More to the point, other people believe in a whole bunch of stuff too - strongly enough that they don't feel the need to reconvince themselves daily by putting it in their.sigs. Why do you?
Hmmm, just a guess, but it could be because people get sick and tired of being told what they believe in is wrong, that science has killed God, that the Bible is full of contradictions, etc.
It seems people always want to not be in the majority. I see people everywhere constantly badmouthing Christianity, yet when other religions are raised, they become instantly accepting and tolerent. It seems that only minority views* need to be tolerated; majority* views can be freely abused.
* Minority and majority are probably not the right words here. More likely its people embracing "new" ideas and abusing "old" ones, simply because if its new, its fashionable.
Einstein is an acclaimed scientist
Einstein believed in God
Therefore, it is possible to be scientific and believe in God
That's perfectly straightforward and logical. It's not saying that Einstein is always right, so God must exist, it's simply saying that science and religion are not mutually exclusive.
When I read in your post that you wouldn't accept anyone who did not get "20 lines of code absolutely correct" on a test, I assumed you meant that if those 20 lines would not compile, you would simply ignore the applicant. Having satisfied myself that the applicant could actually code, I'd then want to see if they could actually analyse a large problem, instead of just implementing someone else's solution.
I'd say that as long as those 20 lines showed a thorough grasp of syntax, structure and an understanding of whatever paradigm they're using (procedural, OO, functional), then that's good enough. I'd act on the assumption that missing semi-colons, closing brackets or slightly mis-spelt variable names would be corrected in about 30 seconds after they tried to compile it.
When you talk about formulating a "correct" answer, well, there's a number of ways to interpret "correctness", and it depends on what you're testing. If you're testing general programming skills, I'd say as long as their solution is algorithmically correct, then that's satisfactory. If I were testing for knowledge of a particular language, I'd ask that their syntax be mostly correct for that language, but I could forgive the odd missing jot or tittle.
If you pass over a competant software architect because he dropped a semi-colon, and instead employ a code monkey, who can write basic code with no mistakes but never has an original thought, you deserve what you get.
That's not saying that the best employee would not be one who could both design software and was finnicky about details, but if you throw away a good architect for the sake of a minor detail in an unrealistic assesment, then you're probably the sort of guy I wouldn't want to work for.
The system the grandparent suggests is not really "loser-pays". He is not suggesting that in all civil suits, the loser pays the winner's legal fees. He's saying that the first priority of the court should be to see if the case has merit. If it does, then each party pays their own fees. If the case is found to be without merit (equivelent to the judge hearing it, then chucking it straight out, I would assume) then the person with the stupid case has to pay.
I think this is a great idea; firstly, it would keep the legal costs paid out down - the "loser" would only have to pay for the costs of the beginning of the trial, before the issue of merit is decided, rather than for the whole huge case. Secondly, it would only punish frivilous cases, not cases where it was close, but one party won by dint of lawyer, or something like that.
Re:This is just rehashed old news ,not a new event
on
SCO Aims For The Feds
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· Score: 1
The editor read the first paragraph and just assumed the rest.
Which isn't necessarily wrong. I'm studying journalism, and one of the first things we learnt is that most people only read the first paragraph of a story. Therefore, when you're writing a news article, you use what's called the "inverted pyramid structure", which basically just means you dump all your facts at the start of the story, so that all the lazy readers get the general gist.
If the editor can't get the gist of the story from the first paragraph, the story is probably poorly written. This is assuming, of course, that the editor didn't simple mis-read the paragraph.
It depends how pinickity you're going to be - expecting someone to write even a 20-line code snippet and getting it to compile straight off is a bit tought. Would I fail the exam for missing the semi-colon at the end of a line, or miss-spelling one instance of a variable name?
Any test that involves writing code without the help of a compiler (or interpreter, depending on the language) is just stupid - you're never going to be in that sort of situation, so why test it?
The perspective the Bible takes on hell isn't punishment. Hell is not so much a punishment as it is a natural consequence - you've had a lifetime to choose wether you want God or not, righty-o, fair enough, welcome to a life where the goodness of God is totally absent. The Bible's perspective is "You're all heading right for Hell, here's a life buoy, grab it quick, and hold on tight."
