Most of the bloat in Microsoft products is due to Microsoft adding an enormous amount of crap that people don't really need and can manage well enough without. Clippy, for example.
Shoot, I'd fail that test - I email my wife at work, and my sister in a completely different country. They never email each other. Come to that, she emails her mother, and I never do, and her mother is out in a desert country just down the coast from Iraq.
Where we REALLY need these is for future applications.
No, what we really need is for programmers to reduce code bloat. Today's computers are far more powerful than those of just a few years ago, and things still seem to be running at about the same kind of speed. That's leaving out the high-graphic-usage games. I've got a 1.6GHz laptop here that takes a noticeable amount of time to start a browser like Firefox, in both Windows and Linux. I've got a K6-II 450 that used to start Netscape 4 in about the same amount of time, off a slower disk, with no fancy graphic adaptor.
I think similar reasoning was used back in the days of the first steam trains. At that time, no vehicle had ever travelled so fast on purpose (leaving out acts of nature such as tornadoes and hurricanes), and it was "proved" that at speeds in excess of 21mph the air would be forced from the train, thereby killing the passengers...
If I remember rightly, once a file was tagged with a certain access level , nobody could change it. About the best you could do would be to print it out and retype it. Assuming there's a printer available with the appropriate security clearance...
It was also definitely possible to set file permissions to deny access to the tape backup daemon, so a user could end up with something critical not backed up. That didn't even need to have the security clearance levels enabled...
Ah, Multics... Now there was an OS that would be really useful these days. It was possible to define security layers so that you couldn't even access your own files without being in the exact right security access level. It would be really funny watching the FBI trying to extract personal information from a properly configured Multics system, where you don't even know what the security levels are called, let alone have access to them...
In one I got recently, this dude was banging on about having cancer, not long to live, millions of dollars stashed away, etc, etc. Supposedly he wanted to make amends before dying and was hoping I'd help him out. It was very tempting, until I came across this little gem in the middle of the text:
"I have decided to give arms to charity organizations"
and I thought, "Hell no! Those buggers are bad enough about calling for donations at inconvenient times. Arming them could only make it worse..."
But first ask yourself, why would they want to?? I think we all agree that Time-Warner didn't really benefit from merging with AOL, and I don't think there's anything for Google to gain from acquiring Time-Warner. Aside from the possibility of opening up some of Time-Warner's IP, that is...
Re:Now we will get "video" images from battlefield
on
Disposable Camcorder
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· Score: 1
Well, yeah, naval guns have a lot longer range, but the GP post was talking about "soldiers on battlefields", which I felt limited the size to something one or two guys could carry. Same with tank-mounted cannon, artillery pieces and air-to-ground missiles - not exactly the sort of kit an average GI walks around with.
The fact remains that a well-timed camera shot could be as politically devasting as a tactical nuke can be on a battlefield...
The oil companies wouldn't be obsolete, they just wouldn't need to be converting oil to gasoline any more. There's plenty of other products they can still make - plastics, lubricants, etc.
Imagine a car that only needs to be refueled every few months/years.
Even better, a car that refuels itself - some guttering around the roof to direct rainwater into a tank, solar cells to provide power to split the water into hydrogen & oxygen, save the hydrogen for the fusion device and pump the oxygen into the car to counteract exhaust fumes from vehicles that haven't been converted yet...
I bought a couple of the $11 Ritz camera disposable digitals for my kids. They're still working fine. Some dude posted a hack program that allows you to alter the number of images taken from 25 to whatever you like. I've set mine for 99, as it's only a 2 digit counter. Not sure I could actually get 99 pics - depending on the content the jpg compression ratio sucks...
Someone got hold of the Walgreens equivalent and found that it wasn't quite the same inside, but he was able to solder in a compact flash (or maybe SD) socket and use removable media instead of hacking in a USB connector.
Re:Now we will get "video" images from battlefield
on
Disposable Camcorder
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· Score: 1
Bullets have a limited range. No more than a mile or so for the bigger guns. Rockets and shells have longer range, but a shot from a camcorder can hit one hell of a lot of people in a very short time, and has the potential for causing much more damage.
When Moses was around, Judaism was the only game in town for God's chosen people. Whereas now, God's chosen people have several different flavors of religion to choose between.
Note: not trying to be funny - different religions have different ideas about who the "chosen people" are, even if the "god" in question is technically the same god...
You don't get around religious doctrine on a technicality...
Really?? I thought the biblical Pharisees were all about technicalities. Just one example - as I recall from religious studies in school, ritual washing of the hands was reduced to dipping one's little finger in a bowl of water and letting a drop of water run down to one's elbow and back.
OK, so I don't have any facts to back that up, and it was taught by a Church of England chaplain, but I don't think he had any particular axe to grind with regards to other religions. He was also a pretty good physics teacher, allowing us to charge each other up to 50,000 volts with a van Der Graaf generator and then light bunsen burners with the static discharge. He also blew up a couple of coffee cans, so he can't have been all bad...:)
I'm a little suprised that no Slashdotter has commented on the irony of widespread theft of the book that's the original source for the "Thou Shalt Not Steal". Which would have allowed me to point out that the Christian Bible (of which the Jewish Torah is the first 5 parts) is the most widely shoplifted book!
Isn't the Christian Bible also the all-time best seller?? If it's also the most widely shoplifted book, that kinda makes a mockery of anyone's "gotta protect our copyright" arguments...
That'll never happen - the RIAA/MPAA (and their clones in other countries) have bought legislation to protect "their" IP. They'd never let anyone actually tax them on it as well. And if somehow such a tax *did* get passed, the copyright holders would simply pass it on to the consumers in the form of raised prices and ever-increasing lawsuits.
