In order for me to communicate most effectively with another person it is important that I do it in a manner which they understand. In order for me to understand someone else's communication it is most effective if I adjust to their method of communication.
And herein lies the problem. How do you know what that method of communication is?
The more people follow the rules, the more you can be reasonably sure what I mean.
For instance, if I tell you, "Stay away from Bob, he's nauseous," what do I mean?
Am I warning you to stay away from Bob because he feels sick and might throw up on you (the common, "incorrect" use of the word), or am I warning you to stay away from Bob because he is, in the word's "correct" sense, actually nauseous and will cause you to throw up?
You don't know, do you? Even if I tell you beforehand that I'm careful with my word choice, you still don't know if I know or care about the correct definition of nauseous.
But if people used "nauseous" just in its correct sense -- inducing nausea -- then you'd have no idea.
If I am in a non English speaking country and I do not know the language well will communication be benefited if the person to whom I am speaking doesn't attempt to communicate at my level of understanding?
For foreign speakers, it's best if you follow the rules better, not try to dumb down your talk. As a sort of stupid example, if you send a new English speaker something with "should of" in it, they won't have any clue what the "of" is there for. If they have someone to turn to for questions, I would bet many would.
If you use "viz" you are hardly better off than "i.e." because it's no more clear which you mean. It's just that with "viz" the ambiguity comes built into the correct definition, while with "i.e." the ambiguity comes from misuse.
The reason that using "i.e." as "for example" is bad isn't that there's some grammar god who will get mad and smite you if you don't follow the prescribed rules, it's because it increases the ambiguity of language. If I'm reading something that uses "i.e." it's usually possible to make a good guess if it's used as "that is" or "for example", but not always. And when writing, if it's important to make the distinction, "i.e." is out because too many people will misunderstand it.
The argument that always comes up against language pedants is "well, if I can get across what I mean unambiguously, what's the harm?" But the misuse of "i.e." makes it so that your statement is ambiguous, because I don't know if you're using it correctly or not. (Or, in the common case where it doesn't effect a particular sentence's ambiguity, it at least contributes to the belief that "i.e." = "for example" which helps propogate the ambiguous instances.)
Here's the problem with that. The 'mushification' of English (or language in general) means that it becomes more difficult to communicate precisely.
For instance, I just went on a rant, as I periodically do, to someone about the difference between the abbreviations e.g. (which means "for example") and i.e. (which does not, and instead means "that is" or "in other words"). Consider this for a moment.
If everyone knew and used these abbreviations correctly, there's no problem. However, there are times when someone uses "i.e." and it's unclear if they are using it correctly or incorrectly. Mushification killing unambiguity*.
Then when I'm writing something, I wonder -- can I use "i.e." and know that people will understand that I'm not referring to an example? The distinction is often important. So I decide that I better not, and substitute "that is" in its place. Mushification killing conciseness.
* This appears to not be a word. However, I feel confidant that you know what I mean. And besides, I have already used "mushification" a couple times, so it's not as if I'm sticking to completly well-formed English.
Here's another thing that bothers me about common usage.;-) (Sorry to pick on you.)
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
Repeat after me: The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example." The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example." The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation to use if you mean "for example" is "e.g.". The abbreviation "i.e." stands for (the Latin of) "that is."
I.e., "i.e." is used when you are rephrasing, clarifying, etc. what was already said. The sentence "i.e. A report for work", if taken literally, means that the only documents that matter to you are reports for work.
I find that figuring out the proper way to work something I want to say is often a fairly dense exercise in logic. I have to work out a way that conveys exactly what I want to say without being too verbose. (Okay, this is perhaps at a bit higher level than mechanical aspects like grammar, but the same thing applies there.)
Of course, it gets annoying when what you would like to say has a different meaning than what everyone else uses, or at least be somewhat odd. Think about the expression "My watch is 5 minutes fast" and what it means. If you think about it logically, the sentence makes no sense because "5 minutes" is a measure of speed, and "fast" is a measure of time. Every time someone says something like that (and I do it too), I immediately think to myself "I bet it goes very close to 60 minutes per hour." But people use it anyway.
