Look at just some of the things they are trying to put into the OS:
probabilistic expert systems and user assistance (think "paper clip")
the file system as a database
a VM and runtime to unify all programming languages
all data contained in its own data vault
etc.
Every idea, however hare brained, that some computer science researcher has come up with, gets put into Windows because it's almost the only place where you can put it.
But without being tested, alone and in combination, in the market, nobody knows whether any of these ideas help or hurt. Microsoft is stumbling along like the central committee of the old USSR, trying to plan for the next ten years. They are going to be no more successful in terms of results: their systems are already far from what a free market would produce, and it will only get orders of magnitude worse. The only question is whether, like the USSR, Microsoft will be able to hold on to their power through coercion and eventually fall apart in a great crash, or whether they split up voluntarily and operate in a free market before then.
Despite its growing popularity among computer professionals, it's still not completely "user friendly."
And despite being even less user friendly than Linux, Microsoft has managed to force almost every PC buyer to acquire a copy of their operating system. Which only goes to show that user friendliness and marketshare have little to do with one another.
But Linux software is getting better -- and now more closely mimics the Windows world that the vast majority of PC users are accustomed to.
It never seems to occur to people that Linux users like their systems to be different. Do we all drive one kind of car? Do we all live in one kind of house? Do we all eat only at chain food stores? Why should operating systems be like the USSR, centrally planned and only coming out in one model?
We need an open market in operating systems, and that means that the courts and regulations need to curb Microsoft's (understandable and natural) monopolistic tendencies, even if that costs the consumer a little time and money in the short run.
Maybe it will run in a vacuum; of course, keeping a constant head-to-disk spacing will get harder, but not impossible (e.g., using mechanical spacers and fine tuning via piezo actuators). The media might also simply become non-rotational.
The old Bill, the one we all know, thought he could do it all--and pretty much did. He built the most profitable tech company in history, almost single-handedly transforming the rarefied, clubby computer industry into a mass-market enterprise
Today, we may still snicker at this. After all, we had a thriving, competitive PC industry without Microsoft: Commodore, Amiga, Atari, Exidy, Apple, and many others. Those systems were often way ahead of whatever Microsoft was selling at the same time. All of Microsoft's major successes were invented by others, then copied by Microsoft.
Rather than creating the modern computer industry, Gates single-handedly destroyed most of it. Gates' legacy in computer history is despicable. But the victors get to write history...
You get two major flavors of Python. One is comes from Fink and is almost identical to the UNIX/Linux version of Python (including Tkinter, wxPython, Numeric, etc.). Another is tightly integrated with OSX and provides access to Cocoa and a lot of other facilities. For the latter, you also get hooks into OSA (Open Script Architecture), which lets you do pretty much everything from Python you can do from AppleScript. Perl, similarly, comes in two such flavors.
Knowing a little bit of AppleScript may still be useful, but on the whole, I wouldn't bother too much with it.
All of this, incidentally, works a lot better in my opinion than Microsoft's scripting framework.
Besides that, AS hooks nicely with scriptable apps on the Mac.
That's simply OSA (Open Script Architecture). You can do the same thing from any other scripting language that knows about OSA, like, for example, Python and Perl.
I find that the same thing is true of AppleScript.
I also think that AppleScript is perhaps OK for very small scripts, but for any serious scripting, people are better off with Python (or Basic, for that matter). It's similar to COBOL or Ada: adding more English words to a programming language doesn't make programs easier to read or write, it just makes them longer.
Again, fortunately, OSA lets you use your preferred scripting language.
Interesting. So this satellite has long since dropped off the face of the solar system. And then, one day, without warning...it's back?
News flash: satellites don't fix themselves.
But, is this important? As far as I am concerned, the answer is no, unless someone decides to actually send a mission to the planet to gather hard evidence. Which currently seems impossible, considering the amount of money wasted on the ISS (which has no clear function IMHO).
It matters because this may provide another good incentive to stop wasting money on the ISS and start investing it in unmanned, robotic Mars probes again.
One of the great attempts at antarctic exploration was perhaps even more astounding. I think the explorers were lost for more than a year, and it took a handful of people sailing thousands (?) of miles in an open boat, then crossing a glacier on foot.
The techie effect can also mean that a band makes it that otherwise wouldn't have become popular. Or many other possibilities. It's such a complicated web of cause and effect that one really can't draw any conclusions.
There are plenty of quiet CPU fans out there. They are usualy high-quality regular CPU fans running at lower speed, combined with a good heat sink. If you have one of those, you often don't need a fan for the case.
But there are some heat sinks that do use the case fan. They are large fan-like things, and if you like, you can get air ducts with them.
