Using a GA basically means it randomly tries some flags. While this is nice and automated, I'd rather have the developer understand his/her code and the compiler to the extent that the best flags can be picked deterministically. Besides, the "optimizer" might very well pick flags that work with the test cases, but break the executable at some other place. At worst this might result in a some terribly hard-to-track security vulnerability.
Don't forget that you'll have to fight one more of your previous instances every time you try again. However, they are YOU so it'll be easy to exploit their weak spots. Oh, wait...
On the other hand, Arcanum was moderately entertaining, though it still has the merit of being the most dissappointing game I have bought.
And besides, of their team of about 30 only five or so have had anything to do with Fallout. I'd rather have Fallout 3 done by Black Isle Studios. I still get the warm and fuzzy feeling when I think about Planescape: Torment.
Undoubtedly they'll change the screen orientation in the N-Gage 2(Nokia tries to react to user feedback), but this is supposed to be compatible with the games designed for the vertical screen in the original N-Gage.
As for the form factor, the pictures seem to make it look a lot more massive that it is. Reading from the specs the QD looks quite small, definitely small enough to fit in your pocket.
If you want a phone you can type with (and the Communicator is too big for you), then the 6820 is for you. A friend of mine has one, and though the keyboard might look kludgy it's actually very good for a portable keyboard. Within minutes I was comfortably typing away. And the phone does Java, too.
I've had a version of putty on my P800 since I got the phone. It's a beta version (it was built 2003-01-31) but I've been using it with no problem for months.
I bet it's the same guy who's running it at 50 bpp color depth - talk about extremities. And then there's one guy whose screen width is 9 pixels. I mean, even my mouse pointer is wider than that.
Having been frustrated with the P800's input system after using email and an ICQ client got me interested in this, but also P800's IR port is on the left side of the phone.
As the parent suggested, bluetooth should be used for this. Indeed, considering the cost of a BT module these days, why put IR on new gadgets at all?
"The black spot, accompanied by at least one plume, can be seen not far away from the Great Red Spot"
Since the Gread Red Spot is twice the size of earth and I quickly estimate you could fit about two of the Red Spots between it and the black oddity, the distance between them is roughly four times the diameter of Earth. That's something like 50000 kilometers.
Yes, they've made mistakes, but one must remember that this is their first real shot at the handheld gaming thingy business. The next version is already in the works, and one must only hope that they'll absorb the criticism and smarten up next time.
If anything, Nokia should be known for the ability to make very dramatic business moves when situations require them. Did you know that the company has its roots in rubber boots and car tires?
It depends on the medium. Pinging data over the bongo drums wouldn't screw over the 'net, though anyone can probably think of some other adverse effects.
However, the speed of sound (or, rather, the lack of it compared to an electric signal) makes it an interesting option. Yes, storing data in TCP/IP packets represented in sound waves sounds cool.
The important thing about a platform like this is the default component library, and at least Millstone has a versatile and strong component set that's also as small as possible. Take a look at their feature demo that showcases the basic components. The feature demo itself runs on Millstone.
Maybe the execs are selling their own stocks to raise capital to buy some IBM shares? If I had any significant liquid funds at the moment, that's what I'd be buying.
Furthermore, the average user whose network was killed by windows update automatically installing the patch will not worry about it immediately. For them "the net is down", so what, happens all the time.
I pity the geeks who get hassled by this after the users figure that the net won't come up anymore, like it usually does.
I doubly pity the geeks who don't find about this in the news and don't realize it's just MS screwing with them.
Re:Usage scenario
on
Searching Sound
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
(paranoia)
No really, what if they start bugging public places where people talk a lot (bars etc) and run the output through something like this? After acquiring a speech sample from bank/airport/whatever and thus connecting it to a person, it's a breeze to have a global textual log of everything the person says in a public place.
Of course, the article talks only about deconstructing the audio sample into words, but further analysis is a natural extension of the idea.
(/paranoia)
Thanks, seems that I skimmed the site too lightly.