Anyway, I fully agree. I also have a few pet peeves that are at a bit higher level than simple grammatical or spelling errors. There are phrases such as "I could care less" that are well formed but are still incorrect, because people mean something other than what they are saying.
Then I have another set of pet peeves that are aimed at the language and its use in general because they are almost universal. One of my favorites is "My watch is fast" when the speaker of course doesn't mean that his watch is fast, but that it is ahead. Presumably the minute hand still takes pretty much 60 minutes to complete a circle. (Of course there is a corrolation between a watch going fast and being ahead, but that isn't what people refer to, as evidenced by the occasional "My watch is 5 minutes fast" when "5 minutes" isn't a unit of speed.) Then there's all sorts of fun with questions like "Aren't you coming?"
There is not one thing that you can do under the GPL that you are not allowed to do under the BSD license, and there is quite a bit more you can do under BSD.
That is pretty much the definition of "more free" under any definition of "free" that applies to this disucssion (e.g. is not the same as "gratis").
Now, the questions of whether the BSD license or GPL leads to more software freedom and which license promotes free software better are up for some debate. The GPL makes sure the software STAYS free, and as such, there are very good arguments that the GPL better promotes free software, the OSS movement is better off than if everything was released BSD, etc. But this is a different matter than which license is more free. If the promotion idea is what you are thinking when you say the GPL is more free, I put to you that you need to be less sloppy with your language and say what you mean, not what sounds good.
You're right, I didn't read it at all. And from the link you gave me, neither did you. If you actually found the license on the site, link to it and we'll be able to settle this instead of speculate on what it does or does not say.
You MAY NOT SWAP license in and out.
You buy an individual license PER DEVELOPPER.
Reread what I wrote earlier. I didn't say switch the developers' licenses, I just said give everyone ONE licenses for his or her preferred platform and have them stick with it.
In other words, I'm not saying swap the license, I'm saying swap the code you're working on. As long as the license doesn't forbid compiling code written on a different platform under a different license, you would be more than able to do this.
That's what they do and that's why I'm complaining.
They are saying that floating licenses do not make sense for a library.
So, unless your organization builds software on a single platform, then you need 6600$ multiplatform license.
No, you don't. You could have one dev working on a Windows version, one on a Mac version, and one on X. Single platform -- $3300 -- for each, but you can build on all three platforms.
You have yet to show me a page saying they forbid this in their license.
I seriously doubt that you'd need to buy every developer the full, triple platform, version. Few people are going to swap back and forth, so what's the use? The only reason you'd need it is if their commercial license forbid companies from getting, say, 5 Windows-only licenses, 5 Linux licenses, 5 Mac licenses, and 1 cross platform license and having everyone work together. My gut reaction is this would be suicide if they did that, so I find it very unlikely they did.
So you've cut that $6600 in half essentially. Maybe a little less so you can get a couple x-platforms, but again, most people won't need them.
Qt and KDE needs to work closer together, because currently the integration just sucks.
The danger with that is if they work too closely together, it likely becomes more difficult maintain the non-X ports, or harder to do "wild", innovative stuff with KDE.
Yes, but the scam involved developers using the GPL version, and then DISTRIBUTING it to another developer who then compiles it with the official version, who then in turn will distribute it to others. In this case, where distributuion is happening, they would be in violation.
No, it'd still be possible to get around it. If you send the GPL version of Qt with it then you'd maybe have a case, but if each developer downloaded the GPL version right from Trolltech and only the parts of the application that the company held the copyright to were distributed, there's no infringement. (This is why the other poster says "you" refers to the company; it effectively does.)
Again, it's deviating quite far from the spirit of the GPL, and is violating their commercial license (enforcable or not), but my reading of the GPL is that this would be allowed as far as the FSF is concerned.
