There's been a lot of great minds, great people, and revolutionary science that's gone into computers since their creation. Computers have changed the world forever, and continue to do so at an alarming rate.
Most people just don't seem to take much interest in these machines. I think it's like an automobile. Most people have absolutely no clue how an internal combustion engine works, and they don't care, and they don't want to know how they've evolved in the last 80 years.
The same applies to a lot of history, though. Most folks I know don't know much about the American Civil War, or even WW2. It was the confederates and the nazis! That's about the extent of it.
You have museams for art, music, etc. These attract people. But History museams don't attract too many and Computer History is a small subset of that.
But you're right, I can think of no production car that is more hideous then this one. And the guy that said it's beautiful must have also purchased a purple iMac and never replaced the stupid mouse.
Although I agree, sometimes it can be difficult if not impossible to set per-user settings. One user might *want* all their mail, and another user wants none of the spam.
If only my Spamassassin/Postfix combo had better control for users to set for themselves.
A lot of your neighborhood computer guys/kids/whatever like to play around with overclocking. I do. I haven't really overclocked a machine in awhile, although my pre-week 52 Barton AthlonXP 1800Mhz runs great at 2000Mhz.
The thing is, when non-technical folks want to buy a PC, they ask the neighborhood computer guy, or the guy in the family that is into it. When someone asks me what they should get, I recommend AMD. Not because I want them to overclock (I don't even mention it to them) but that I know it's a high quality part that's fast and inexpensive. I know this becuase I use them, and people recommend what they use.
It's a grass-roots (to use a term I hate) type of marketing. And it does make a big difference on people's buying descisions.
How very presumptuous of you to believe that I am not a network admin now, that I don't have to deal with spyware issues, and that I "install gator" on machines.
I like having my own little area. I like being able to put up things on the walls and set up my own personal space. I like the privacy, even if it is less then a "real" office.
I worked in an office that was a sea of cubicles as far as the eyes could see. But it wasn't bad. It was devided up into "pods" with three or four desks in each square. You still had communication with people around you, and worked closer with the people in your pod, and still had a level of privacy.
I mean, it's not like I wanted to surf porn sites. But it's no fun having people watching what you're doing all day either.
I agree about the computer thing. I personally hate over zealous admins that lock the hell out of everything. I mean, sure, there's a place for it. But often times it simply pisses people off because they feel as though they aren't trusted and it makes them dislike their work enviornment just a litle less.
Most people won't fill their machines with bullshit. And the ones that do are pretty easy to detect, and those are the ones you can lock down.
And I agree with one of the parent posts - you should have a fast internet connection. People love fast internet connections, and it just makes everything move a little bit smoother all around.
Every version of Office since '97 includes a fulls set of UI code. That way, you can load up Office XP on Windows 98, or Windows XP, and it looks the same. Same goes for Office 2003; it looks the same on Windows 2000 as it does on XP, besides the window decorations provided by XP's "themes."
I do not think that OO is poorly optimized. It might not be AS optimized in the way that Microsoft is able to cheat by modifying the OS to accomodate their own programming staff, but it's certainly fast when it's done loading. There's a few reasons for this.
With MS Office, lots of the libraries that are needed are already included with windows and in many cases are already loaded. With OpenOffice, nothing is provided by the OS, so it has to load everything from disk, and initialize all of it's controls. There's a lot more to load.
I admit, OO could use a little optimization, but not necessarily in the code, but the methods on how it loads up it's configuration and libraries. But the fact of the matter is, no matter how good they make it, it will never load faster then Microsoft's Office on Microsoft's Windows because they design it that way.
" and three little rows of stuff that's either terrible (Outlaw Golf, anyone?)"
First of all, I'd like to say that I like Outlaw Golf. It's a fun to play golf game, it's easy enough to be fun and hard enough to be challanging.
While, sure, there's more PS2 games then XBox games, I've found that a great many Xbox games are unique and fun to play. When I look at the wall of PS2 stuff, I see a shit load of sports games, and another shit load of generic RPG games that all have the same theme: Some kid with blue hair and big ass shoes has to slay some monster that's four stories tall.
It's not about the volume of games, it's about the quality of them. And while the PS2 has a fine collection of games that are good, it has at least as many if not more games that are simply wall space. If this fools people into buying PS2's, then I guess the system works for Sony.
Going back a little bit:
"Isn't this obvious to everyone??! What the hell is wrong with these Xbox executives?" (speaking of the comment that since PS2 came out first, it wins)
I can't really agree 100% with this; it's not just that the PS2 came out first, but more that the original Playstation was out there first. People know the name. Developers *already* had contracts with Sony even though the PS2 wasn't even being developed yet.
I think Microsoft will shoot themselves in the foot if they release too fast, and especially if the new system can't play original Xbox games.
