Mandrake has got to be the easiest distro to install and manage. Everything is autodetected, and setup flies by painlessly (that is, if you are semi-literate). Linux is getting its foot in the door, but the question is whether people will catch on. Using Mandrake to do this will help a lot, IMHO.
I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere but I think it's important to look at the demographics behind Walmart's decision to market these computers.
This may be a bit offtopic but it's worth mentioning -- how do these people who are buying these boxes going to get on the internet? Perhaps they aren't the most technically inclined (trying to put it as nicely as possible) and so the most logical and easy way to get on the internet is to go through AOL.
Unless Walmart has bundled in some kind of ISP deal that supports Linux, has AOL released a Linux client, or did Wine start running AOL and I didn't hear about it, how do these computers get on the internet?
If none of the above are true then I would say this is a bad, bad move on behalf of Walmart. Let's face it-- these days, the internet is probably 90% of the point of owning a computer. I would love to know how these people are planning to have any internet connectivity.
Cray SX-6 Installed at ARSC
Fairbanks, Alaska - The Arctic Region Supercomputing Center (ARSC) and Cray Inc. (Nasdaq NM: CRAY) announced today an agreement that places a Cray SX-6 at ARSC. ARSC is pleased to be able to offer this leading technology to the wi
Oh wait a minute, it's a f*cking supercomputer! Sorry about that.
I agree. There was an article here on Slashdot that talked about Internet2:
An international team set a new record for Internet performance by transferring the equivalent of an entire compact disc's contents across more than 7608 miles (12,272 km) of network in 13 seconds. The rate of 401 megabits per second achieved in transferring 625 megabytes of data from Fairbanks, Alaska to Amsterdam in the Netherlands is over 8000 times greater than the fastest dial-up modem."
Perhaps that's what it will take for these phones to be suitable for everyday use...
Yeah but do you think things will be any different? Who will regulate VoIP when it is ready to replace what we currently have?
Maybe I'm being pessimistic here, but I think that when VoIP is phased in, we may see lower prices but the system will still get the shit taxed out of it. Essentially, the only thing that will change is the technology underlying the means of how we communicate. Then again, that's just my opinion.:)
Jebara did admit that there are times when the Stochastick could be awkward.
"If you're in a Harley Davidson bar where the people may not approve, you may want to be very discreet about wearing a computer aid."
Well no shit. But then again I don't see many geeks going to these "Harley Davidson bars" in the first place.
Also, your chances of meeting girls diminishes even further with one of these things. Leave the Stochastick at home!
*$995 base model gets you the IMSAI SERIES TWO Classic cabinet; newly designed advanced IEEE-696 compatible Programmer's Front Panel; ZiLOG 20 MHz. Z8S180 processor; 1 Meg battery-backed static ram; 32K Flash memory (mapped into 1 meg directly-addressable memory space); battery-backed Real-time Clock; PS/2 keyboard interface; IMSAI-to-PC parallel interface; 10-slot actively-terminated S-100 Bus interface with four sockets (additional sockets extra); IDE Drive interface for up to four hard drives, CD-ROM drives, etc.; dual 5 1/4" & 8" Floppy Disk controller; two RS-232 Serial ports and two TTL/RS-232 Serial Ports; one Centronics parallel printer port; system monitor firmware with Assembly Language source code; 350 watt switching power supply (standard, 500 watt optional); Owner's manual; DOS software development utilities disk, and upgrade offers that will ensure value for years to come!
One meg of RAM. That may run about 4 services in Windows. Maybe.
This article talks about the health risks involved with WiFi.
An excerpt:
The next time someone warns you about the cell phone or Wi-Fi card or microwave oven say, honey, there's no enough energy by the time it hits me to change the temperature of water a millionth of a degree.
Essentially, you have to be ~1/10 of an inch away from the source to get any potentially harmful effects. You're probably safe...
I completely agree...distributed computing projects are great, but the ones that do something really constructive (i.e. disease research, etc) are even better. Frankly, using a distributed computing project in the effort to make a better chess-playing computer is a waste of resources and time.