People keep talking about uncertainty about DVD-R formats. I'm not aware of any uncertainty about "DVD-R" (the read-only) version. Isn't there just one format, the one compatible with current DVD drives (including consumer drives)?
There does seem to be uncertainty about DVD-RW/DVD+RW/DVD-RAM, but that is a different matter.
We have encountered instances where companies and individuals constructed entire commercial Web "radio" sites based on links to NPR and similar audio.
And where is the problem with that?
We have also encountered Web sites of issue advocacy groups that have positioned the audio link to an NPR story such that one cannot tell that NPR is not supporting their cause.
Does NPR support any causes? If not, this shouldn't be a problem, since neither the content itself nor its use could then be misinterpreted as "supporting someone's cause". If NPR does support some causes, maybe they shouldn't, given their funding and mandate.
SUWANJINDAR (of Microsoft): "Our software remains the same. This is the same Pocket PC 2002 software that performs fabulously across other ARM processors (StrongARM 1110, OMAP710, etc).
The links in question point to a few editions of an on-line magazine that suggests that people derail trains carrying nuclear materials and tells them how to. I don't see why it would make much of a difference whether it would point directly to the page in question or just to the index--the article isn't hard to find, and the content is infamous for this.
Now, should such content be published and widely accessible? If the article is bogus and does not describe a real threat, it doesn't matter. Now, let's say that the article described techniques that actually work. It was published, what, five years ago? If it still poses a threat, we have to conclude that this kind of transport just cannot be made safe, in which case it shouldn't be carried out. If a bunch of adolescents can describe this in a low-quality rag, real terrorists can certainly figure it out as well. Whichever way you look at it, the article should not pose a threat to actual nuclear transport or rail travel.
This just goes to show again that security through obscurity is as stupid when it comes to physical security as when it comes to computer security. Sadly, much of our government spooks are living by that principle, and we all pay the price, both in loss of civil liberties and loss of life.
Well, that and there are very few desktop linux users.
Oh? What makes you say that? Among all the machines I see people use, both in our organizations and others, I'd say at least 25% run Linux on the desktop. Linux is also very widely used in academia. Extrapolating just from that, it seems pretty clear that there must be millions of Linux desktop users out there. I challenge you to come up with concrete data to disprove that claim.
there are no PDAs or PCMCIA converters for the format.
Not only are there PCMCIA adapters, they actually work more nicely than CF adapters: with a SmartMedia PCMCIA adapter, you can just eject the SmartMedia card from the adapter. With a CF adapter, you have to eject the whole PCMCIA card and then pull out the CF card, resulting in more wear on the laptop. This is, in fact, one significant advantage for SmartMedia.
SmartMedia is a nice format for consumer applications, and the most popular in Japan. The cards are physically flexible, easy to clean, and have high storage density. CF is less robust because of its use of pins. The storage density of CF is less as well, and CF is too large and inflexible to carry, say, in your wallet.
CF has its place, but so does SmartMedia. If there is one format to obsolete both, its SD/MMC, which combines most of the advantages of CF with the pinless design and storage density of SmartMedia.
From what little I know, one of the biggest hindrances to using Linux on a laptop effectively is that most all of them use Winmodems with closed,
Winmodems and built-in modems are useless anyway. You don't want to plug a built-in modem into a random phone line because it may fry it. And Winmodems are just not reliable.
There are plenty of tiny PCMCIA and USB modems that work really well. And when they get fried (which they will sooner or later), you just get a new one.
The reason why few people bought IBM laptops with Linux preinstalled was probably that very few (if any) models were offered that way. Almost all of our IBM laptops run Linux, and none of them could actually be ordered that way.
Nevertheless, IBM's support for Linux was very important in our purchasing decisions because we knew (1) drivers were around and (2) there were usually web pages at IBM explaining how to install the stuff.
Overall, I think this action by IBM is stupid: without explicit Linux support, we're just going to buy something cheaper, or we are going to buy machines from companies that do support Linux on laptops.
This supposedly creative business of high technology has invented nothing that compares with the Xerox Star in over 20 years. All the R&D money has been diverted, mismanaged, killed by zealous bean counters, or simply wasted. Most of the big R&D labs have been closed or cut back. All the R&D seems to be in semiconductor technologies, which is because that particular business is more of a psychopathic rat-race than anything else and you get eaten by the rats if you miss a step.
I fully agree with this. The state of computer research is depressing, and funding for it is very limited.
However, Dvorak's attacks on Apple or Linux are ill-founded. Both Apple and the Linux community are pushing the envelope within the limits of what is commercially feasible or practical. Neither Apple nor Linux developers are charities. In order to survive, they have to deliver tools and environments that programmers and users trained in the current, outdated paradigms can deal with.