The good thing about the console market is that there's some competition. Even though the PS2 is the most popular by some margin, there's still good stuff to be had with the Game Cube and the Xbox. Microsoft always NEEDS to be #1, and because they strive for this goal all the time, they really DO need to be. If they didn't try to take over the markets all the time, they would probably spend a lot less money on the products and they wouldn't have to dominate in order to make any money..
And finally, there's no rule that says you can't have both game systems. They are cheap. Very cheap. Grab an Xbox AND a PS2.
Yea! Exactly. I checked out the GPL bios thing that those guys are working on at LinuxBIOS. I like they way they go about it - they let Linux (the OS, not the LinuxBIOS) handle as much as possible. Get basic functions up, and let the OS do the rest. Of course, they also have some cool features like network accessable bios, but overall it's very simple. "Let Linux do it" is their motto.
Too bad it's only available for a limited set of motherboards.
I agree - Microsoft likes to break standards, and they sure made a mess of the web browser.
Because, that IS what you're saying. People apparently wrote some web pages specifically for Internet Explorer, and they don't work correctly with browsers based on standards.
That's what standards are good for, and it's what Open Source software tends to follow a LOT closer then pay-per-view Microsoft software. And I can't exactly single Microsoft out completely; plenty of closed source companies do the same, but then again most don't have a monopoly.
Some of your points are valid, but it doesn't matter WHY Microsoft is changing around API's, it's the fact that they are changing at all.
Sure, backwards compatibility with Win32. But not full backwards compatibility, it's more like a subsystem.
The point is, why re-code all your applications for the new longhorn stuff, why re-code all your applications for all the.NET stuff, when you could just code web apps, or apps based on Open Source, and *know* they will work in the future? And the other point is that companies aren't going to jump on the new platforms because they won't be released for several years and won't be mainstream for several years past that, if at all, with competition brewing.
It's an interesting time, and I won't bet on either side of the coin. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.
ps. Mozilla and Firefox run Slashdot and 99.8% of web sites out there perfectly for me.
Microsoft MADE web applications stand still when they stopped developing IE. IE hasn't changed much since version 4. They added some new stuff to IE5 so that OWA would be better.
If Microsoft hadn't fucked the web browser up, web apps would probably be a lot better by now.
It's really too bad, because I agree that HTML and it's buddies aren't powerful enough to replace a lot of applications out there.
But I really feel the need to comment here as well. It's my law-given right to make a backup of my games.
I take all my games, and put them into CD-Images. If they are copy protected, I use something like this or CloneCD. I never have to worry about losing my media. It's always right there on a hard disk. I simply mount the disc when I need it.
Many games now a days don't require the disc in the drive (or virtual drive) since you can play online, and they verify with your CD-Key. Making a copy of my CD won't allow someone else to use my CD-Key.
Now, if they SOMEHOW manage to get all the copy protected copiers off the streets (which they will never do anyways) I'll STILL be able to play all my games without the CD's because people will continue to write game cracks.
Going after this company for selling a lawful application is not just wrong, it should be illegal. They do not claim it to allow pirating, and it DOES NOT BREAK copy protection, it copies that too! You can't copy the copy.
3,000 people is nothing compared to a Slashdot flood. The blogs are small. He could have easily shut it down to the general populace, and left it open only to the owners of the existing blogs. It wouldn't have been more traffic then normal.
Yes, it was free. No, you can't do anything about it. And yes, it was still and asshole thing to do.
Considering that the majority of the data is displayed on users' browsers, they could have shut down the sites but allowed the owners of the blogs to grab the data. It would probably have been less traffic in the few days before shutdown then normal traffic.
It doesn't look bad at all. It's pretty minimal - Screen, some buttons on the sides.
I'm not sure where all these folks are coming from about the iPods. I have a Sony Minidisc player that is extremely small and very easy to use with only a few buttons. I know it's only good for Minidiscs, but the design is quite on the money. I guess my point is that Apple didn't really do anything special if you ask me, and there's plenty of setups and looks that are great even if they don't have the name "iPod" on them.
I'm bored with Apple's cutsie names for everything, too.
Slashdot Mirror
It's true.
There's been a lot of great minds, great people, and revolutionary science that's gone into computers since their creation. Computers have changed the world forever, and continue to do so at an alarming rate.
Most people just don't seem to take much interest in these machines. I think it's like an automobile. Most people have absolutely no clue how an internal combustion engine works, and they don't care, and they don't want to know how they've evolved in the last 80 years.
The same applies to a lot of history, though. Most folks I know don't know much about the American Civil War, or even WW2. It was the confederates and the nazis! That's about the extent of it.
You have museams for art, music, etc. These attract people. But History museams don't attract too many and Computer History is a small subset of that.
