Agreed. That's the feeling I had the instant I saw the headline. Laptop is really a luxury for a 6th grader as long as they can go to a library or a lab and get free computer access there.
Yea, I agree, as long as they don't share their network with the rest of the company. I think most companies are too lazy and lack the inhouse experience to set this up, even if they aren't too lazy. And game companies are really no exception.
If a game company should set this up to protect their IP, shouldn't then almost any company that develops source code? Yes, right? It should be the same for all companies that have IP to protect.
Yet this is not happening, and Valve, is really, just another, boring, unsexy company. It's not special in any way, other than it makes a game that many people happen to like. But so what. I'm sure once you got inside Valve (or whatever parent entity that controls it) you'd be facing same old corp BS (even if they aren't incorporated), same attitudes, same general atmosphere.
So, maybe Valve is going to learn its lesson and create just such a network (I doubt it). Here is five bucks saying that other game companies seeing this will do nothing (and never mind non-game companies).
You make good points about obscurity. So obscurity cannot be taken out of the equation (point taken) and we do rely on it.
What I was trying to say, in light of this, is that we shouldn't rely on obscurity more than we have to. Clearly there is a difference between SSH and telnet.
Then someone brings a laptop or VPNs into the network with an infected machine...
As we discussed recently, firewalls are nice, but they're not all that (unless you can whitelist the allowed nic IDs, that might work against casual users).
He's talking about security as in GnuPG or OpenSSH. Yea, OpenSSH had one bug in it recently, but generally it is very secure. Both open and closed source programs can contain bugs, but the advantage of the open source is that you can verify that the algorithm itself is secure. In other words we know that RSA encryption itself is secure and that SSL, the algorithm, is secure.
In relation to games that means not relying on obscurity to hide important game data, but rather not sending it to begin with. Yea, I know about optimization for speed, etc. Still, I do think it's possible to create a secure protocol game network protocol that wouldn't need to rely on obscurity, but could be verifiably secure barring implementation bugs.
I tried these "wacky" queries on alltheweb and didn't get any wackiness there. However, I did get a bunch of results that seem to indicate that there is really no such thing as "speaker bracelet" or "candle truck". Still, there are many pages that contain both words of these pairs, so why wouldn't Google return them?
Page rank should only rank pages and not actually remove any pages. Assuming that Google is innocent, I'd say there is a bug in page ranking algorithm they use.
Maybe this is a bug in "offensive" filter? "Offensive" filter does remove results, right?
And now I am wondering if Google runs some secret filters to remove "trash" results (something that may cause me to stop using Google if that's true). Page ranking is one thing, but secret and totally opaque filtering process is another.
We all depend on each other, whether you like it or not. There is no such thing as independence of an individual. The sooner you internalize this fact, the better off our society will be.
Shame you had to post this "gem" as anonymous coward.
some people are desperately defending C and MS
on
The Next Path for Joy
·
· Score: 1
It's sad to see. They pose as the beacons of objectivity and are getting highly moderated, but often, their message is either completely wrong or contains grievous errors, as is shown in highly moderated replies underneath.
Why do people love C and Microsoft so much? Microsoft business practices are some of the worst that a company can practice (and found illegal in USA at least). There is nothing good or magical about C. C is simply an assembler with a better syntax. Why do people cling to things like that for their deal life?
Every time I read about people swooning over Cryptonomicon, I just don't get it. I've read the first few hundred pages and after failing to be excited on any level - emotional, intellectual, spiritual - I had to put it down. There is no decent plot, zero (!) action and yet zero deep introspection. If a book is going to be slow and without much action and plot, dear God, please at least let it be deep?
To contrast this with something, I loved every single Dune book. While some books had more action, others, without much action, had plenty of depth to keep me satisfied. I felt like swimming in another mind and in another soul, and it was great. When I was reading Cryptonomicon, I felt like chewing paper. The taste was very dry, void of any nutritional value, nothing whatsoever was happening in the book, with the most exciting action scene being the american guy adventuring in a bar full of asians - boooooooriinnggg....and this is coming from someone who is fascinated with asian culture. On the other hand, there is absolutely zero spiritual, OR intellectual content. Zero. I don't expect great spiritual depth from this author, but at least, as a hacker (or a hacker wannabe, or a hacker in spirit, what have you), he ought to be more engaging mentally at least.
