To me, it seems like a horrible answer to a (what should be) simple problem. Developers should be concerned with making a good game, not how much battery life their game will have. I'm sure this will eliminate or seriously affect entire genres. When building a portable, you would think that one of the first things you would focus on is battery life. Most companies hold off on releasing a product until it gets acceptable battery life. Now, I guess it won't be as bad as a Game Gear since you can recharge the batteries, but it shouldn't really be a concern either -- at least not for a (supposedly) $350 device. I think I'll save some cash, not worry about battery life, and pick up a DS instead.
How is the quality on those DVDs from Blockbuster? I have rented so many scratched until they were unwatchable DVDs from Blockbuster that I am afraid to even consider buying the Pre-viewed ones.
Hmmm...I think I once read that the Jedi ghost is supposedly from one's most "pure" stage in life. Considering Anakin, he would probably be most pure in his early life while Obi-won and Yoda were probably most pure just before thier deaths. I could be wrong tho...
Oops...looks like I can't copy and paste correctly:-P Here is the rest of my letter:
Now, I hope you don't confuse my message; I'm not saying that Linux is appropriate for every situation (as I mentioned I was never satisfied with it as a desktop os), if a company's employees can only use Windows technologies - then it seems appropriate to stay with Windows. I just don't think people should claim fault with Linux or other open source apps when the problems seem to be related to a lack of experience with the system and not a problem in the system itself. If you try to approach Linux as you would a Windows system, there will be some conflicts. The company I work for is currently moving away from Microsoft technologies on the server side. We used to employ Frontpage extensions on our unix server, but we are currently removing the proprietary code from our web pages and using standard techniques so that we don't become locked in to Microsoft technologies. As far as the desktop is concerned, I think Mac OS X has found a nearly perfect marriage of open source technology and a system that works without major headaches. A system such as this is something that Linux distros need to work towards in order to seem more use on the desktop.
One other thing that I think is of interest considering this topic is something that I read some time ago. It seems that some companies, when their Microsoft licenses are up, would install Linux on their servers in order to get better prices on Microsoft software. Apparently, Microsoft gives prices breaks to companies switching away from Linux. I wonder if this factored into the decisions made by the companies you spoke of? Of course, what I heard may not be true and companies may not do it at all...but the thought is out there.
Well, you have a very interesting article. It is always interesting to read about people who seem to be doing the exact opposite of what seems to be trendy these days. In the end, I think it boils down to people staying with what they know best. I find it kind of sad that they were not willing to work past their difficulties and become experts on a new system, but then again from a business point of view, I can see why they would want to do anything possible to stay away from down-time.
Here is an email I sent to the author discussing the article:
Your article in eWeek about migration from Linux to Windows was very interesting. As someone in the technology field, I pay pretty close attention to the ebb and flow of Linux enthusiast and Microsoft supporters. I think the topic of people trying Linux and switching back to Windows is something that you don't hear about very often. Personally, I use Windows XP and Mac OS X at home. I have also dabbled in Linux on my home systems, but it has never found a permanent place on one of my boxes. As someone who has tryed the various systems (and I've even developed in PHP and MySQL) I find it odd that people switched for the reasons mentioned in your article. For instance, the ski resort that experience outages due to high demand -- their problems seem to be the result of bugs in their code and not something resulting from the use of open source software. I can't see why a user going over an order limit would cause PHP script to crash. Also, if this limit was so important, the fact that it wasn't checked before the order was processed also seems to be an oversight. One customer also mentions growth after switching back to Windows that would not have otherwise been possible. I think views like these seem very narrow. Certainly, anything that you can create on a Windows platform could be created using Linux.
I don't know why so many people make it their mission to defeat Microsoft. I think it sounds really bad when you are asked about your operating system that you are developing and you start spouting off about how Microsoft is evil and they need to fall. To me, it seems childish. If you think Microsoft is evil, thats fine. If you use that as inner motivation to work a full time job, then come home and make a free linux distro, even better because I could probably never do something like that. However, judging by his article it seems like his goal is to make a free version for everyday users and have "enterprise" class software or something more customized for corporations. If I was looking for something to run on my servers, I would probably want a distro that seems like it comes from a professional source, not someone who just wants to topple a mega-corporation. I think he should ignore the success of MS (at least publicly) and concentrate on ways to do something innovative and better than than other distros and better than what comes out of Redmond. Helping this guy with his personal vendetta is not good motivation for me to use his product. Being able to get a great distro from him is.