Also take note of the passage where Paul says that "it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not of yourself, it is a gift from God." (Ephesians 2:5, I think). Christians shouldn't be arrogant about the fact that they've been saved, because they know they don't deserve it.
I'm not sure what the relevenace of half of those verses are to your argument; I didn't look all of them up, but the Acts 5 passage at least is talking about some of the leaders of the Jews, not Christians.
If you're thinking of the same passage I am when you talk of unprofitable servants being punished, the parable of the talents(Matthew 25), then that is talking exclusively about Christians. The same as the passage that talks about the branches of the vine that bear no fruit being cut off.
What the first passage is saying, is that everyone has been given gifts from God, and that Christians are supposed to use those gifts in God's service. There's nothing there about punishing non-Christians. The second one is talking about how, as a Christian, you should bear Christian fruit. If you call yourself a Christian, but your actions speak to the contrary, then something's wrong, and you'd better take a good look at your relationship with God.
To be honest, I've never read the Bible cover-to-cover, straight through either, but I've read every book at one time or another. Although I admit, I think I skimmed through quite a few genealogies and lists of stuff taken from exile.
3. Have ISPs monitor port 25. If traffic is seen, test it for an open relay. This could be part of the contract the customer would sign. If it's an open relay, block it and tell the customer to clean up the machine if they want it open.
All that monitoring and callback seems a pain in the butt. How about this. Block port 25 by default. Include a simple mechanism for customers to unblock their port - my ISP has a web interface for changing plans, updating billing details, etc. It would be easy to incorporate something like that there.
The best option would be to block *all* ports, and provide a web interface like that found on many SOHO routers, essentially turning the ISP into a customizable firewall - but I've got no idea how much that would cost to implement correctly without slowing the system down.
Most bugs recently are either spread by user stupidity (running evil attachments) or by flaws in the software listening on incoming ports. These are more nefarious of the two, as people really haven't done anything wrong to get them. Firewalling connections at the ISP level (while maintaining the opportunity for competent users to unblock them - incompetent users probably wouldn't bother figuring out how) would totally eliminate this second type of virus.
I hope you send a message to your MP about this, I did.
I don't think it went to my MP, but I submitted my opinion to the general feedback address provided on the government site dealing with the FTA.
Do you have a PS2?
Nah, I don't; I don't play enough games to justify a console. But if I did, it would be a PS2, if just for the opportunity to play the newer Final Fantasy titles. Why, oh why did they stop the PC ports?:(
I'm not certain as to the quality of Maburaho subs - I actually didn't watch the series, but it came up in a discussion of fansub ethics I was having with some other folk. I'm not sure how widespread the practice is, but some R2 DVDs at least, do include english subs.
Personally, I have no problem myself downloading fansubs until the shows are not only licensed, but commercially available. Of course, I'll always buy a show I like, regardless of wether I've got the whole series fansubbed, and I've got the DVDs to prove it.
I'm actually in Australia too - and yes, bypassing region coding is legal now, but I'm not sure for how much longer. The reason region coding is legal now is simply precedence, the decision of a judge. However, with the free trade agreement that was recently made, Australia agreed to implement a DMCA-style law, although from what I understand, they are still negotiating as to exactly what parts of it to implement.
I don't buy R2 DVDs, basically because I couldn't be bothered chipping my DVD player, or finding a patch for my DVD software on my computer, but I do buy discs of my favorite anime when Madman releases it. Apparantly they've got a whole bunch of Ghibli stuff coming out in the next twelve months - I'm hanging out for "Whisper of the Heart"!
Unfortunately, I think I'm going to have to stick with my fansubs of Hikaru no Go and Saishuu Heiki Kanojo for a little while longer.
If it's region-free, it's probably a bootleg. But there are a number of legitimate R2 titles that have English subtitles - Maburaho is one recent title like this. As anime gets more and more populat in the western world, Japanese companies are going to begin catering more and more to it.