I also find it amusing that the stale styrofoam such as Cryptonomicon got a link and yet, the arguably better book, Snowcrash is without a link.
I realize that many people love this book, but I don't understand why. Why?
I've wondered the same thing. The only thing I could think of is letting the gravity drop the lens back down somehow (by relaxing the ridges?). Obviously this wouldn't work too well, would it? Sounds like either the invention is vaporware or the journalist did a poor job explaining it.
It's upsetting that our economy is governed and explained by a horde of pseudo-scientists who cringe at the very idea of social good and who just can't bear this or that concept. Most economists have invested their feelings into a certain system and are doing their darnest to propagate it forever.
In USA we have rabid "capitalism" (only when it helps you, but, it's OK to have communism in form of patents, copyrights, etc.) foaming at the mouth economists and politicians.
How about this? Politicians have no business deciding what is economically right any more than a witch doctor (or a faith healing priest, for you biggots, who can't see the other side of the coin) has a right to determine how to heal a patient!
We made advancements in medicine by putting down our preconceptions about what's right and wrong and applying science. It is time to do the same with economics!
Why don't economists strive to elevate themselves to a scientific level where the good of all is the goal (altruism) and where all preconcieved notions are discarded. Gone is the notion that captialism is the only way. Gone is the notion that socialism is the answer. Let's use scientific method to find what is the best answer. And let's put in jail those who oppose science for their own greedy ends! Wouldn't we jail a doctor who amputated a limb to make money when no such thing was necessary? Why then do politicians, business leaders (richest elite) and pseudo-scientific economists get away with it? One of those crooks harms more people than a single bad doctor ever could.
Economics of today is really like alchemy of centuries past.
At least I didn't resort to name calling, unlike you. Anyway, I'm still right. You can't easily download kernel32.dll separately from Microsoft, and I sincerely doubt that kernel32.dll is *the* entire kernel, because we know that Windows kernel is highly integrated and I doubt it would all be in one file. Looking further I notice that it's not even used in the newer Microsoft OSes.
I can imagine this file being upgraded when you install a service pack, but has Microsoft released a stand alone beta kernel upgrade? Or even just a stand alone kernel upgrade? Never.
So you found one or two critical updates that patch the kernel, big deal. That's not the same thing as what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about going from 2.4.20 --> 2.4.21. I'm talking about 2.4 --> 2.6, it's like going from Windows 2000 to 2003 by replacing kernel only. Microsoft doesn't allow that and never will.
You're wrong buddy. On Windows you don't even get a comparable feature! How can you upgrade a windows kernel? You can't. It's not that it's much easier. It is simply impossible to upgrade a kernel in Microsoft Windows. You have to upgrade an entire OS to upgrade your kernel and for a good reason: money, money, money!
So you compare something that can be done on Linux vs. something that cannot at all be done on Windows. Keep this in mind.
I think you picked a terrible example to prove your point. This is one area where Linux trumps Windows left and right. Next time you want to write "Advantage Bill" kind of post, stick with tried and true arguments, like GUI consistency across apps, better applications, better driver support (this is not Linux's fault though), etc. You just picked one area where Linux shines and so it's easy to refute your point.
Second, this tutorial is for hard-core geeks who simply cannot wait for their distribution company/project to provide an easy upgrade. But once distribution company bundles this new kernel into a package, upgrading it becomes trivial. For example:
Now, if you are truly scared to type anything like that, then you'd use a graphical tool like Synaptic and then point and click to a new kernel package, and then point and click inside your graphical "folder" explorer (Nautilus on Gnome and whatever KDE uses) and run Nvidia's script. Simple! And you've just upgraded your kernel which is not even possible on Windows! Not only that, but you've upgraded to a beta version of the kernel, and there is no chance Microsoft would make beta versions of their kernel available to public even if they did give us the ability to upgrade the kernel separately from the rest of the OS.
I totally agree with all your points. What you say is common sense and it hurts for me to hear it. I think it's a shame that this bandwagon effect is happening, not because some Indians will get our jobs, but because they didn't give people over here a chance to compete.