I think that not enough people are aware that newspapers are really very biased pieces of literature. What you are really buying is the editor's slanted view on the occurances of the day before. It is often easy to find the bias by just reading the headlines. I would imagine that some news sources are more biased than others, but when there are two sides of the story to report (for instance a politicians speech - it can either help or hurt him) eventually the author or editor has to take a stance and that stance will more than likely go along with his or her bias. For an unbiased view of things, the only thing one can do is read multiple sources and form their own opinion.
Yes...that story reminds me of Metal Gear Solid where the head of Arms Tech (or whatever the arms corporation was called) forgets the radio channel for someone you need to contact to progress further in the game. I figured it must have been some kind of copy protection, since it was really out of place and seemed to rip the player from the game world.
I thought I heard this somewhere, but I might have imagined it:) Is it true that if you buy HL2 on steam you get a CD/DVD/800 floppies in the mail a few weeks later?
You betcha! Just look at Apple and OSX. I can't really claim this idea as my own (I think someone talked about it in MacWorld), but it is true. The author said how the older Mac OS didn't even have a command line. The big feature of the Mac was that you didn't need commands and could use a menu driven interface. Now one of the big selling points of OS X (for me anyway) is that it has a UNIX base and I can use all the *nix commands and apps that are pretty standard for developers.
Sure, it can make your classes look like part of the core libraries, but it is only a simple redirection of function calls. It is really just a change in syntax that doesn't really add any new functionality to the language. To me, I'd rather add a toString() method to my Java class so I can use it with print() or println(). If I wanted to do it the c++ way, I would probably make a toString() method anyway and just call that from the overloaded operator. Same idea just different ways of going about it.
To a casual observer of the weather, like me, it seems that the paths of the hurricanes are little more than extrapolations of the current path with a slight bend to the east. For the hurricanes this year, it seems that time and again the models proved wrong for last minutes changes to the storm. I know from family who lives on the west coast of Florida that many people were caught off guard by Charlie. I really think that it is probably impossible to accurrately predict the path of a storm. I mean I could take a look at the motion of the storm and guess about as accurately as the models guess. My same family that was caught off guard by Charlie headed to Orlando when Ivan was about a week away, but the storm didn't land near their house. If you think about it, 3 days notice is not enough to have every person in a metropolis patch up their houses and move to higher ground. Some might say that everyone with the possibilty of getting hit by the storm should prepare, but imagine having to board your windows every 3 weeks or so only to be missed by the storm. It would be even worse if you evactuated on the same schedule. This would make it very difficult to live a normal life. Honestly, the prediction of storms like hurricanes needs to get much better, but I doubt that it ever will.
If these numbers are correct and based on my experience, I would think XP would have a failure rate much closer to zero. Granted, I run the professional edition and obviously know what I am doing when it comes to computers, so mine isn't junked up, but even my family's computer running home has proved to be very stable.
You know, as a Star Wars fan I tend to dislike some of the changes made in the SE of the original series. So people even go as far as to say that Lucas butchered the series. I don't really see how this could be considered butchering the series. If you enjoyed the movies in their original form, you should still be able to enjoy them now. The core of the movies remains untouched, and only a few scenes had small alterations. Star Wars is still great in my mind, it still has a great story, battles that were way before its time, and an engulfing universe that continues to be expanded today. If a few changes ruined the movies for you, then you must not have enjoyed them that much in the first place.
"Working with NASA, Cerf is also trying to extend the network into outer space to better communicate with spacecraft."
Astronaut: Houston, we have a problem...one of the display screens is reading "j00 R pAwned".
I don't know why more sites don't have legal bittorrent downloads. Right now I am getting around 250 kB/s which is about what I would get downloading from FilePlanet. Good speed and the people hosting the file don't have to worry about the bandwidth.
I think it will be interesting to see how long it takes for the release to be availiable on Steam once the game does go gold. Concievably, once they make the final build it could be up in a matter of hours. Since many people already have most of the game downloaded, this could mean that they could also be playing the game within hours of the final build being made.
I know this is supposed to be funny, but I think I should comment anyway. I don't think Linux sucks, it really is a viable alternative to Windows, it is just that I was pointing out that Linux still needs a lot of work to be done. Think about it, if people on/. and other geeks are surprised that this laptop works without any problems then imagine what the normal user's ideas about linux must be? they probably think it is a piece of garbage or that it is only something for servers. In many ways, the average user is not ready for linux (or to put it more accurately linux is not ready for them) a lot of work needs to be done if not only to the code but to the image of linux on the desktop.
Well, I think that using Wine would be considered a compromise. Running no native software on a laptop seems like I would sacrafice a lot of speed which is something I really don't want to do.