However, I see a slight problem with the "let third parties do the work" approach. Unless they can somehow get the gadget companies themselves write the conduits it's extremely unlikely that the conduits will be adopted by companies. Companies willing to pay money for this thing want the whole package, ie. "press button and everything is sync'ed" functionality bundled with the software. Telling them to download a conduit written by some hacker is exactly what a company does not want to hear. After all, all PC suites for popular gadgets already come with Outlook conduit, why doesn't this? And making the device manufacturer's include support in their PC suites is all but impossible until you have at least two figure market share percentage.
Another way is to have some third party sell the conduit and make it effortless to buy bundled with the PIM package. This is cool with companies (though not as cool as having native support like in Outlook), but it makes it uninteresting to the average geek who in general do not want to pay to enable their devices to talk with a free software package.
Slashdotted after 20 comments, that was quicker than usual.
What about support for mobile gadgets?
on
Chandler 0.1 Released
·
· Score: 4, Informative
A quick peek at their site did not reveal any information about support for various mobile devices. For me, at least, it's crucial that my calendar app can be easily synchronized with whatever mobile gizmo I happen to be using as a calendar. While Outlook is the only viable alternative (for good or bad, I'm not a Lotus user), this thing gets only a "thumbs up" from me.
If I read correctly, he wants to add an extra fixed fee to all internet access bills. What about when movie studios realize the potential, and want to add their fee, because surely people are downloading movies? And then come the book/whatever digital media publishers - next thing you know only a small percentage of your internet access bill is for actual data transfer costs. I don't think ISP's are going to let this sail, either.
And besides, is Joe Sixpack who's never heard of P2P networks or even mp3s going allow his ISP to tax him for this?
Slashdot Mirror
Using a GA basically means it randomly tries some flags. While this is nice and automated, I'd rather have the developer understand his/her code and the compiler to the extent that the best flags can be picked deterministically. Besides, the "optimizer" might very well pick flags that work with the test cases, but break the executable at some other place. At worst this might result in a some terribly hard-to-track security vulnerability.
Don't forget that you'll have to fight one more of your previous instances every time you try again. However, they are YOU so it'll be easy to exploit their weak spots. Oh, wait...
You mean the same people who did Temple of Elemental Evil, the game that was so buggy that the community had to release a patch for it?
On the other hand, Arcanum was moderately entertaining, though it still has the merit of being the most dissappointing game I have bought.
And besides, of their team of about 30 only five or so have had anything to do with Fallout. I'd rather have Fallout 3 done by Black Isle Studios. I still get the warm and fuzzy feeling when I think about Planescape: Torment.
Undoubtedly they'll change the screen orientation in the N-Gage 2(Nokia tries to react to user feedback), but this is supposed to be compatible with the games designed for the vertical screen in the original N-Gage. As for the form factor, the pictures seem to make it look a lot more massive that it is. Reading from the specs the QD looks quite small, definitely small enough to fit in your pocket.
If you want a phone you can type with (and the Communicator is too big for you), then the 6820 is for you. A friend of mine has one, and though the keyboard might look kludgy it's actually very good for a portable keyboard. Within minutes I was comfortably typing away. And the phone does Java, too.
I've had a version of putty on my P800 since I got the phone. It's a beta version (it was built 2003-01-31) but I've been using it with no problem for months.
I bet it's the same guy who's running it at 50 bpp color depth - talk about extremities. And then there's one guy whose screen width is 9 pixels. I mean, even my mouse pointer is wider than that.
I'd much rather have them integrate Cthuugle. Pr0n is so much easier to find than the ancient secrets of Elder Gods.
With some help from Google it's no bitch at all.
Having been frustrated with the P800's input system after using email and an ICQ client got me interested in this, but also P800's IR port is on the left side of the phone.
As the parent suggested, bluetooth should be used for this. Indeed, considering the cost of a BT module these days, why put IR on new gadgets at all?
"The black spot, accompanied by at least one plume, can be seen not far away from the Great Red Spot"
Since the Gread Red Spot is twice the size of earth and I quickly estimate you could fit about two of the Red Spots between it and the black oddity, the distance between them is roughly four times the diameter of Earth. That's something like 50000 kilometers.