Plus, there is plenty of work in China, for example, that doesn't require offshoring. China's IT industry is booming now and they have their own demand for IT to fill (thank god). Hopefully Indian IT will boom as well, and they will want to employ some of their own IT workers. Because, while they keep selling the labor of their own IT workers, their own IT is not benefitting as much as it could be. Too much outsource support can hurt India.
I've heard some horror stories about outsourcing projects too. I'm sure that's not true about every project, but people should consider that outsourcing is not a magical pixie dust that will solve all problems. It can end up being more expensive.
So while the PHB's are learning all these lessons, the people will suffer. Take your time PHB's. Take your time.
Well, geeks aren't the most enterprising people. I like to do technical things and I do not like to do business related things, for example. Same for every other geek I know except one. Business minded geeks are rare. But hopefully some of them are reading these posts and are thinking to at least avoid ridiculously expensive east/west coast hotspots.
Ok, call me stupid, and I've floated this idea before...so let me say it again (and I'll say it again later too).
Why can't a person setup a company in the middle of USA, say Oklahoma or West Virginia, where living is cheap, and where people are content to enjoy nature and being paid less, say 30-40k a year. Sure, it's not as low as India, but if the quality of software products and services were high, English skills are a given (and will be head and shoulder above those of native Indians), time zone is better, it's more "patriotic", etc... there are many benefits to outsourcing to such a company.
What I'm saying is, I think USA can compete with India on Indians terms. Sure, say goodbye to Silicon Valley (and good riddens, what a horrid, trashy place it has become, yuck, yuck). Say goodbye to high salaries. But all is not lost and there is plenty of room, we, USA citizens, can go down in price and still be happy. There will always be some fat schmucks who are arrogant and think they deserve 100k a year to write 2 lines of code a day, screw em. But there is plenty of opportunity in the middle of USA.
The middle of USA is like India right here inside USA. And people living in there could sure use all the economic stimulus they can get. So, it would be both cheap, and good for the people, and competitive.
So why not? If you are thinking of starting a new company, why not start it on a virgin land in some obscure state? Indians have proven that all you need is a phone line and the network connection (and sometimes even a modem connection is fine) and you get the job!
I just can't understand why seemingly every fool insists on setting up their company in San Fran or NYC and then complains that they can't find cheap labor there.
If you actually believe the parent's rant is correct, then you've got bigger problems than an absent sense of humor.
No, I think he's deriding open source programmers and hackers. That's not even that bad, but it's just totally flat and it lacks creativity. I think Slashdot moderators who +1 such trash have big problems. If the guy at least had some wit instead of just canned "parroting" style...
<rant> I have -2 modifier on all "Funny" posts for a reason. It's not that I don't laugh (I do, daily) or that I don't have a sense of humor. Slashdot's concept of "funny" is just warped (like "imagine a beowulf cluster...", or "step 1, step 2...profit", or "you insensitive clod..." or any number of tired canned trash or otherwise stupid, witless humour). Slashdot humor has got to be the worst. </rant>
Re:Good Project
on
MIT Everyware
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
If you've ever attended college and skipped a class, you should know there is absolutely no comparison between being in class and reading the notes on the web later.
I beg to differ. There is hardly any difference because:
1) There is almost never a need to ask questions. Most people understand right away what is being taught, and if they don't, professor is not going to stop an entire class for 2 hours so that 2 people can finally get it. Yes, you can ask after class, but then you're not talking about class attendance, but rather one on one tutoring (which is far, far, far more effective than learning in a class setting). It's called a lecture for a reason, and "to lecture someone" carries a negative connotation.
2) In many modern, famous, great Universities class sizes run into 100's of students (700 is not unusual). Everyone sits in an auditorium and listens. You might as well buy a "book on tape". Yes, I know, by the time you reach your 4th year, and M.S., the class size decreases, but that doesn't excuse a charade that happens before then.
3) At times professor may have such a nasty, thick foreign accent, that you can't understand a single word anyway. This observation comes to you from an ESL person. I think if a person doesn't put the effort and time into getting a decent pronunciation and a good English speaking skill they need to be fired. Unfortunately that isn't the case. Again, may I remind you, I'm not a native English speaker and yet I say this anyway. This actually happened to me in one of the most difficult classes I took.