Slashdot Mirror
To me, it seems like a horrible answer to a (what should be) simple problem. Developers should be concerned with making a good game, not how much battery life their game will have. I'm sure this will eliminate or seriously affect entire genres. When building a portable, you would think that one of the first things you would focus on is battery life. Most companies hold off on releasing a product until it gets acceptable battery life. Now, I guess it won't be as bad as a Game Gear since you can recharge the batteries, but it shouldn't really be a concern either -- at least not for a (supposedly) $350 device. I think I'll save some cash, not worry about battery life, and pick up a DS instead.
How is the quality on those DVDs from Blockbuster? I have rented so many scratched until they were unwatchable DVDs from Blockbuster that I am afraid to even consider buying the Pre-viewed ones.
Hmmm...I think I once read that the Jedi ghost is supposedly from one's most "pure" stage in life. Considering Anakin, he would probably be most pure in his early life while Obi-won and Yoda were probably most pure just before thier deaths. I could be wrong tho...
Oops...looks like I can't copy and paste correctly :-P Here is the rest of my letter:
Now, I hope you don't confuse my message; I'm not saying that Linux is appropriate for every situation (as I mentioned I was never satisfied with it as a desktop os), if a company's employees can only use Windows technologies - then it seems appropriate to stay with Windows. I just don't think people should claim fault with Linux or other open source apps when the problems seem to be related to a lack of experience with the system and not a problem in the system itself. If you try to approach Linux as you would a Windows system, there will be some conflicts. The company I work for is currently moving away from Microsoft technologies on the server side. We used to employ Frontpage extensions on our unix server, but we are currently removing the proprietary code from our web pages and using standard techniques so that we don't become locked in to Microsoft technologies. As far as the desktop is concerned, I think Mac OS X has found a nearly perfect marriage of open source technology and a system that works without major headaches. A system such as this is something that Linux distros need to work towards in order to seem more use on the desktop.
One other thing that I think is of interest considering this topic is something that I read some time ago. It seems that some companies, when their Microsoft licenses are up, would install Linux on their servers in order to get better prices on Microsoft software. Apparently, Microsoft gives prices breaks to companies switching away from Linux. I wonder if this factored into the decisions made by the companies you spoke of? Of course, what I heard may not be true and companies may not do it at all...but the thought is out there.
Well, you have a very interesting article. It is always interesting to read about people who seem to be doing the exact opposite of what seems to be trendy these days. In the end, I think it boils down to people staying with what they know best. I find it kind of sad that they were not willing to work past their difficulties and become experts on a new system, but then again from a business point of view, I can see why they would want to do anything possible to stay away from down-time.
Here is an email I sent to the author discussing the article:
Your article in eWeek about migration from Linux to Windows was very interesting. As someone in the technology field, I pay pretty close attention to the ebb and flow of Linux enthusiast and Microsoft supporters. I think the topic of people trying Linux and switching back to Windows is something that you don't hear about very often. Personally, I use Windows XP and Mac OS X at home. I have also dabbled in Linux on my home systems, but it has never found a permanent place on one of my boxes. As someone who has tryed the various systems (and I've even developed in PHP and MySQL) I find it odd that people switched for the reasons mentioned in your article. For instance, the ski resort that experience outages due to high demand -- their problems seem to be the result of bugs in their code and not something resulting from the use of open source software. I can't see why a user going over an order limit would cause PHP script to crash. Also, if this limit was so important, the fact that it wasn't checked before the order was processed also seems to be an oversight. One customer also mentions growth after switching back to Windows that would not have otherwise been possible. I think views like these seem very narrow. Certainly, anything that you can create on a Windows platform could be created using Linux.
I don't know why so many people make it their mission to defeat Microsoft. I think it sounds really bad when you are asked about your operating system that you are developing and you start spouting off about how Microsoft is evil and they need to fall. To me, it seems childish. If you think Microsoft is evil, thats fine. If you use that as inner motivation to work a full time job, then come home and make a free linux distro, even better because I could probably never do something like that. However, judging by his article it seems like his goal is to make a free version for everyday users and have "enterprise" class software or something more customized for corporations. If I was looking for something to run on my servers, I would probably want a distro that seems like it comes from a professional source, not someone who just wants to topple a mega-corporation. I think he should ignore the success of MS (at least publicly) and concentrate on ways to do something innovative and better than than other distros and better than what comes out of Redmond. Helping this guy with his personal vendetta is not good motivation for me to use his product. Being able to get a great distro from him is.
