"The reason I don't have a laptop computer today is because I couldn't find anyone willing to sell me one without Windows on it. And it wasn't for lack of trying either.:-("
You may want to check out EmperorLinux. They specialize in selling Linux-powered laptops and provide support them as well. They have been around for a while now and make buying laptops for work a lot easier.
"Yes, I know I can contribute, blah, blah, blah. Doesn't change the current situation."
Well, perhaps it doesn't change the situation right away, but it will improve the situation - one more updating the docs today is one better than yesterday. Improvement is incremental, especially in the open source community.
I wondered that too, and went with the iAudio M3 instead. It's usable as a removable USB storage device (no drivers needed for Win/Lin/Mac), comes with MP3, WMA, Ogg and FLAC support. Oh, and 40GB in a slim pack that looks better than the iPod. Works like a charm for me.
It doesn't matter if it's from the USA or not. The same consume-and-dump mindset (or lack of mindset?) is widely spread across the entire western world, and it's spreading as fast as developing countries can catch up.
The environment isn't a national issue, and I agree on that the original poster should have left out the "Blame America" part.
That's exactly the kind of answers the Linux community doesn't need. Why? Because it's horseshit. Look at the specs of SuSE 9.1 Professional for example. What indicates that it's targeted at being used as an LDAP server? The details speak of KDE 3.2, Gnome 2.4 and Samba 3. Not of LDAP.
SuSE 9.1, along with several other Linux distributions, are targeted at the corporate desktop. And on a desktop you expect to find fully working sound for instance.
You claim that PC users don't need high priced commercial Linux distributions, but what makes the server crave a high priced Linux distro? A high priced Linux distro would be ideal if it could promise (and keep that promise!) to support pretty much all sound hardware out of the box, support common and not-so common disk controller (SATA RAID, anyone?)...and so on.
I think SuSE and the likes are doing a great job for increasing Linux's credibility on the desktop but there is still a long way to go.
Windows NT has been running on most ATMs in Sweden for years. It's a huge source of frustration (and of course amusement) when every ATM in town has blue-screened - and it happens often.
Very good point. I run a semi-professional studio with a couple of friends - built around a PC running Windows 2000 and a HoonTech DSP24 soundcard along with Emagic Logic Audio. I would love to replace Windows with Linux and Logic with an open alternative (especially as Apple won't be supporting Logic for the PC from now on), but the alternatives are at best like an early beta Windows alternative.
This is not meant as being offensive towards free software developers, but there no open project that can replace or even threaten Logic, Cubase (et al) at this time. Right now (and for quite some time now) my favourite project on Sourceforge is Audacity. It looks like it could be a real competitor, but on the other hand that's what it's been looking like for years. Perhaps I should take that C coding class anyway so I could help out a bit.
Now I'd really like to see a movie without a walking silicon plant as the big female star.
For God's sake there are many pretty and talented actresses that don't have implants.
If they just wanted the tits and lips they could've taken that gal that posed for the original Lara Croft model - I heard she has made a couple of 'changes' to her looks to make her look more (she's gone from a B cup to a DD or something similar - that's not where the talent is, missy, it's in the head!) like Croft.
This sounds like a really great idea, but as the site seems to have been slashdotted into unavailability, I can't read about it.
I made some silly 'cases' some time ago when putting together some scrapped 486's for friends.
1. A lego box. Yup, I stole the idea from Slashdot, but I didn't have the patience, nor the skill to build it from scratch - I simply glued the pieces onto the existing case. Looks great though, especially the sides that come from the Space station lego (grey lego that looks like the surface of the moon).
2. A Wooden box. I rescued a scrapped, non working 70'iesTV set and took the sides from it and glued onto the case. The front of the case (a midi tower one) is covered by the black plastic panel from the TV. Looks great and the computer is so silent you can't tell it's on.
3. A case made of used plastic ice cream boxes and a plastic washing tub. Not a great idea. My friend's girlfriend didn't recognize it as a computer, so she almost threw it away - she thought it was trash ("An old washing tub filles with cables").
I see this as a thing that was bound to happen. Stardivision was never a major player in the league where Microsoft and Corel play, and as such, they were never going to get much market share, no matter how good their suite may be. Now, when Sun's making StarOffice open-sourced, there is a reason to go with it. We, in the community, know that it (StarOffice) will continue to develop and expand - perhaps not into bloatware (which is what it would be like in the future if the recent development path was to be continued), but into a very useful set of tools, integrated with our beloved windows managers and desktops.
I see this as a great big step for the OS community. Now we can get a fully functional, proven, open source office suite as OSS.
Perhaps RedHat or some other of the major distributions will assign some developers full-time onto this and get us on our way as quickly as possible. That would be the ideal scenario, since all the "home hacks" will need a professional central point in order to develop fast and in a professional way.
Slashdot Mirror
Use 23 instead. Pretty much the same service but without the lock-in and delisting of screenshots.
You may want to check out EmperorLinux. They specialize in selling Linux-powered laptops and provide support them as well. They have been around for a while now and make buying laptops for work a lot easier.
L-ViS
Well, perhaps it doesn't change the situation right away, but it will improve the situation - one more updating the docs today is one better than yesterday. Improvement is incremental, especially in the open source community.