And lastly, I've yet to find a single topic where a well written book didn't do quite nicely. The only thing I can think of that University instruction is good for, is for stuff that is not yet published. Everything that is researched usually will be (and should be) published very quickly. As far as instruction goes, that's the only thing. Univesity is good for active research where you need a lab and some science-minded (as opposed to profit-minded) colleagues to work effectively. Research is not the same thing as instruction.
Re:This idea is genius.
on
MIT Everyware
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
That's called altruism and it's always been at the heart of science.
It always bothered me that actual knowledge is pretty worthless in getting job interviews, but rather your charm (personal and on resume) and "paper degree" is what counts. Maybe if University degrees lost their prestige, genuine knowledge and education (as opposed to mere credentials) would become more important.
Yea, and don't even try to tell me "but you need that University given knowledge *after* you get hired" bullsh*t. Most graduates (even M.S.) in my experience write awful code, have no clue about software engineering principles, and survival is all they do, often unwilling to even get excited by computing.
This problem is going to keep happening as long as we have idiotic H.R. and so-called "head hunters" filtering people out without any knowledge of the field they are hiring for!
Closing Slashdot is not preaching to the choir! What it is, is a kick in the pants to get off our lazy arses and DO something!
Yea, everyone here knows that software patents are bad. But maybe, just maybe, closing Slashdot will energize people into action who otherwise would do nothing.
I think PostgreSQL is infinitely superior to SAPDB. Have you actually tried using SAPDB? I have tried it on Solaris, and it failed to run on our version of Solaris (I believe it was 8). I looked at their home page and documentation and I was left feeling that SapDB is a half-baked, kludgey, crusty product.
PostgreSQL on the other hand just works, is fast and is smooth as silk. I think even plain old MySQL 4.x is better than SAPDB (yea, it lacks features, but it's a better product overall).
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting. When business does this, it's called "Good business", but if we try it, it's called "Mail Fraud"?
Nice.
Agreed. That's the feeling I had the instant I saw the headline. Laptop is really a luxury for a 6th grader as long as they can go to a library or a lab and get free computer access there.
Yea, I agree, as long as they don't share their network with the rest of the company. I think most companies are too lazy and lack the inhouse experience to set this up, even if they aren't too lazy. And game companies are really no exception.
If a game company should set this up to protect their IP, shouldn't then almost any company that develops source code? Yes, right? It should be the same for all companies that have IP to protect.
Yet this is not happening, and Valve, is really, just another, boring, unsexy company. It's not special in any way, other than it makes a game that many people happen to like. But so what. I'm sure once you got inside Valve (or whatever parent entity that controls it) you'd be facing same old corp BS (even if they aren't incorporated), same attitudes, same general atmosphere.
So, maybe Valve is going to learn its lesson and create just such a network (I doubt it). Here is five bucks saying that other game companies seeing this will do nothing (and never mind non-game companies).
Hindsight is always 20/20 right?
You make good points about obscurity. So obscurity cannot be taken out of the equation (point taken) and we do rely on it.
What I was trying to say, in light of this, is that we shouldn't rely on obscurity more than we have to. Clearly there is a difference between SSH and telnet.
Then someone brings a laptop or VPNs into the network with an infected machine...
As we discussed recently, firewalls are nice, but they're not all that (unless you can whitelist the allowed nic IDs, that might work against casual users).
He's talking about security as in GnuPG or OpenSSH. Yea, OpenSSH had one bug in it recently, but generally it is very secure. Both open and closed source programs can contain bugs, but the advantage of the open source is that you can verify that the algorithm itself is secure. In other words we know that RSA encryption itself is secure and that SSL, the algorithm, is secure.
In relation to games that means not relying on obscurity to hide important game data, but rather not sending it to begin with. Yea, I know about optimization for speed, etc. Still, I do think it's possible to create a secure protocol game network protocol that wouldn't need to rely on obscurity, but could be verifiably secure barring implementation bugs.
I tried these "wacky" queries on alltheweb and didn't get any wackiness there. However, I did get a bunch of results that seem to indicate that there is really no such thing as "speaker bracelet" or "candle truck". Still, there are many pages that contain both words of these pairs, so why wouldn't Google return them?