$2500 for Rational Rose (sorry, no link), and that draws pretty pictures.
(Okay, so it does a lot more than draw pretty pictures, but I would make the argument that if you were doing x-platform development Qt could be a lot more beneficial to you than Rose.)
This is against the GPL license terms. Any programer who touches the code with the GPL version is legally obligated to open the entire codebase.
As long as you don't distribute it you're okay, because I believe the GPL allows you to create derivative works without requiring your code to be GPLd. And I'm even more sure that this is the position the FSF takes even if it's not in the license explicitly.
I agree that this is a very risky strategy, but it's something that is probably being done by some companies, and will probably be done more. (I doubt it's enough to significantly impact Trolltech's bottom line.)
Who do you think was buying Windows licences before?
Think anyone who could afford to buy a licence was writing programs they don't mind being GPL'd?
I think probably the only way that they will lose income (and I think this is a very real possibility btw) is people who cheat (violate the license for the commercial version probably) and get a couple licensed copies to do production builds on, but develop mostly on GPL'd versions.
Forget China, what happens if the spammer is in South Dakota?
Does Utah have any jurisdiction over what happens? I sorta doubt it, though I'm not exactly up on my communication law.
(As a related point, does it work the same as if someone in a state that allows people to record telephone calls w/o the other party's knowledge or consent records a call to a two-party state? I don't know how that works either, but I would think it's the same.)
You could arrange them, for instance, on radii of a circle. I don't know if that would be any good, but it'd probably be better than a rectangular grid.
Or in a gridish pattern, but with the "columns" offset a bit so your fingers fall on keys when resting.
Restricting your thinking to grids limit your options.
RTFA. Unless X has gotten a lot more powerful since I last used it, it doesn't let allow you to move the physical keys on your keyboard to anywhere you like. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen any program that will let you completely change your hardware.
Sorry to sound so rude, but the "customize X" solution is so different from what this keyboard is that if I didn't already reply to a post in this story there's a good chance I'd mod you off topic.
I'm not trying to argue any merit this keyboard may or may not have, but your post is a red herring.
RTFA. Unless X has gotten a lot more powerful since I last used it, it doesn't let allow you to move the keys on your keyboard to anywhere you like. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen any program that will let you completely change your hardware.
Sorry to sound so rude, but the "customize X" solution is so far different from what this keyboard is that if I didn't already reply to a post in this story there's a good chance I'd mod you off topic.
On this fancy one, they have the keys arranged in a grid (which is the only other basic key pattern I can think of when you're working with a flat surface)
You can put the keys anywhere, you don't have to put them on a grid.
If you were looking at the Tom's article where they show the software with the grid, it's just a layout guide, not a requirement.
No major manufacturer doesn't offer drives with a 3 year warranty, but most (all but Segate?) offer drives with 1 year warranties. WD's special edition drives have 3 yr warranties, and Maxtor's MaxPlus drives have 3 yr warranties, but their lower end drives are all 1.
80 GB Maxtor from Best Buy 80GB Hitachi from Best Buy Actually, I looked at 6 drives at Best Buy's website; 4 had 1 yr warranties, and 1 was a Segate I never expected to.
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In order for me to communicate most effectively with another person it is important that I do it in a manner which they understand. In order for me to understand someone else's communication it is most effective if I adjust to their method of communication.
And herein lies the problem. How do you know what that method of communication is?
The more people follow the rules, the more you can be reasonably sure what I mean.
For instance, if I tell you, "Stay away from Bob, he's nauseous," what do I mean?
Am I warning you to stay away from Bob because he feels sick and might throw up on you (the common, "incorrect" use of the word), or am I warning you to stay away from Bob because he is, in the word's "correct" sense, actually nauseous and will cause you to throw up?
You don't know, do you? Even if I tell you beforehand that I'm careful with my word choice, you still don't know if I know or care about the correct definition of nauseous.
But if people used "nauseous" just in its correct sense -- inducing nausea -- then you'd have no idea.