L-ViS
I wondered that too, and went with the iAudio M3 instead. It's usable as a removable USB storage device (no drivers needed for Win/Lin/Mac), comes with MP3, WMA, Ogg and FLAC support. Oh, and 40GB in a slim pack that looks better than the iPod. Works like a charm for me.
L-ViS
It doesn't matter if it's from the USA or not. The same consume-and-dump mindset (or lack of mindset?) is widely spread across the entire western world, and it's spreading as fast as developing countries can catch up.
The environment isn't a national issue, and I agree on that the original poster should have left out the "Blame America" part.
L-ViS
That's exactly the kind of answers the Linux community doesn't need. Why? Because it's horseshit. Look at the specs of SuSE 9.1 Professional for example. What indicates that it's targeted at being used as an LDAP server? The details speak of KDE 3.2, Gnome 2.4 and Samba 3. Not of LDAP.
SuSE 9.1, along with several other Linux distributions, are targeted at the corporate desktop. And on a desktop you expect to find fully working sound for instance.
You claim that PC users don't need high priced commercial Linux distributions, but what makes the server crave a high priced Linux distro? A high priced Linux distro would be ideal if it could promise (and keep that promise!) to support pretty much all sound hardware out of the box, support common and not-so common disk controller (SATA RAID, anyone?)...and so on.
I think SuSE and the likes are doing a great job for increasing Linux's credibility on the desktop but there is still a long way to go.
L-ViS
L-ViS
Windows NT has been running on most ATMs in Sweden for years. It's a huge source of frustration (and of course amusement) when every ATM in town has blue-screened - and it happens often.
L-ViS
Very good point. I run a semi-professional studio with a couple of friends - built around a PC running Windows 2000 and a HoonTech DSP24 soundcard along with Emagic Logic Audio. I would love to replace Windows with Linux and Logic with an open alternative (especially as Apple won't be supporting Logic for the PC from now on), but the alternatives are at best like an early beta Windows alternative.
This is not meant as being offensive towards free software developers, but there no open project that can replace or even threaten Logic, Cubase (et al) at this time. Right now (and for quite some time now) my favourite project on Sourceforge is Audacity. It looks like it could be a real competitor, but on the other hand that's what it's been looking like for years. Perhaps I should take that C coding class anyway so I could help out a bit.
L-ViS
If that was the case, you would be password (and login) guessing - not URL guessing. Quite a different thing to do.
L-ViS
Now I'd really like to see a movie without a walking silicon plant as the big female star.
For God's sake there are many pretty and talented actresses that don't have implants.
If they just wanted the tits and lips they could've taken that gal that posed for the original Lara Croft model - I heard she has made a couple of 'changes' to her looks to make her look more (she's gone from a B cup to a DD or something similar - that's not where the talent is, missy, it's in the head!) like Croft.
L-ViS
I mirror some programs for friends etc.
Have a look here.
Here is a mirror.
L-ViS
There is some dude in the US making fine RedHat ISO's (which in turn are distributed all over the world).
/distributions/redhat.iso/ Fast from Europe
ftp://ftp.redhat-iso.commwerks.c om/pub/redhat-iso Original Site - Slow
Mirrors:
ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/Linux
ftp://www.linux.or.kr/pub/redhat-iso Korea. Dunno 'bout the speed.
ftp://ftp.nuri.net/pub/FreeISO Dunno 'bout the speed. Enjoy,
This sounds like a really great idea, but as the site seems to have been slashdotted into unavailability, I can't read about it.
:-)
I made some silly 'cases' some time ago when putting together some scrapped 486's for friends.
1. A lego box. Yup, I stole the idea from Slashdot, but I didn't have the patience, nor the skill to build it from scratch - I simply glued the pieces onto the existing case. Looks great though, especially the sides that come from the Space station lego (grey lego that looks like the surface of the moon).
2. A Wooden box. I rescued a scrapped, non working 70'iesTV set and took the sides from it and glued onto the case. The front of the case (a midi tower one) is covered by the black plastic panel from the TV. Looks great and the computer is so silent you can't tell it's on.
3. A case made of used plastic ice cream boxes and a plastic washing tub. Not a great idea. My friend's girlfriend didn't recognize it as a computer, so she almost threw it away - she thought it was trash ("An old washing tub filles with cables").
Anyway, customizing your computer is FUN.
Kids, do try this at home!
L-ViS
Yup, I noticed that, after having read the other three replies that point out the same thing. ;-)
L-ViS
I see this as a thing that was bound to happen. Stardivision was never a major player in the league where Microsoft and Corel play, and as such, they were never going to get much market share, no matter how good their suite may be.
Now, when Sun's making StarOffice open-sourced, there is a reason to go with it. We, in the community, know that it (StarOffice) will continue to develop and expand - perhaps not into bloatware (which is what it would be like in the future if the recent development path was to be continued), but into a very useful set of tools, integrated with our beloved windows managers and desktops.
I see this as a great big step for the OS community. Now we can get a fully functional, proven, open source office suite as OSS.
Perhaps RedHat or some other of the major distributions will assign some developers full-time onto this and get us on our way as quickly as possible. That would be the ideal scenario, since all the "home hacks" will need a professional central point in order to develop fast and in a professional way.
Major props to Sun on this one.
L-ViS
I can't connect to the CNN news site (Server error - Slashdotted?) right now, but I think this sounds very much like the crap posted back in February.
If I'm completely out of my mind or am making a fool of myself (because I haven't read the article), please bear with me.