Page rank should only rank pages and not actually remove any pages. Assuming that Google is innocent, I'd say there is a bug in page ranking algorithm they use.
Maybe this is a bug in "offensive" filter? "Offensive" filter does remove results, right?
And now I am wondering if Google runs some secret filters to remove "trash" results (something that may cause me to stop using Google if that's true). Page ranking is one thing, but secret and totally opaque filtering process is another.
We all depend on each other, whether you like it or not. There is no such thing as independence of an individual. The sooner you internalize this fact, the better off our society will be.
Shame you had to post this "gem" as anonymous coward.
It's sad to see. They pose as the beacons of objectivity and are getting highly moderated, but often, their message is either completely wrong or contains grievous errors, as is shown in highly moderated replies underneath.
Why do people love C and Microsoft so much? Microsoft business practices are some of the worst that a company can practice (and found illegal in USA at least). There is nothing good or magical about C. C is simply an assembler with a better syntax. Why do people cling to things like that for their deal life?
Every time I read about people swooning over Cryptonomicon, I just don't get it. I've read the first few hundred pages and after failing to be excited on any level - emotional, intellectual, spiritual - I had to put it down. There is no decent plot, zero (!) action and yet zero deep introspection. If a book is going to be slow and without much action and plot, dear God, please at least let it be deep?
To contrast this with something, I loved every single Dune book. While some books had more action, others, without much action, had plenty of depth to keep me satisfied. I felt like swimming in another mind and in another soul, and it was great. When I was reading Cryptonomicon, I felt like chewing paper. The taste was very dry, void of any nutritional value, nothing whatsoever was happening in the book, with the most exciting action scene being the american guy adventuring in a bar full of asians - boooooooriinnggg....and this is coming from someone who is fascinated with asian culture. On the other hand, there is absolutely zero spiritual, OR intellectual content. Zero. I don't expect great spiritual depth from this author, but at least, as a hacker (or a hacker wannabe, or a hacker in spirit, what have you), he ought to be more engaging mentally at least.
I also find it amusing that the stale styrofoam such as Cryptonomicon got a link and yet, the arguably better book, Snowcrash is without a link.
I realize that many people love this book, but I don't understand why. Why?
I've wondered the same thing. The only thing I could think of is letting the gravity drop the lens back down somehow (by relaxing the ridges?). Obviously this wouldn't work too well, would it? Sounds like either the invention is vaporware or the journalist did a poor job explaining it.
It's upsetting that our economy is governed and explained by a horde of pseudo-scientists who cringe at the very idea of social good and who just can't bear this or that concept. Most economists have invested their feelings into a certain system and are doing their darnest to propagate it forever.
In USA we have rabid "capitalism" (only when it helps you, but, it's OK to have communism in form of patents, copyrights, etc.) foaming at the mouth economists and politicians.
How about this? Politicians have no business deciding what is economically right any more than a witch doctor (or a faith healing priest, for you biggots, who can't see the other side of the coin) has a right to determine how to heal a patient!
We made advancements in medicine by putting down our preconceptions about what's right and wrong and applying science. It is time to do the same with economics!
Why don't economists strive to elevate themselves to a scientific level where the good of all is the goal (altruism) and where all preconcieved notions are discarded. Gone is the notion that captialism is the only way. Gone is the notion that socialism is the answer. Let's use scientific method to find what is the best answer. And let's put in jail those who oppose science for their own greedy ends! Wouldn't we jail a doctor who amputated a limb to make money when no such thing was necessary? Why then do politicians, business leaders (richest elite) and pseudo-scientific economists get away with it? One of those crooks harms more people than a single bad doctor ever could.
Economics of today is really like alchemy of centuries past.
At least I didn't resort to name calling, unlike you. Anyway, I'm still right. You can't easily download kernel32.dll separately from Microsoft, and I sincerely doubt that kernel32.dll is *the* entire kernel, because we know that Windows kernel is highly integrated and I doubt it would all be in one file. Looking further I notice that it's not even used in the newer Microsoft OSes.
Now, look at this discription of kernel32.dll.