If I am in a non English speaking country and I do not know the language well will communication be benefited if the person to whom I am speaking doesn't attempt to communicate at my level of understanding?
For foreign speakers, it's best if you follow the rules better, not try to dumb down your talk. As a sort of stupid example, if you send a new English speaker something with "should of" in it, they won't have any clue what the "of" is there for. If they have someone to turn to for questions, I would bet many would.
That doesn't help the issue at all.
If you use "viz" you are hardly better off than "i.e." because it's no more clear which you mean. It's just that with "viz" the ambiguity comes built into the correct definition, while with "i.e." the ambiguity comes from misuse.
The reason that using "i.e." as "for example" is bad isn't that there's some grammar god who will get mad and smite you if you don't follow the prescribed rules, it's because it increases the ambiguity of language. If I'm reading something that uses "i.e." it's usually possible to make a good guess if it's used as "that is" or "for example", but not always. And when writing, if it's important to make the distinction, "i.e." is out because too many people will misunderstand it.
The argument that always comes up against language pedants is "well, if I can get across what I mean unambiguously, what's the harm?" But the misuse of "i.e." makes it so that your statement is ambiguous, because I don't know if you're using it correctly or not. (Or, in the common case where it doesn't effect a particular sentence's ambiguity, it at least contributes to the belief that "i.e." = "for example" which helps propogate the ambiguous instances.)
But vis has the exact same problems.
Here's the problem with that. The 'mushification' of English (or language in general) means that it becomes more difficult to communicate precisely.
For instance, I just went on a rant, as I periodically do, to someone about the difference between the abbreviations e.g. (which means "for example") and i.e. (which does not, and instead means "that is" or "in other words"). Consider this for a moment.
If everyone knew and used these abbreviations correctly, there's no problem. However, there are times when someone uses "i.e." and it's unclear if they are using it correctly or incorrectly. Mushification killing unambiguity*.
Then when I'm writing something, I wonder -- can I use "i.e." and know that people will understand that I'm not referring to an example? The distinction is often important. So I decide that I better not, and substitute "that is" in its place. Mushification killing conciseness.
* This appears to not be a word. However, I feel confidant that you know what I mean. And besides, I have already used "mushification" a couple times, so it's not as if I'm sticking to completly well-formed English.
(i.e. A report for work)
;-) (Sorry to pick on you.)
e g.html, or http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/abbreviations/f /ievseg.htm. (Note the use of "e.g." for "for example.")
Here's another thing that bothers me about common usage.
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
Repeat after me:
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation "i.e." does not mean "for example."
The abbreviation to use if you mean "for example" is "e.g.". The abbreviation "i.e." stands for (the Latin of) "that is."
I.e., "i.e." is used when you are rephrasing, clarifying, etc. what was already said. The sentence "i.e. A report for work", if taken literally, means that the only documents that matter to you are reports for work.
For more information, see, e.g., http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/8707/52862, http://www.planetoid.org/grammar_for_geeks/ie_vs_
(Sorry, I go on this rant periodically. Don't take it personally.)
I agree!
I find that figuring out the proper way to work something I want to say is often a fairly dense exercise in logic. I have to work out a way that conveys exactly what I want to say without being too verbose. (Okay, this is perhaps at a bit higher level than mechanical aspects like grammar, but the same thing applies there.)
Of course, it gets annoying when what you would like to say has a different meaning than what everyone else uses, or at least be somewhat odd. Think about the expression "My watch is 5 minutes fast" and what it means. If you think about it logically, the sentence makes no sense because "5 minutes" is a measure of speed, and "fast" is a measure of time. Every time someone says something like that (and I do it too), I immediately think to myself "I bet it goes very close to 60 minutes per hour." But people use it anyway.
Sorry, I couldn't help myself.
Anyway, I fully agree. I also have a few pet peeves that are at a bit higher level than simple grammatical or spelling errors. There are phrases such as "I could care less" that are well formed but are still incorrect, because people mean something other than what they are saying.