A number of Japanese discs include English subtitles. However, for one thing, Japanese discs are usually more expensive than US releases, plus you've got import costs, and for a second thing, from what I understand of US law, playing a R2 encoded disc in the US involves violating US laws - you're not allowed to manufacture or import multi-region players, and you're not allowed not modify players to support multiple regions.
If you're going to break a law no matter what you do, why not just grab the fansubs for free? It's one of those cases where having one ridiculous law brings the whole of the law into disrepute. If you have a law that nobody can keep, then nobody is going to be bothered keeping the law.
playing a copy of a Nintendo game on the Zodiac system is not "archiving".
I'm not American, so I'm not too up on this, but has the concept of space-shifting been ruled upon in a court? Because all this is basically doing is space-shifting from your console to your PC.
However, their lawyer quoted above isn't saying that it's illegal to play the software images of the carts, he's saying it's illegal to even make then. And simply making them easily falls under the archival exception.
Well, I haven't read the article text, but that picture of Bill is DAMN SCARY. Anyone else think that hand is outstretched to tear out the throat of someone just outside the photo?
Yeah, but unlike MP3, OGG is not patented, and thus it's not possible for a single company to control the format.
If some stupid media player company decides to make their player play only DRMed OGG files, nothing stops someone else from writing a player that doesn't from open specs. In the MP3 world, they could be sued into oblivion for doing so.
I don't know about that. I agree that the Watch series are probably the most serious, but they're not epic in the way The Lord of the Rings is. You don't have huge armies, and massive battles, or stuff like that, which is where a lot of money would go, I'd imagine.
You'd probably want to do Detritus with CGI, I'd imagine, which might be a bit costly.
Animated might be good, but I think it would totally fail as a kids series, mostly because the Watch series is the most serious. Not that kids can't appreciate a serious movie, but the themes it deals with are adult themes.
The Bromeliad was written for children, so it might be a better shot for that sort of thing. Or even some of the Witches books, maybe.
Really? I felt Dragonlance was a bit too choppy - there's some parts that are fairly integral to the plot that are covered in a page or so of poetry. Like finding the hammer for the dwarves, or getting the Silver Arm, or finding the orb and the shattered dragonlance in the north...all those things.
I really liked the Dragonlance Legends - the trilogy featuring Caramon and Raistlin. Not because of the plot, which was fairly ordinary, but because of the characters.
The Death Gate series was great, but I felt a little let down by the nature of good and evil revealed in the last book. It just seemed like a bit of an easy cop-out, compared to the rest of the ending.
I also really liked the Rose of the Prophet series, which is out of print in Australia now, sadly. It was very different to their other books, and enjoyable.
What you say is true, but it doesn't contradict my point.
Yes, you can license GPLed software under other licenses - I know MySQL does. But you can't grab the GPL licence, add a further restriction to that licence, and then claim your software is GPLed. It's not.
Eddings' second series, The Elenium, wasn't too bad. I agree the Belgariad is a bit too kiddy.
As for other movies, The Wheel of Time would be good for a series - they could probably combine the last 5 books or so into a single 2 hour movie and not lose much though.
Feist's Magician would be good, I think. Maybe a bit too long for a single movie. I'd love a movie adaption of Weis and Hickman's The Darksword Trilogy as well - I think they hit their peak with that series; they managed to get their plot sorted out a bit better than Dragonlance, while maintaining their skill with characters.
Of course, my dearest, deepest love would be for a cinematic rendering of some of the Watch books, by Terry Pratchett. I'd nominate Guards! Guards!, Feet Of Clay and Night Watch to make a super trilogy. Unfortunately, I don't think Hollywood's ready for a comic fantasy satire yet.
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More to the point, other people believe in a whole bunch of stuff too - strongly enough that they don't feel the need to reconvince themselves daily by putting it in their .sigs. Why do you?
Hmmm, just a guess, but it could be because people get sick and tired of being told what they believe in is wrong, that science has killed God, that the Bible is full of contradictions, etc.
