nearly as important as language compatability. Code reuse and luring developers for Windows all depend more on the availably of C# on Linux than the ability to run
Developers are going to learn C#. Many of them are going to like it. They're going to be wondering why Linux doesn't have a C# compiler (or not really wondering, but more like complaining
So, to sum up:
Things are binary compatible right now because it's fairly trivial to do so.
I think being able to develop software using C# under linux is important.
If MS decides to make things incompatible for the sake of incompatiblity, things will really be no different than the gcc and VC++ incompatiblities.
The writer didn't really acknowledge this - those two people who spent their lives working on Dragon Dictate wound up completely hosed, and can't hack on their lifes' work anymore. I mean, *ouch*!
If there was one story that advocated open source, this was it.
Well, be a lot afraid. Microsoft is tricking you into writing native apps for GNU/Linux and making them dependent on the WINDOWS API (Windows.Forms are part of the new Windows API). . . and the mono guys have fallen for it hook line and sinker (and are helping).
.Net completely and then be blindsided. I am a mono developer, and who are you to tell me what to spend my time on?
.Net is NOT to be crossplatform, but to provide a nice programming environment. If Mono isn't compatible with .Net then so be it.. it doesn't make Mono any less desirable as a development platform.
Oh Please.. talk about knee jerk reaction. I bet you say the same thing about Wine.. and Codeweavers will destroy linux.
Most people recommend you use Gtk# over SWF because Gtk# is more crossplatform. The only reason there are people working on SWF support is because there is a huge demand for it.
Are you saying that we should ignore the demands of users? That because a technology comes from microsoft, we should ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist? That's just stupid and NIH syndrome to a massive degree.
I'd much rather have mono fail than to ignore
Who cares if MS changes the specs to make mono incompatible? We still have mono.. we still have an ECMA and soon-to-be ISO standard. The point of
Is Mono *NIX software or Linux software as so much development now is?
Mono can be compiled and run on OSX. The JIT doesn't compile (yet), but the interpretter does. Mono also runs on Windows.
I don't know about FreeBSD etc, but I don't see why it shouldn't.
First, in re: the NET Act, what is the "retail value" of an out-of-print title? My assumption is that it is zero, otherwise the record co., in this case CBS/Sony, would market it.
I think you've really got something there. It wouldn't take much to convince a jury and a judge that the value of those mp3s is $0.00 simply because it's out of print.
Cross examining the label, "Why is this CD out of print?" "Because it wouldn't be financially benefitial to print it" "Are you saying that it would cost more to print the CD than it would make?" "Yes"
Then while questioning you, "I understood you burned these mp3s to a CD?" "Yes" "How much did that cost you?" "50 cents" "It cost you 50 cents to create this CD?" "Yes"
In summation, "You've heard testimony that it would cost more to print the CD than they'd make selling it. My client printed this CD for 50 cents. These mp3s are worth less than 50 cents.. I'd say my client is guilty! Guilty of stealing 50 cents. I implore the jury to right this injustice, and demand that my client pay back that 50 cents to the record label"
The precedent set would be wonderful.
If the retail outlets had the popular CDs on the shelf but also had a CD burner and on-line access to the complete back catalogue they could supply any album on-demand at very little cost (to them).
0 60697/tec h_plugin.html
Remember Blockbuster Music? They had a plan to do this. They would store all the songs in wav format on a central computer, then you would use a kiosk to order your CD, which would be burned and the cd insert printed while you wait.
The RIAA wouldn't let this happen.
http://www.augustachronicle.com/stories/
Sam Goody used to do something similar with tapes in the 80s. They had a huge book with thousands upon thousands of songs in it. You'd flip through the book looking up songs, and write their ID numbers on a form. 30 minutes later, you'd have a tape with all the songs you wanted on it. I still have 2 of those custom tapes.
The RIAA put a stop to this too.
youve-got.mil
About 70 percent of all the queries were either identical, or repeat requests for addresses within the same domain. It is as if a telephone user were dialing directory assistance to get the phone numbers of certain businesses, and repeating the directory-assistance calls again and again.
This is somewhat of an invalid metaphor for both the way dns works, and the way computer caching works.
It's also a misinterpretation of the data. The duplicates aren't all coming from the same domain, they're all looking up servers on the same domain.
They're not redundant because they're all coming from different servers. Those idiots at the university are going "look at all these requests for slashdot.org! Talk about redundant!" not understanding that that there are thousands of dns servers requesting the dns.. and DNS entries expire, so they cannot be cached forever.
After all, a little note that says "Microsoft is selling sensitive information about the software running on US Government servers to other governments" sent to the right people can do wonders for Government policy.