The real culprit is the US government. Due to a quirk in military funding and the cold war, it used to fund research lavishly and often independent of short-term commercial considerations. But in the spirit the radical free market ideology that has gripped most of the government, research is now largely only funded if people can answer the question "what is it good for in the short term", or "how many jobs will it create in my state before I face re-election".
Of course, it should also be said that some innovative ideas in programming are out there, if you know where to look. And it should also be said that the "low hanging fruit" has been plucked in the 20th century--most of the easy, gee wiz, solutions have been found.
You still have to make the mold itself, and since it is in actual mechanical contact with the substrate, it won't last anywhere near as long as an optical mask. So, you certainly have to make masters fairly regularly, and those processes may be disproportionately costly and time consuming (electron beam lithography, nanoprobes, etc.).
Altogether, it looks like a nice process, but it's not immediately clear that it will help.
and the problem with that is what?
on
Blogspace vs. NPR
·
· Score: 2
Well, and if they had half a clue, they can set up their web server so that audio files can only be accessed when accessed from their site.
I also don't see the problem. NPR is a public radio station. They aren't supported by advertising but by member contributions. If your bestofnpr.com has a nicer layout and causes more people to listen to their audio, all the better. If you make a dollar in the process (I doubt it), you will hopefully have the good sense of donating some money to them. Also, you should have the good sense of not using their trademark ("NPR") in your web address because that they can legally control.
Slashdot Mirror
- probabilistic expert systems and user assistance (think "paper clip")
- the file system as a database
- a VM and runtime to unify all programming languages
- all data contained in its own data vault
- etc.
Every idea, however hare brained, that some computer science researcher has come up with, gets put into Windows because it's almost the only place where you can put it.But without being tested, alone and in combination, in the market, nobody knows whether any of these ideas help or hurt. Microsoft is stumbling along like the central committee of the old USSR, trying to plan for the next ten years. They are going to be no more successful in terms of results: their systems are already far from what a free market would produce, and it will only get orders of magnitude worse. The only question is whether, like the USSR, Microsoft will be able to hold on to their power through coercion and eventually fall apart in a great crash, or whether they split up voluntarily and operate in a free market before then.
And despite being even less user friendly than Linux, Microsoft has managed to force almost every PC buyer to acquire a copy of their operating system. Which only goes to show that user friendliness and marketshare have little to do with one another.
But Linux software is getting better -- and now more closely mimics the Windows world that the vast majority of PC users are accustomed to.
It never seems to occur to people that Linux users like their systems to be different. Do we all drive one kind of car? Do we all live in one kind of house? Do we all eat only at chain food stores? Why should operating systems be like the USSR, centrally planned and only coming out in one model?
We need an open market in operating systems, and that means that the courts and regulations need to curb Microsoft's (understandable and natural) monopolistic tendencies, even if that costs the consumer a little time and money in the short run.
Maybe it will run in a vacuum; of course, keeping a constant head-to-disk spacing will get harder, but not impossible (e.g., using mechanical spacers and fine tuning via piezo actuators). The media might also simply become non-rotational.
Today, we may still snicker at this. After all, we had a thriving, competitive PC industry without Microsoft: Commodore, Amiga, Atari, Exidy, Apple, and many others. Those systems were often way ahead of whatever Microsoft was selling at the same time. All of Microsoft's major successes were invented by others, then copied by Microsoft.
Rather than creating the modern computer industry, Gates single-handedly destroyed most of it. Gates' legacy in computer history is despicable. But the victors get to write history...
Knowing a little bit of AppleScript may still be useful, but on the whole, I wouldn't bother too much with it.
All of this, incidentally, works a lot better in my opinion than Microsoft's scripting framework.
That's simply OSA (Open Script Architecture). You can do the same thing from any other scripting language that knows about OSA, like, for example, Python and Perl.
I find that the same thing is true of AppleScript.
I also think that AppleScript is perhaps OK for very small scripts, but for any serious scripting, people are better off with Python (or Basic, for that matter). It's similar to COBOL or Ada: adding more English words to a programming language doesn't make programs easier to read or write, it just makes them longer.
Again, fortunately, OSA lets you use your preferred scripting language.
Sure, at only $20-$60/month, and without those pesky regulations that go along with broadcast TV.
Ah, but when they get captured and repaired by super-powerful machine intelligences they come back to earth bigger, better, and badder than before. OSCAR 7 DEMANDS TO SEE THE CREATOR.