It seems people always want to not be in the majority. I see people everywhere constantly badmouthing Christianity, yet when other religions are raised, they become instantly accepting and tolerent. It seems that only minority views* need to be tolerated; majority* views can be freely abused.
* Minority and majority are probably not the right words here. More likely its people embracing "new" ideas and abusing "old" ones, simply because if its new, its fashionable.
No, that's not what he's saying.
Einstein is an acclaimed scientist
Einstein believed in God
Therefore, it is possible to be scientific and believe in God
That's perfectly straightforward and logical. It's not saying that Einstein is always right, so God must exist, it's simply saying that science and religion are not mutually exclusive.
I think we're really arguing the same side.
When I read in your post that you wouldn't accept anyone who did not get "20 lines of code absolutely correct" on a test, I assumed you meant that if those 20 lines would not compile, you would simply ignore the applicant. Having satisfied myself that the applicant could actually code, I'd then want to see if they could actually analyse a large problem, instead of just implementing someone else's solution.
I'd say that as long as those 20 lines showed a thorough grasp of syntax, structure and an understanding of whatever paradigm they're using (procedural, OO, functional), then that's good enough. I'd act on the assumption that missing semi-colons, closing brackets or slightly mis-spelt variable names would be corrected in about 30 seconds after they tried to compile it.
When you talk about formulating a "correct" answer, well, there's a number of ways to interpret "correctness", and it depends on what you're testing. If you're testing general programming skills, I'd say as long as their solution is algorithmically correct, then that's satisfactory. If I were testing for knowledge of a particular language, I'd ask that their syntax be mostly correct for that language, but I could forgive the odd missing jot or tittle.
It's your own loss.
If you pass over a competant software architect because he dropped a semi-colon, and instead employ a code monkey, who can write basic code with no mistakes but never has an original thought, you deserve what you get.
That's not saying that the best employee would not be one who could both design software and was finnicky about details, but if you throw away a good architect for the sake of a minor detail in an unrealistic assesment, then you're probably the sort of guy I wouldn't want to work for.
The system the grandparent suggests is not really "loser-pays". He is not suggesting that in all civil suits, the loser pays the winner's legal fees. He's saying that the first priority of the court should be to see if the case has merit. If it does, then each party pays their own fees. If the case is found to be without merit (equivelent to the judge hearing it, then chucking it straight out, I would assume) then the person with the stupid case has to pay.
I think this is a great idea; firstly, it would keep the legal costs paid out down - the "loser" would only have to pay for the costs of the beginning of the trial, before the issue of merit is decided, rather than for the whole huge case. Secondly, it would only punish frivilous cases, not cases where it was close, but one party won by dint of lawyer, or something like that.
The editor read the first paragraph and just assumed the rest.
Which isn't necessarily wrong. I'm studying journalism, and one of the first things we learnt is that most people only read the first paragraph of a story. Therefore, when you're writing a news article, you use what's called the "inverted pyramid structure", which basically just means you dump all your facts at the start of the story, so that all the lazy readers get the general gist.
If the editor can't get the gist of the story from the first paragraph, the story is probably poorly written. This is assuming, of course, that the editor didn't simple mis-read the paragraph.
It depends how pinickity you're going to be - expecting someone to write even a 20-line code snippet and getting it to compile straight off is a bit tought. Would I fail the exam for missing the semi-colon at the end of a line, or miss-spelling one instance of a variable name?
Any test that involves writing code without the help of a compiler (or interpreter, depending on the language) is just stupid - you're never going to be in that sort of situation, so why test it?
Well, I'm sure they only modded it as flamebait because there's no "-1, Wrong End Of The Cluestick" mod.
I agree with both the grandparent and you.
The perspective the Bible takes on hell isn't punishment. Hell is not so much a punishment as it is a natural consequence - you've had a lifetime to choose wether you want God or not, righty-o, fair enough, welcome to a life where the goodness of God is totally absent. The Bible's perspective is "You're all heading right for Hell, here's a life buoy, grab it quick, and hold on tight."