As for UD's Linux client, keep dreaming. According to one UD employee (Nugget, who used to be at Distributed.net) from the forums @ UD.com:
The unfortunate fact is that porting THINK to Linux would require more resources than the potential performance boost can justify. When the Intel FORTRAN compiler is released for Linux or if we see business demand from our customers for Linux support, the equation will change and we'll re-visit the issue.
Translation: We'll probably find a cure for cancer before they release a Linux client. Very unfortunate.
I'm sorry to go offtopic here. But didn't Bowie look like Jane Curtin for a while there, with that womanly haircut? You know, the lady from Kate and Ally (and old Saturday Night Lives)?
I conducted a survey on the street, and it's official -- a resounding 94% considered Star Trek, even after the increasing popularity of William Shatner, to be a show for nerds. Thank you.
U.S. popular culture sucks, and MTV is the direct cause of it.
When Puff Daddy is revered as an upstanding member of society and is throwing parties in the Hamptons with Martha Stewart, etc. there is something terribly wrong.
I've been hearing all about this website. Although I've never seen it myself, everybody seems to paste it into their comments -- it really must be providing a great service to its visitors or that Anonymous Coward guy wouldn't be recommending it all the time!
doing what was done in article and having a TV card in your computer and capturing the video, as an mpeg, and then putting it on a DVD? Maybe I missed something in the article.
Slashdot Mirror
Mandrake has got to be the easiest distro to install and manage. Everything is autodetected, and setup flies by painlessly (that is, if you are semi-literate). Linux is getting its foot in the door, but the question is whether people will catch on. Using Mandrake to do this will help a lot, IMHO.
I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere but I think it's important to look at the demographics behind Walmart's decision to market these computers.
This may be a bit offtopic but it's worth mentioning -- how do these people who are buying these boxes going to get on the internet? Perhaps they aren't the most technically inclined (trying to put it as nicely as possible) and so the most logical and easy way to get on the internet is to go through AOL.
Unless Walmart has bundled in some kind of ISP deal that supports Linux, has AOL released a Linux client, or did Wine start running AOL and I didn't hear about it, how do these computers get on the internet?
If none of the above are true then I would say this is a bad, bad move on behalf of Walmart. Let's face it-- these days, the internet is probably 90% of the point of owning a computer. I would love to know how these people are planning to have any internet connectivity.
What about some of the other distros? What are they optimised for?
Cray SX-6 Installed at ARSC
Fairbanks, Alaska - The Arctic Region Supercomputing Center (ARSC) and Cray Inc. (Nasdaq NM: CRAY) announced today an agreement that places a Cray SX-6 at ARSC. ARSC is pleased to be able to offer this leading technology to the wi
Oh wait a minute, it's a f*cking supercomputer! Sorry about that.
I agree. There was an article here on Slashdot that talked about Internet2:
An international team set a new record for Internet performance by transferring the equivalent of an entire compact disc's contents across more than 7608 miles (12,272 km) of network in 13 seconds. The rate of 401 megabits per second achieved in transferring 625 megabytes of data from Fairbanks, Alaska to Amsterdam in the Netherlands is over 8000 times greater than the fastest dial-up modem."
Perhaps that's what it will take for these phones to be suitable for everyday use...
Yeah but do you think things will be any different? Who will regulate VoIP when it is ready to replace what we currently have?
:)
Maybe I'm being pessimistic here, but I think that when VoIP is phased in, we may see lower prices but the system will still get the shit taxed out of it. Essentially, the only thing that will change is the technology underlying the means of how we communicate. Then again, that's just my opinion.
Jebara did admit that there are times when the Stochastick could be awkward. "If you're in a Harley Davidson bar where the people may not approve, you may want to be very discreet about wearing a computer aid."
Well no shit. But then again I don't see many geeks going to these "Harley Davidson bars" in the first place.
Also, your chances of meeting girls diminishes even further with one of these things. Leave the Stochastick at home!
From the article:
...which can be defeated by a 99-cent felt-tip pen.
"That's an example of why labels are experimenting with copy-protection technology" that blocks duplication, said RIAA spokesman Jonathan Lamy.