I can imagine this file being upgraded when you install a service pack, but has Microsoft released a stand alone beta kernel upgrade? Or even just a stand alone kernel upgrade? Never.
So you found one or two critical updates that patch the kernel, big deal. That's not the same thing as what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about going from 2.4.20 --> 2.4.21. I'm talking about 2.4 --> 2.6, it's like going from Windows 2000 to 2003 by replacing kernel only. Microsoft doesn't allow that and never will.
Alltheweb
Before I settled on Google, I remember these guys were running neck and neck with Google producing very high quality search results. Give it a try.
It's a shame Google chose to remove the links instead of fighting the case.
You're wrong buddy. On Windows you don't even get a comparable feature! How can you upgrade a windows kernel? You can't. It's not that it's much easier. It is simply impossible to upgrade a kernel in Microsoft Windows. You have to upgrade an entire OS to upgrade your kernel and for a good reason: money, money, money!
So you compare something that can be done on Linux vs. something that cannot at all be done on Windows. Keep this in mind.
I think you picked a terrible example to prove your point. This is one area where Linux trumps Windows left and right. Next time you want to write "Advantage Bill" kind of post, stick with tried and true arguments, like GUI consistency across apps, better applications, better driver support (this is not Linux's fault though), etc. You just picked one area where Linux shines and so it's easy to refute your point.
Second, this tutorial is for hard-core geeks who simply cannot wait for their distribution company/project to provide an easy upgrade. But once distribution company bundles this new kernel into a package, upgrading it becomes trivial. For example:
apt-get update
apt-get install new-kernel
path/to/nvidia-driver.sh
done (this works for both Debian and Red Hat)
Now, if you are truly scared to type anything like that, then you'd use a graphical tool like Synaptic and then point and click to a new kernel package, and then point and click inside your graphical "folder" explorer (Nautilus on Gnome and whatever KDE uses) and run Nvidia's script. Simple! And you've just upgraded your kernel which is not even possible on Windows! Not only that, but you've upgraded to a beta version of the kernel, and there is no chance Microsoft would make beta versions of their kernel available to public even if they did give us the ability to upgrade the kernel separately from the rest of the OS.
I totally agree with all your points. What you say is common sense and it hurts for me to hear it. I think it's a shame that this bandwagon effect is happening, not because some Indians will get our jobs, but because they didn't give people over here a chance to compete.
Plus, there is plenty of work in China, for example, that doesn't require offshoring. China's IT industry is booming now and they have their own demand for IT to fill (thank god). Hopefully Indian IT will boom as well, and they will want to employ some of their own IT workers. Because, while they keep selling the labor of their own IT workers, their own IT is not benefitting as much as it could be. Too much outsource support can hurt India.
I've heard some horror stories about outsourcing projects too. I'm sure that's not true about every project, but people should consider that outsourcing is not a magical pixie dust that will solve all problems. It can end up being more expensive.
So while the PHB's are learning all these lessons, the people will suffer. Take your time PHB's. Take your time.
Well, geeks aren't the most enterprising people. I like to do technical things and I do not like to do business related things, for example. Same for every other geek I know except one. Business minded geeks are rare. But hopefully some of them are reading these posts and are thinking to at least avoid ridiculously expensive east/west coast hotspots.
Ok, call me stupid, and I've floated this idea before...so let me say it again (and I'll say it again later too).
Why can't a person setup a company in the middle of USA, say Oklahoma or West Virginia, where living is cheap, and where people are content to enjoy nature and being paid less, say 30-40k a year. Sure, it's not as low as India, but if the quality of software products and services were high, English skills are a given (and will be head and shoulder above those of native Indians), time zone is better, it's more "patriotic", etc... there are many benefits to outsourcing to such a company.
What I'm saying is, I think USA can compete with India on Indians terms. Sure, say goodbye to Silicon Valley (and good riddens, what a horrid, trashy place it has become, yuck, yuck). Say goodbye to high salaries. But all is not lost and there is plenty of room, we, USA citizens, can go down in price and still be happy. There will always be some fat schmucks who are arrogant and think they deserve 100k a year to write 2 lines of code a day, screw em. But there is plenty of opportunity in the middle of USA.
The middle of USA is like India right here inside USA. And people living in there could sure use all the economic stimulus they can get. So, it would be both cheap, and good for the people, and competitive.