Also take note of the passage where Paul says that "it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not of yourself, it is a gift from God." (Ephesians 2:5, I think). Christians shouldn't be arrogant about the fact that they've been saved, because they know they don't deserve it.
I'm not sure what the relevenace of half of those verses are to your argument; I didn't look all of them up, but the Acts 5 passage at least is talking about some of the leaders of the Jews, not Christians.
If you're thinking of the same passage I am when you talk of unprofitable servants being punished, the parable of the talents(Matthew 25), then that is talking exclusively about Christians. The same as the passage that talks about the branches of the vine that bear no fruit being cut off.
What the first passage is saying, is that everyone has been given gifts from God, and that Christians are supposed to use those gifts in God's service. There's nothing there about punishing non-Christians. The second one is talking about how, as a Christian, you should bear Christian fruit. If you call yourself a Christian, but your actions speak to the contrary, then something's wrong, and you'd better take a good look at your relationship with God.
To be honest, I've never read the Bible cover-to-cover, straight through either, but I've read every book at one time or another. Although I admit, I think I skimmed through quite a few genealogies and lists of stuff taken from exile.
Hah! Let's see, I own three munitions dumps, so that's...$200! Pay up!
*** Community Chest ****
Your hotels have just been the victims of a drive-by shooting. Pay $400 to dispose of the bodies hygenically.
Needless to say, I'd be the battleship. That boot's had it coming for a long time.
3. Have ISPs monitor port 25. If traffic is seen, test it for an open relay. This could be part of the contract the customer would sign. If it's an open relay, block it and tell the customer to clean up the machine if they want it open.
All that monitoring and callback seems a pain in the butt. How about this. Block port 25 by default. Include a simple mechanism for customers to unblock their port - my ISP has a web interface for changing plans, updating billing details, etc. It would be easy to incorporate something like that there.
The best option would be to block *all* ports, and provide a web interface like that found on many SOHO routers, essentially turning the ISP into a customizable firewall - but I've got no idea how much that would cost to implement correctly without slowing the system down.
Most bugs recently are either spread by user stupidity (running evil attachments) or by flaws in the software listening on incoming ports. These are more nefarious of the two, as people really haven't done anything wrong to get them. Firewalling connections at the ISP level (while maintaining the opportunity for competent users to unblock them - incompetent users probably wouldn't bother figuring out how) would totally eliminate this second type of virus.
I hope you send a message to your MP about this, I did.
:(
I don't think it went to my MP, but I submitted my opinion to the general feedback address provided on the government site dealing with the FTA.
Do you have a PS2?
Nah, I don't; I don't play enough games to justify a console. But if I did, it would be a PS2, if just for the opportunity to play the newer Final Fantasy titles. Why, oh why did they stop the PC ports?
I'm not certain as to the quality of Maburaho subs - I actually didn't watch the series, but it came up in a discussion of fansub ethics I was having with some other folk. I'm not sure how widespread the practice is, but some R2 DVDs at least, do include english subs.
Personally, I have no problem myself downloading fansubs until the shows are not only licensed, but commercially available. Of course, I'll always buy a show I like, regardless of wether I've got the whole series fansubbed, and I've got the DVDs to prove it.
I'm actually in Australia too - and yes, bypassing region coding is legal now, but I'm not sure for how much longer. The reason region coding is legal now is simply precedence, the decision of a judge. However, with the free trade agreement that was recently made, Australia agreed to implement a DMCA-style law, although from what I understand, they are still negotiating as to exactly what parts of it to implement.
I don't buy R2 DVDs, basically because I couldn't be bothered chipping my DVD player, or finding a patch for my DVD software on my computer, but I do buy discs of my favorite anime when Madman releases it. Apparantly they've got a whole bunch of Ghibli stuff coming out in the next twelve months - I'm hanging out for "Whisper of the Heart"!
Unfortunately, I think I'm going to have to stick with my fansubs of Hikaru no Go and Saishuu Heiki Kanojo for a little while longer.