There's some ugly cars out there.
But you're right, I can think of no production car that is more hideous then this one. And the guy that said it's beautiful must have also purchased a purple iMac and never replaced the stupid mouse.
Although I agree, sometimes it can be difficult if not impossible to set per-user settings. One user might *want* all their mail, and another user wants none of the spam.
If only my Spamassassin/Postfix combo had better control for users to set for themselves.
Cue vacant minded bashers of vacant minded bush bashers.
A lot of your neighborhood computer guys/kids/whatever like to play around with overclocking. I do. I haven't really overclocked a machine in awhile, although my pre-week 52 Barton AthlonXP 1800Mhz runs great at 2000Mhz.
The thing is, when non-technical folks want to buy a PC, they ask the neighborhood computer guy, or the guy in the family that is into it. When someone asks me what they should get, I recommend AMD. Not because I want them to overclock (I don't even mention it to them) but that I know it's a high quality part that's fast and inexpensive. I know this becuase I use them, and people recommend what they use.
It's a grass-roots (to use a term I hate) type of marketing. And it does make a big difference on people's buying descisions.
How very presumptuous of you to believe that I am not a network admin now, that I don't have to deal with spyware issues, and that I "install gator" on machines.
Dumbass.
Lots of people hate cubicles for some reason.
I like them.
I like having my own little area. I like being able to put up things on the walls and set up my own personal space. I like the privacy, even if it is less then a "real" office.
I worked in an office that was a sea of cubicles as far as the eyes could see. But it wasn't bad. It was devided up into "pods" with three or four desks in each square. You still had communication with people around you, and worked closer with the people in your pod, and still had a level of privacy.
I mean, it's not like I wanted to surf porn sites. But it's no fun having people watching what you're doing all day either.
I agree about the computer thing. I personally hate over zealous admins that lock the hell out of everything. I mean, sure, there's a place for it. But often times it simply pisses people off because they feel as though they aren't trusted and it makes them dislike their work enviornment just a litle less.
Most people won't fill their machines with bullshit. And the ones that do are pretty easy to detect, and those are the ones you can lock down.
And I agree with one of the parent posts - you should have a fast internet connection. People love fast internet connections, and it just makes everything move a little bit smoother all around.
Every version of Office since '97 includes a fulls set of UI code. That way, you can load up Office XP on Windows 98, or Windows XP, and it looks the same. Same goes for Office 2003; it looks the same on Windows 2000 as it does on XP, besides the window decorations provided by XP's "themes."
I do not think that OO is poorly optimized. It might not be AS optimized in the way that Microsoft is able to cheat by modifying the OS to accomodate their own programming staff, but it's certainly fast when it's done loading. There's a few reasons for this.
With MS Office, lots of the libraries that are needed are already included with windows and in many cases are already loaded. With OpenOffice, nothing is provided by the OS, so it has to load everything from disk, and initialize all of it's controls. There's a lot more to load.
I admit, OO could use a little optimization, but not necessarily in the code, but the methods on how it loads up it's configuration and libraries. But the fact of the matter is, no matter how good they make it, it will never load faster then Microsoft's Office on Microsoft's Windows because they design it that way.
I gotta disagree with you a little here.
" and three little rows of stuff that's either terrible (Outlaw Golf, anyone?)"
First of all, I'd like to say that I like Outlaw Golf. It's a fun to play golf game, it's easy enough to be fun and hard enough to be challanging.
While, sure, there's more PS2 games then XBox games, I've found that a great many Xbox games are unique and fun to play. When I look at the wall of PS2 stuff, I see a shit load of sports games, and another shit load of generic RPG games that all have the same theme: Some kid with blue hair and big ass shoes has to slay some monster that's four stories tall.
It's not about the volume of games, it's about the quality of them. And while the PS2 has a fine collection of games that are good, it has at least as many if not more games that are simply wall space. If this fools people into buying PS2's, then I guess the system works for Sony.
Going back a little bit:
"Isn't this obvious to everyone??! What the hell is wrong with these Xbox executives?" (speaking of the comment that since PS2 came out first, it wins)
I can't really agree 100% with this; it's not just that the PS2 came out first, but more that the original Playstation was out there first. People know the name. Developers *already* had contracts with Sony even though the PS2 wasn't even being developed yet.
I think Microsoft will shoot themselves in the foot if they release too fast, and especially if the new system can't play original Xbox games.
The good thing about the console market is that there's some competition. Even though the PS2 is the most popular by some margin, there's still good stuff to be had with the Game Cube and the Xbox. Microsoft always NEEDS to be #1, and because they strive for this goal all the time, they really DO need to be. If they didn't try to take over the markets all the time, they would probably spend a lot less money on the products and they wouldn't have to dominate in order to make any money..