So why not? If you are thinking of starting a new company, why not start it on a virgin land in some obscure state? Indians have proven that all you need is a phone line and the network connection (and sometimes even a modem connection is fine) and you get the job!
I just can't understand why seemingly every fool insists on setting up their company in San Fran or NYC and then complains that they can't find cheap labor there.
I laughed at a few of each, but after about 5th post or so, they get stale. Bite me.
If you actually believe the parent's rant is correct, then you've got bigger problems than an absent sense of humor.
No, I think he's deriding open source programmers and hackers. That's not even that bad, but it's just totally flat and it lacks creativity. I think Slashdot moderators who +1 such trash have big problems. If the guy at least had some wit instead of just canned "parroting" style...
<rant>
I have -2 modifier on all "Funny" posts for a reason. It's not that I don't laugh (I do, daily) or that I don't have a sense of humor. Slashdot's concept of "funny" is just warped (like "imagine a beowulf cluster...", or "step 1, step 2...profit", or "you insensitive clod..." or any number of tired canned trash or otherwise stupid, witless humour). Slashdot humor has got to be the worst.
</rant>
If you've ever attended college and skipped a class, you should know there is absolutely no comparison between being in class and reading the notes on the web later.
I beg to differ. There is hardly any difference because:
1) There is almost never a need to ask questions. Most people understand right away what is being taught, and if they don't, professor is not going to stop an entire class for 2 hours so that 2 people can finally get it. Yes, you can ask after class, but then you're not talking about class attendance, but rather one on one tutoring (which is far, far, far more effective than learning in a class setting). It's called a lecture for a reason, and "to lecture someone" carries a negative connotation.
2) In many modern, famous, great Universities class sizes run into 100's of students (700 is not unusual). Everyone sits in an auditorium and listens. You might as well buy a "book on tape". Yes, I know, by the time you reach your 4th year, and M.S., the class size decreases, but that doesn't excuse a charade that happens before then.
3) At times professor may have such a nasty, thick foreign accent, that you can't understand a single word anyway. This observation comes to you from an ESL person. I think if a person doesn't put the effort and time into getting a decent pronunciation and a good English speaking skill they need to be fired. Unfortunately that isn't the case. Again, may I remind you, I'm not a native English speaker and yet I say this anyway. This actually happened to me in one of the most difficult classes I took.
And lastly, I've yet to find a single topic where a well written book didn't do quite nicely. The only thing I can think of that University instruction is good for, is for stuff that is not yet published. Everything that is researched usually will be (and should be) published very quickly. As far as instruction goes, that's the only thing. Univesity is good for active research where you need a lab and some science-minded (as opposed to profit-minded) colleagues to work effectively. Research is not the same thing as instruction.
That's called altruism and it's always been at the heart of science.
It always bothered me that actual knowledge is pretty worthless in getting job interviews, but rather your charm (personal and on resume) and "paper degree" is what counts. Maybe if University degrees lost their prestige, genuine knowledge and education (as opposed to mere credentials) would become more important.
Yea, and don't even try to tell me "but you need that University given knowledge *after* you get hired" bullsh*t. Most graduates (even M.S.) in my experience write awful code, have no clue about software engineering principles, and survival is all they do, often unwilling to even get excited by computing.
This problem is going to keep happening as long as we have idiotic H.R. and so-called "head hunters" filtering people out without any knowledge of the field they are hiring for!
Closing Slashdot is not preaching to the choir! What it is, is a kick in the pants to get off our lazy arses and DO something!
Yea, everyone here knows that software patents are bad. But maybe, just maybe, closing Slashdot will energize people into action who otherwise would do nothing.
I think PostgreSQL is infinitely superior to SAPDB. Have you actually tried using SAPDB? I have tried it on Solaris, and it failed to run on our version of Solaris (I believe it was 8). I looked at their home page and documentation and I was left feeling that SapDB is a half-baked, kludgey, crusty product.
PostgreSQL on the other hand just works, is fast and is smooth as silk. I think even plain old MySQL 4.x is better than SAPDB (yea, it lacks features, but it's a better product overall).
Is this really funny? I didn't laugh.