If it's region-free, it's probably a bootleg. But there are a number of legitimate R2 titles that have English subtitles - Maburaho is one recent title like this. As anime gets more and more populat in the western world, Japanese companies are going to begin catering more and more to it.
A number of Japanese discs include English subtitles. However, for one thing, Japanese discs are usually more expensive than US releases, plus you've got import costs, and for a second thing, from what I understand of US law, playing a R2 encoded disc in the US involves violating US laws - you're not allowed to manufacture or import multi-region players, and you're not allowed not modify players to support multiple regions.
If you're going to break a law no matter what you do, why not just grab the fansubs for free? It's one of those cases where having one ridiculous law brings the whole of the law into disrepute. If you have a law that nobody can keep, then nobody is going to be bothered keeping the law.
playing a copy of a Nintendo game on the Zodiac system is not "archiving".
I'm not American, so I'm not too up on this, but has the concept of space-shifting been ruled upon in a court? Because all this is basically doing is space-shifting from your console to your PC.
However, their lawyer quoted above isn't saying that it's illegal to play the software images of the carts, he's saying it's illegal to even make then. And simply making them easily falls under the archival exception.
Well, I haven't read the article text, but that picture of Bill is DAMN SCARY. Anyone else think that hand is outstretched to tear out the throat of someone just outside the photo?
I don't see doctors making websites about what idiots we are when we call them for medical advice.
Of course not, that's what case notes are for.
required to supply complete copies of everything they've ever done relating to Unix.
Who wants to bet SCO gives it to the judge in hard copy?
Yeah, but unlike MP3, OGG is not patented, and thus it's not possible for a single company to control the format.
If some stupid media player company decides to make their player play only DRMed OGG files, nothing stops someone else from writing a player that doesn't from open specs. In the MP3 world, they could be sued into oblivion for doing so.
I don't know about that. I agree that the Watch series are probably the most serious, but they're not epic in the way The Lord of the Rings is. You don't have huge armies, and massive battles, or stuff like that, which is where a lot of money would go, I'd imagine.
You'd probably want to do Detritus with CGI, I'd imagine, which might be a bit costly.
Animated might be good, but I think it would totally fail as a kids series, mostly because the Watch series is the most serious. Not that kids can't appreciate a serious movie, but the themes it deals with are adult themes.
The Bromeliad was written for children, so it might be a better shot for that sort of thing. Or even some of the Witches books, maybe.
Really? I felt Dragonlance was a bit too choppy - there's some parts that are fairly integral to the plot that are covered in a page or so of poetry. Like finding the hammer for the dwarves, or getting the Silver Arm, or finding the orb and the shattered dragonlance in the north...all those things.
I really liked the Dragonlance Legends - the trilogy featuring Caramon and Raistlin. Not because of the plot, which was fairly ordinary, but because of the characters.
The Death Gate series was great, but I felt a little let down by the nature of good and evil revealed in the last book. It just seemed like a bit of an easy cop-out, compared to the rest of the ending.
I also really liked the Rose of the Prophet series, which is out of print in Australia now, sadly. It was very different to their other books, and enjoyable.
What you say is true, but it doesn't contradict my point.
Yes, you can license GPLed software under other licenses - I know MySQL does. But you can't grab the GPL licence, add a further restriction to that licence, and then claim your software is GPLed. It's not.
Eddings' second series, The Elenium, wasn't too bad. I agree the Belgariad is a bit too kiddy.
As for other movies, The Wheel of Time would be good for a series - they could probably combine the last 5 books or so into a single 2 hour movie and not lose much though.
Feist's Magician would be good, I think. Maybe a bit too long for a single movie. I'd love a movie adaption of Weis and Hickman's The Darksword Trilogy as well - I think they hit their peak with that series; they managed to get their plot sorted out a bit better than Dragonlance, while maintaining their skill with characters.
Of course, my dearest, deepest love would be for a cinematic rendering of some of the Watch books, by Terry Pratchett. I'd nominate Guards! Guards!, Feet Of Clay and Night Watch to make a super trilogy. Unfortunately, I don't think Hollywood's ready for a comic fantasy satire yet.