It matters because this may provide another good incentive to stop wasting money on the ISS and start investing it in unmanned, robotic Mars probes again.
One of the great attempts at antarctic exploration was perhaps even more astounding. I think the explorers were lost for more than a year, and it took a handful of people sailing thousands (?) of miles in an open boat, then crossing a glacier on foot.
Like... When did this flood occur? How long was the water present? Was it triggered by a meteor impact, melting subsurface ice?
The techie effect can also mean that a band makes it that otherwise wouldn't have become popular. Or many other possibilities. It's such a complicated web of cause and effect that one really can't draw any conclusions.
But there are some heat sinks that do use the case fan. They are large fan-like things, and if you like, you can get air ducts with them.
There does seem to be uncertainty about DVD-RW/DVD+RW/DVD-RAM, but that is a different matter.
And where is the problem with that?
We have also encountered Web sites of issue advocacy groups that have positioned the audio link to an NPR story such that one cannot tell that NPR is not supporting their cause.
Does NPR support any causes? If not, this shouldn't be a problem, since neither the content itself nor its use could then be misinterpreted as "supporting someone's cause". If NPR does support some causes, maybe they shouldn't, given their funding and mandate.
Well, that statement clearly deserves a +5 Funny.
Now, should such content be published and widely accessible? If the article is bogus and does not describe a real threat, it doesn't matter. Now, let's say that the article described techniques that actually work. It was published, what, five years ago? If it still poses a threat, we have to conclude that this kind of transport just cannot be made safe, in which case it shouldn't be carried out. If a bunch of adolescents can describe this in a low-quality rag, real terrorists can certainly figure it out as well. Whichever way you look at it, the article should not pose a threat to actual nuclear transport or rail travel.
This just goes to show again that security through obscurity is as stupid when it comes to physical security as when it comes to computer security. Sadly, much of our government spooks are living by that principle, and we all pay the price, both in loss of civil liberties and loss of life.
Oh? What makes you say that? Among all the machines I see people use, both in our organizations and others, I'd say at least 25% run Linux on the desktop. Linux is also very widely used in academia. Extrapolating just from that, it seems pretty clear that there must be millions of Linux desktop users out there. I challenge you to come up with concrete data to disprove that claim.
Not only are there PCMCIA adapters, they actually work more nicely than CF adapters: with a SmartMedia PCMCIA adapter, you can just eject the SmartMedia card from the adapter. With a CF adapter, you have to eject the whole PCMCIA card and then pull out the CF card, resulting in more wear on the laptop. This is, in fact, one significant advantage for SmartMedia.
CF has its place, but so does SmartMedia. If there is one format to obsolete both, its SD/MMC, which combines most of the advantages of CF with the pinless design and storage density of SmartMedia.
Winmodems and built-in modems are useless anyway. You don't want to plug a built-in modem into a random phone line because it may fry it. And Winmodems are just not reliable.
There are plenty of tiny PCMCIA and USB modems that work really well. And when they get fried (which they will sooner or later), you just get a new one.
Nevertheless, IBM's support for Linux was very important in our purchasing decisions because we knew (1) drivers were around and (2) there were usually web pages at IBM explaining how to install the stuff.
Overall, I think this action by IBM is stupid: without explicit Linux support, we're just going to buy something cheaper, or we are going to buy machines from companies that do support Linux on laptops.
I fully agree with this. The state of computer research is depressing, and funding for it is very limited.
However, Dvorak's attacks on Apple or Linux are ill-founded. Both Apple and the Linux community are pushing the envelope within the limits of what is commercially feasible or practical. Neither Apple nor Linux developers are charities. In order to survive, they have to deliver tools and environments that programmers and users trained in the current, outdated paradigms can deal with.
The real culprit is the US government. Due to a quirk in military funding and the cold war, it used to fund research lavishly and often independent of short-term commercial considerations. But in the spirit the radical free market ideology that has gripped most of the government, research is now largely only funded if people can answer the question "what is it good for in the short term", or "how many jobs will it create in my state before I face re-election".
Of course, it should also be said that some innovative ideas in programming are out there, if you know where to look. And it should also be said that the "low hanging fruit" has been plucked in the 20th century--most of the easy, gee wiz, solutions have been found.
Altogether, it looks like a nice process, but it's not immediately clear that it will help.
I also don't see the problem. NPR is a public radio station. They aren't supported by advertising but by member contributions. If your bestofnpr.com has a nicer layout and causes more people to listen to their audio, all the better. If you make a dollar in the process (I doubt it), you will hopefully have the good sense of donating some money to them. Also, you should have the good sense of not using their trademark ("NPR") in your web address because that they can legally control.