I'm glad to see the release candidate available, but it's actually a week overdue, not ontime.
But isn't that the deal with a lot of software anyways?
Better late than never, I say. And RC2 was only late by a week.
At least it's not like that nightmare of a beta test for Windows XP, where you had to pay for it.
It's a cluster of this guy.
From the website:
*$995 base model gets you the IMSAI SERIES TWO Classic cabinet; newly designed advanced IEEE-696 compatible Programmer's Front Panel; ZiLOG 20 MHz. Z8S180 processor; 1 Meg battery-backed static ram; 32K Flash memory (mapped into 1 meg directly-addressable memory space); battery-backed Real-time Clock; PS/2 keyboard interface; IMSAI-to-PC parallel interface; 10-slot actively-terminated S-100 Bus interface with four sockets (additional sockets extra); IDE Drive interface for up to four hard drives, CD-ROM drives, etc.; dual 5 1/4" & 8" Floppy Disk controller; two RS-232 Serial ports and two TTL/RS-232 Serial Ports; one Centronics parallel printer port; system monitor firmware with Assembly Language source code; 350 watt switching power supply (standard, 500 watt optional); Owner's manual; DOS software development utilities disk, and upgrade offers that will ensure value for years to come!
One meg of RAM. That may run about 4 services in Windows. Maybe.
That's like asking which of the following would I rather do...
a) have a 3-way with two hot chicks
b) clean the floor behind my refrigerator
I wonder.
This is what you get for blatant karma whoring? Modded down to -1 in less than 3 minutes. Damn.
was good for something. Now that my forearm is huge (my right arm), my cell phone will never, ever go dead again!
is a good thing. Homogeny can do nothing but help.
This article talks about the health risks involved with WiFi.
An excerpt:
The next time someone warns you about the cell phone or Wi-Fi card or microwave oven say, honey, there's no enough energy by the time it hits me to change the temperature of water a millionth of a degree.
Essentially, you have to be ~1/10 of an inch away from the source to get any potentially harmful effects. You're probably safe...
I completely agree...distributed computing projects are great, but the ones that do something really constructive (i.e. disease research, etc) are even better. Frankly, using a distributed computing project in the effort to make a better chess-playing computer is a waste of resources and time.
As for UD's Linux client, keep dreaming. According to one UD employee (Nugget, who used to be at Distributed.net) from the forums @ UD.com:
The unfortunate fact is that porting THINK to Linux would require more resources than the potential performance boost can justify. When the Intel FORTRAN compiler is released for Linux or if we see business demand from our customers for Linux support, the equation will change and we'll re-visit the issue.
Translation: We'll probably find a cure for cancer before they release a Linux client. Very unfortunate.
I'm sorry to go offtopic here. But didn't Bowie look like Jane Curtin for a while there, with that womanly haircut? You know, the lady from Kate and Ally (and old Saturday Night Lives)?
I conducted a survey on the street, and it's official -- a resounding 94% considered Star Trek, even after the increasing popularity of William Shatner, to be a show for nerds. Thank you.
Go out, it's Friday! Don't sit inside all night and watch TV...95% of you have PVR or something similar, so use it...
Honestly, it's not a troll. I promise.
MTV is a cancer to this country.
U.S. popular culture sucks, and MTV is the direct cause of it.
When Puff Daddy is revered as an upstanding member of society and is throwing parties in the Hamptons with Martha Stewart, etc. there is something terribly wrong.
I've been hearing all about this website. Although I've never seen it myself, everybody seems to paste it into their comments -- it really must be providing a great service to its visitors or that Anonymous Coward guy wouldn't be recommending it all the time!
doing what was done in article and having a TV card in your computer and capturing the video, as an mpeg, and then putting it on a DVD? Maybe I missed something in the article.
I like to think of it as a poor man's PVR.
IIRC, the PS2 linux kit was around $150 US? I didn't know you got the 40GB hard drive, Ethernet adapter, VGA connector, etc.
Is there some kind of catch? The whole thing seems like a pretty good deal. Maybe Sony isn't a bunch of bastards after all?
will this obsolete/phase out ISA? What am I going to do w/my 3c509?