Then I have another set of pet peeves that are aimed at the language and its use in general because they are almost universal. One of my favorites is "My watch is fast" when the speaker of course doesn't mean that his watch is fast, but that it is ahead. Presumably the minute hand still takes pretty much 60 minutes to complete a circle. (Of course there is a corrolation between a watch going fast and being ahead, but that isn't what people refer to, as evidenced by the occasional "My watch is 5 minutes fast" when "5 minutes" isn't a unit of speed.) Then there's all sorts of fun with questions like "Aren't you coming?"
BSD is more free than GPL.
There is not one thing that you can do under the GPL that you are not allowed to do under the BSD license, and there is quite a bit more you can do under BSD.
That is pretty much the definition of "more free" under any definition of "free" that applies to this disucssion (e.g. is not the same as "gratis").
Now, the questions of whether the BSD license or GPL leads to more software freedom and which license promotes free software better are up for some debate. The GPL makes sure the software STAYS free, and as such, there are very good arguments that the GPL better promotes free software, the OSS movement is better off than if everything was released BSD, etc. But this is a different matter than which license is more free. If the promotion idea is what you are thinking when you say the GPL is more free, I put to you that you need to be less sloppy with your language and say what you mean, not what sounds good.
You didn't read the license correctly.
You're right, I didn't read it at all. And from the link you gave me, neither did you. If you actually found the license on the site, link to it and we'll be able to settle this instead of speculate on what it does or does not say.
You MAY NOT SWAP license in and out.
You buy an individual license PER DEVELOPPER.
Reread what I wrote earlier. I didn't say switch the developers' licenses, I just said give everyone ONE licenses for his or her preferred platform and have them stick with it.
In other words, I'm not saying swap the license, I'm saying swap the code you're working on. As long as the license doesn't forbid compiling code written on a different platform under a different license, you would be more than able to do this.
That's what they do and that's why I'm complaining.
They are saying that floating licenses
do not make sense for a library.
So, unless your organization builds software on a single platform, then you need 6600$ multiplatform license.
No, you don't. You could have one dev working on a Windows version, one on a Mac version, and one on X. Single platform -- $3300 -- for each, but you can build on all three platforms.
You have yet to show me a page saying they forbid this in their license.
I've done some research too, and what I've seen tends to show that it's slightly faster for people of similar "experience".
;-) ). I changed when I was having wrist problems.
I use it though because I find it a lot more comfortable than QWERTY (except for typing QWERTY
Seriously 6600$ is lots of money
I seriously doubt that you'd need to buy every developer the full, triple platform, version. Few people are going to swap back and forth, so what's the use? The only reason you'd need it is if their commercial license forbid companies from getting, say, 5 Windows-only licenses, 5 Linux licenses, 5 Mac licenses, and 1 cross platform license and having everyone work together. My gut reaction is this would be suicide if they did that, so I find it very unlikely they did.
So you've cut that $6600 in half essentially. Maybe a little less so you can get a couple x-platforms, but again, most people won't need them.
Qt and KDE needs to work closer together, because currently the integration just sucks.
The danger with that is if they work too closely together, it likely becomes more difficult maintain the non-X ports, or harder to do "wild", innovative stuff with KDE.
Yes, but the scam involved developers using the GPL version, and then DISTRIBUTING it to another developer who then compiles it with the official version, who then in turn will distribute it to others. In this case, where distributuion is happening, they would be in violation.
No, it'd still be possible to get around it. If you send the GPL version of Qt with it then you'd maybe have a case, but if each developer downloaded the GPL version right from Trolltech and only the parts of the application that the company held the copyright to were distributed, there's no infringement. (This is why the other poster says "you" refers to the company; it effectively does.)
Again, it's deviating quite far from the spirit of the GPL, and is violating their commercial license (enforcable or not), but my reading of the GPL is that this would be allowed as far as the FSF is concerned.