And finally, there's no rule that says you can't have both game systems. They are cheap. Very cheap. Grab an Xbox AND a PS2.
If he didn't want to spend any money, he could have sold the thing, and gotten a real system with a real interface.
And probably have extra money left over.
Give any notebook a few months, and you'll get an hour out of the battery on those too, no matter how many hours they say they will run at.
Sure, maybe without a screen on, they all last the claimed 4 hours..
Yea! Exactly. I checked out the GPL bios thing that those guys are working on at LinuxBIOS. I like they way they go about it - they let Linux (the OS, not the LinuxBIOS) handle as much as possible. Get basic functions up, and let the OS do the rest. Of course, they also have some cool features like network accessable bios, but overall it's very simple. "Let Linux do it" is their motto.
Too bad it's only available for a limited set of motherboards.
You're right, and I tried to say that in the first place but you managed to say it a lot better.
Then we got sidetracked.
We don't need DRM built into the BIOS, and that's exactly what would happen if Microsoft had a say in it.
I agree that we don't need more complexity. Let the OS handle the hardware as much as possible.
I agree - Microsoft likes to break standards, and they sure made a mess of the web browser.
Because, that IS what you're saying. People apparently wrote some web pages specifically for Internet Explorer, and they don't work correctly with browsers based on standards.
That's what standards are good for, and it's what Open Source software tends to follow a LOT closer then pay-per-view Microsoft software. And I can't exactly single Microsoft out completely; plenty of closed source companies do the same, but then again most don't have a monopoly.
Some of your points are valid, but it doesn't matter WHY Microsoft is changing around API's, it's the fact that they are changing at all.
.NET stuff, when you could just code web apps, or apps based on Open Source, and *know* they will work in the future? And the other point is that companies aren't going to jump on the new platforms because they won't be released for several years and won't be mainstream for several years past that, if at all, with competition brewing.
Sure, backwards compatibility with Win32. But not full backwards compatibility, it's more like a subsystem.
The point is, why re-code all your applications for the new longhorn stuff, why re-code all your applications for all the
It's an interesting time, and I won't bet on either side of the coin. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.
ps. Mozilla and Firefox run Slashdot and 99.8% of web sites out there perfectly for me.
Microsoft MADE web applications stand still when they stopped developing IE. IE hasn't changed much since version 4. They added some new stuff to IE5 so that OWA would be better.
If Microsoft hadn't fucked the web browser up, web apps would probably be a lot better by now.
It's really too bad, because I agree that HTML and it's buddies aren't powerful enough to replace a lot of applications out there.
Even if that was really true, there were only 3,000 blogs. Most of them small. None of them very large.
It would have been minimal bandwidth. He could have asked for donations at the end to cover any excess bandwidth requirements, if any.
But I really feel the need to comment here as well. It's my law-given right to make a backup of my games.
I take all my games, and put them into CD-Images. If they are copy protected, I use something like this or CloneCD. I never have to worry about losing my media. It's always right there on a hard disk. I simply mount the disc when I need it.
Many games now a days don't require the disc in the drive (or virtual drive) since you can play online, and they verify with your CD-Key. Making a copy of my CD won't allow someone else to use my CD-Key.
Now, if they SOMEHOW manage to get all the copy protected copiers off the streets (which they will never do anyways) I'll STILL be able to play all my games without the CD's because people will continue to write game cracks.
Going after this company for selling a lawful application is not just wrong, it should be illegal. They do not claim it to allow pirating, and it DOES NOT BREAK copy protection, it copies that too! You can't copy the copy.
What does top500 have to do with anything. Throw enough nodes in there and anyone can have the #1 spot.
#2 is Intel Xeons, and #6 is AMD Opterons.
3,000 people is nothing compared to a Slashdot flood. The blogs are small. He could have easily shut it down to the general populace, and left it open only to the owners of the existing blogs. It wouldn't have been more traffic then normal.
Yes, it was free. No, you can't do anything about it. And yes, it was still and asshole thing to do.
Considering that the majority of the data is displayed on users' browsers, they could have shut down the sites but allowed the owners of the blogs to grab the data. It would probably have been less traffic in the few days before shutdown then normal traffic.
Hehe, but to me, fast IS nice. =)
I'm not a Machead, I'm an x86head. Always will be.
It doesn't look bad at all. It's pretty minimal - Screen, some buttons on the sides.
I'm not sure where all these folks are coming from about the iPods. I have a Sony Minidisc player that is extremely small and very easy to use with only a few buttons. I know it's only good for Minidiscs, but the design is quite on the money. I guess my point is that Apple didn't really do anything special if you ask me, and there's plenty of setups and looks that are great even if they don't have the name "iPod" on them.
I'm bored with Apple's cutsie names for everything, too.