Not far, indeed...
Yes, they've made mistakes, but one must remember that this is their first real shot at the handheld gaming thingy business. The next version is already in the works, and one must only hope that they'll absorb the criticism and smarten up next time.
If anything, Nokia should be known for the ability to make very dramatic business moves when situations require them. Did you know that the company has its roots in rubber boots and car tires?
It depends on the medium. Pinging data over the bongo drums wouldn't screw over the 'net, though anyone can probably think of some other adverse effects.
However, the speed of sound (or, rather, the lack of it compared to an electric signal) makes it an interesting option. Yes, storing data in TCP/IP packets represented in sound waves sounds cool.
We need to know how this thing works. Could we have a video about it?
Yes, options are always good.
Echo seems interesting, and there is also Millstone, which is truly terminal independent, whereas Echo seems to be browser only.
Fundamentally the two platforms seem to be very similar, just take a look at the HelloWorld examples: HelloWorld with Echo, HelloWorld with Millstone.
The important thing about a platform like this is the default component library, and at least Millstone has a versatile and strong component set that's also as small as possible. Take a look at their feature demo that showcases the basic components. The feature demo itself runs on Millstone.
So this is why you really should have proper cooling system in your Big Iron!
Maybe the execs are selling their own stocks to raise capital to buy some IBM shares? If I had any significant liquid funds at the moment, that's what I'd be buying.
"It could be a sitcom or something completely different," said Mike Darnell, Fox executive VP alternative programming and specials.
Well, I sure hope it won't be an another ST:TNG movie.
Furthermore, the average user whose network was killed by windows update automatically installing the patch will not worry about it immediately. For them "the net is down", so what, happens all the time.
I pity the geeks who get hassled by this after the users figure that the net won't come up anymore, like it usually does.
I doubly pity the geeks who don't find about this in the news and don't realize it's just MS screwing with them.
But wasn't it supposed to be Not Tested?
(paranoia)
No really, what if they start bugging public places where people talk a lot (bars etc) and run the output through something like this? After acquiring a speech sample from bank/airport/whatever and thus connecting it to a person, it's a breeze to have a global textual log of everything the person says in a public place.
Of course, the article talks only about deconstructing the audio sample into words, but further analysis is a natural extension of the idea.
(/paranoia)
Thanks, seems that I skimmed the site too lightly.
However, I see a slight problem with the "let third parties do the work" approach. Unless they can somehow get the gadget companies themselves write the conduits it's extremely unlikely that the conduits will be adopted by companies. Companies willing to pay money for this thing want the whole package, ie. "press button and everything is sync'ed" functionality bundled with the software. Telling them to download a conduit written by some hacker is exactly what a company does not want to hear. After all, all PC suites for popular gadgets already come with Outlook conduit, why doesn't this? And making the device manufacturer's include support in their PC suites is all but impossible until you have at least two figure market share percentage.
Another way is to have some third party sell the conduit and make it effortless to buy bundled with the PIM package. This is cool with companies (though not as cool as having native support like in Outlook), but it makes it uninteresting to the average geek who in general do not want to pay to enable their devices to talk with a free software package.
Slashdotted after 20 comments, that was quicker than usual.
A quick peek at their site did not reveal any information about support for various mobile devices. For me, at least, it's crucial that my calendar app can be easily synchronized with whatever mobile gizmo I happen to be using as a calendar. While Outlook is the only viable alternative (for good or bad, I'm not a Lotus user), this thing gets only a "thumbs up" from me.
If I read correctly, he wants to add an extra fixed fee to all internet access bills. What about when movie studios realize the potential, and want to add their fee, because surely people are downloading movies? And then come the book/whatever digital media publishers - next thing you know only a small percentage of your internet access bill is for actual data transfer costs. I don't think ISP's are going to let this sail, either.
And besides, is Joe Sixpack who's never heard of P2P networks or even mp3s going allow his ISP to tax him for this?