$2500 for Rational Rose (sorry, no link), and that draws pretty pictures.
(Okay, so it does a lot more than draw pretty pictures, but I would make the argument that if you were doing x-platform development Qt could be a lot more beneficial to you than Rose.)
This is against the GPL license terms. Any programer who touches the code with the GPL version is legally obligated to open the entire codebase.
As long as you don't distribute it you're okay, because I believe the GPL allows you to create derivative works without requiring your code to be GPLd. And I'm even more sure that this is the position the FSF takes even if it's not in the license explicitly.
I agree that this is a very risky strategy, but it's something that is probably being done by some companies, and will probably be done more. (I doubt it's enough to significantly impact Trolltech's bottom line.)
Who do you think was buying Windows licences before?
Think anyone who could afford to buy a licence was writing programs they don't mind being GPL'd?
I think probably the only way that they will lose income (and I think this is a very real possibility btw) is people who cheat (violate the license for the commercial version probably) and get a couple licensed copies to do production builds on, but develop mostly on GPL'd versions.
I would just like to add my voice to say this series is perhaps the funniest troll I've seen.
Forget China, what happens if the spammer is in South Dakota?
Does Utah have any jurisdiction over what happens? I sorta doubt it, though I'm not exactly up on my communication law.
(As a related point, does it work the same as if someone in a state that allows people to record telephone calls w/o the other party's knowledge or consent records a call to a two-party state? I don't know how that works either, but I would think it's the same.)
You could arrange them, for instance, on radii of a circle. I don't know if that would be any good, but it'd probably be better than a rectangular grid.
Or in a gridish pattern, but with the "columns" offset a bit so your fingers fall on keys when resting.
Restricting your thinking to grids limit your options.
RTFA. Unless X has gotten a lot more powerful since I last used it, it doesn't let allow you to move the physical keys on your keyboard to anywhere you like. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen any program that will let you completely change your hardware.
Sorry to sound so rude, but the "customize X" solution is so different from what this keyboard is that if I didn't already reply to a post in this story there's a good chance I'd mod you off topic.
I'm not trying to argue any merit this keyboard may or may not have, but your post is a red herring.
RTFA. Unless X has gotten a lot more powerful since I last used it, it doesn't let allow you to move the keys on your keyboard to anywhere you like. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen any program that will let you completely change your hardware.
Sorry to sound so rude, but the "customize X" solution is so far different from what this keyboard is that if I didn't already reply to a post in this story there's a good chance I'd mod you off topic.
On this fancy one, they have the keys arranged in a grid (which is the only other basic key pattern I can think of when you're working with a flat surface)
You can put the keys anywhere, you don't have to put them on a grid.
If you were looking at the Tom's article where they show the software with the grid, it's just a layout guide, not a requirement.
Actually, I was wrong.
I take back what I said before. I could have sworn it was the other way around.
Never mind.
*Buzz*
USB 2.0 Hi-speed is 12Mbps (note: megabit/s, not MB). USB 2.0 full-speed is the 480.
At least now... I think they may have swapped names maybe 3 years ago. (I think it was around the time I got my computer.)
No major manufacturer doesn't offer drives with a 3 year warranty, but most (all but Segate?) offer drives with 1 year warranties. WD's special edition drives have 3 yr warranties, and Maxtor's MaxPlus drives have 3 yr warranties, but their lower end drives are all 1.
Examples:
250GB WD from Best Buy
120GB WD from Best Buy
80 GB Maxtor from Best Buy
80GB Hitachi from Best Buy
Actually, I looked at 6 drives at Best Buy's website; 4 had 1 yr warranties, and 1 was a Segate I never expected to.
300GB Maxtor from Newegg
120GB Iomega drive from Newegg
120GB external WD drive from Newegg
No, see, that many drives IS porn to us.
And actually, every onboard RAID chip I've seen only does RAID 0, 1, and maybe 0+1.
Granted, I haven't looked for a couple years, but I doubt things have changed.