So what happens if SCO runs out of cash and can't afford to continue paying lawyers, etc?? Is it possible for the lawsuits to just go away if SCO folds up??
I'm thinking that the Linux community would be best served if there's a clear judgment in our favor. If the lawsuits could just fizzle out because SCO folds, some bonehead might try to resurrect the case somewhere down the line.
Don't worry too much. They'll get shut down by Homeland Security as soon as it becomes obvious that terrorists could splice'n'dice some *really* nasty bugs. Not just biological warfare, either. Imagine someone cooking up an organism that craps plastic explosive... Drop that in a bag of sugar along with a bug that decomposes exothermically after a predetermined time. Hmmm.... Could bake up some Combat Muffins (apologies to pterry). Good times.
Better yet, modify human gut bacteria to turn human crap into explosives. Wouldn't have to smuggle explosives onto an airplane, just eat something a couple of hours before boarding.
Slashdot Mirror
Most of the bloat in Microsoft products is due to Microsoft adding an enormous amount of crap that people don't really need and can manage well enough without. Clippy, for example.
Shoot, I'd fail that test - I email my wife at work, and my sister in a completely different country. They never email each other. Come to that, she emails her mother, and I never do, and her mother is out in a desert country just down the coast from Iraq.
No, what we really need is for programmers to reduce code bloat. Today's computers are far more powerful than those of just a few years ago, and things still seem to be running at about the same kind of speed. That's leaving out the high-graphic-usage games. I've got a 1.6GHz laptop here that takes a noticeable amount of time to start a browser like Firefox, in both Windows and Linux. I've got a K6-II 450 that used to start Netscape 4 in about the same amount of time, off a slower disk, with no fancy graphic adaptor.
Might want to reveal it from the safety of another country, preferably one that doesn't allow extradition to the US...
Apologies to Bradley, then. However, I still believe I first saw it as a message from the fortune progam, regardless of who wrote it.
I think similar reasoning was used back in the days of the first steam trains. At that time, no vehicle had ever travelled so fast on purpose (leaving out acts of nature such as tornadoes and hurricanes), and it was "proved" that at speeds in excess of 21mph the air would be forced from the train, thereby killing the passengers...
It was also definitely possible to set file permissions to deny access to the tape backup daemon, so a user could end up with something critical not backed up. That didn't even need to have the security clearance levels enabled...
Ah, Multics... Now there was an OS that would be really useful these days. It was possible to define security layers so that you couldn't even access your own files without being in the exact right security access level. It would be really funny watching the FBI trying to extract personal information from a properly configured Multics system, where you don't even know what the security levels are called, let alone have access to them...
Wait, Hawaii's a state now? Since when??
But first ask yourself, why would they want to?? I think we all agree that Time-Warner didn't really benefit from merging with AOL, and I don't think there's anything for Google to gain from acquiring Time-Warner. Aside from the possibility of opening up some of Time-Warner's IP, that is...
The fact remains that a well-timed camera shot could be as politically devasting as a tactical nuke can be on a battlefield...
The oil companies wouldn't be obsolete, they just wouldn't need to be converting oil to gasoline any more. There's plenty of other products they can still make - plastics, lubricants, etc.
Even better, a car that refuels itself - some guttering around the roof to direct rainwater into a tank, solar cells to provide power to split the water into hydrogen & oxygen, save the hydrogen for the fusion device and pump the oxygen into the car to counteract exhaust fumes from vehicles that haven't been converted yet...
Sure, the method's reproducible, but how about the results??
Someone got hold of the Walgreens equivalent and found that it wasn't quite the same inside, but he was able to solder in a compact flash (or maybe SD) socket and use removable media instead of hacking in a USB connector.
Bullets have a limited range. No more than a mile or so for the bigger guns. Rockets and shells have longer range, but a shot from a camcorder can hit one hell of a lot of people in a very short time, and has the potential for causing much more damage.
Note: not trying to be funny - different religions have different ideas about who the "chosen people" are, even if the "god" in question is technically the same god...
Really?? I thought the biblical Pharisees were all about technicalities. Just one example - as I recall from religious studies in school, ritual washing of the hands was reduced to dipping one's little finger in a bowl of water and letting a drop of water run down to one's elbow and back.
OK, so I don't have any facts to back that up, and it was taught by a Church of England chaplain, but I don't think he had any particular axe to grind with regards to other religions. He was also a pretty good physics teacher, allowing us to charge each other up to 50,000 volts with a van Der Graaf generator and then light bunsen burners with the static discharge. He also blew up a couple of coffee cans, so he can't have been all bad... :)
Isn't the Christian Bible also the all-time best seller?? If it's also the most widely shoplifted book, that kinda makes a mockery of anyone's "gotta protect our copyright" arguments...
That'll never happen - the RIAA/MPAA (and their clones in other countries) have bought legislation to protect "their" IP. They'd never let anyone actually tax them on it as well. And if somehow such a tax *did* get passed, the copyright holders would simply pass it on to the consumers in the form of raised prices and ever-increasing lawsuits.
I'm thinking that the Linux community would be best served if there's a clear judgment in our favor. If the lawsuits could just fizzle out because SCO folds, some bonehead might try to resurrect the case somewhere down the line.
Wait a minute - aren't SCO claiming we've already grabbed their code??
Better yet, modify human gut bacteria to turn human crap into explosives. Wouldn't have to smuggle explosives onto an airplane, just eat something a couple of hours before boarding.