I think that not enough people are aware that newspapers are really very biased pieces of literature. What you are really buying is the editor's slanted view on the occurances of the day before. It is often easy to find the bias by just reading the headlines. I would imagine that some news sources are more biased than others, but when there are two sides of the story to report (for instance a politicians speech - it can either help or hurt him) eventually the author or editor has to take a stance and that stance will more than likely go along with his or her bias. For an unbiased view of things, the only thing one can do is read multiple sources and form their own opinion.
Yes...that story reminds me of Metal Gear Solid where the head of Arms Tech (or whatever the arms corporation was called) forgets the radio channel for someone you need to contact to progress further in the game. I figured it must have been some kind of copy protection, since it was really out of place and seemed to rip the player from the game world.
I thought I heard this somewhere, but I might have imagined it :) Is it true that if you buy HL2 on steam you get a CD/DVD/800 floppies in the mail a few weeks later?
"Everything old is new again, eh?"
You betcha! Just look at Apple and OSX. I can't really claim this idea as my own (I think someone talked about it in MacWorld), but it is true. The author said how the older Mac OS didn't even have a command line. The big feature of the Mac was that you didn't need commands and could use a menu driven interface. Now one of the big selling points of OS X (for me anyway) is that it has a UNIX base and I can use all the *nix commands and apps that are pretty standard for developers.
Sure, it can make your classes look like part of the core libraries, but it is only a simple redirection of function calls. It is really just a change in syntax that doesn't really add any new functionality to the language. To me, I'd rather add a toString() method to my Java class so I can use it with print() or println(). If I wanted to do it the c++ way, I would probably make a toString() method anyway and just call that from the overloaded operator. Same idea just different ways of going about it.
To a casual observer of the weather, like me, it seems that the paths of the hurricanes are little more than extrapolations of the current path with a slight bend to the east. For the hurricanes this year, it seems that time and again the models proved wrong for last minutes changes to the storm. I know from family who lives on the west coast of Florida that many people were caught off guard by Charlie. I really think that it is probably impossible to accurrately predict the path of a storm. I mean I could take a look at the motion of the storm and guess about as accurately as the models guess. My same family that was caught off guard by Charlie headed to Orlando when Ivan was about a week away, but the storm didn't land near their house. If you think about it, 3 days notice is not enough to have every person in a metropolis patch up their houses and move to higher ground. Some might say that everyone with the possibilty of getting hit by the storm should prepare, but imagine having to board your windows every 3 weeks or so only to be missed by the storm. It would be even worse if you evactuated on the same schedule. This would make it very difficult to live a normal life. Honestly, the prediction of storms like hurricanes needs to get much better, but I doubt that it ever will.
If these numbers are correct and based on my experience, I would think XP would have a failure rate much closer to zero. Granted, I run the professional edition and obviously know what I am doing when it comes to computers, so mine isn't junked up, but even my family's computer running home has proved to be very stable.
You know, as a Star Wars fan I tend to dislike some of the changes made in the SE of the original series. So people even go as far as to say that Lucas butchered the series. I don't really see how this could be considered butchering the series. If you enjoyed the movies in their original form, you should still be able to enjoy them now. The core of the movies remains untouched, and only a few scenes had small alterations. Star Wars is still great in my mind, it still has a great story, battles that were way before its time, and an engulfing universe that continues to be expanded today. If a few changes ruined the movies for you, then you must not have enjoyed them that much in the first place.
Big Swedish female nurse: Luke I am your father!
Luke: But you are a woman?!?
Nurse: So it would seem...
Luke jumps out 6th story hospital window
Nixon: NIXON'S BACK!!!!
Yes, unparalleled 2D and 3D graphics meaning that no other company parallels how slow the 3D performance will be! bada bing!
"Working with NASA, Cerf is also trying to extend the network into outer space to better communicate with spacecraft."
Astronaut: Houston, we have a problem...one of the display screens is reading "j00 R pAwned".
What really sucks is when a few of my friends that I play Halo with never make it past that first step. Some how they always end up on my team too...
I don't know why more sites don't have legal bittorrent downloads. Right now I am getting around 250 kB/s which is about what I would get downloading from FilePlanet. Good speed and the people hosting the file don't have to worry about the bandwidth.
I think it will be interesting to see how long it takes for the release to be availiable on Steam once the game does go gold. Concievably, once they make the final build it could be up in a matter of hours. Since many people already have most of the game downloaded, this could mean that they could also be playing the game within hours of the final build being made.
I know this is supposed to be funny, but I think I should comment anyway. I don't think Linux sucks, it really is a viable alternative to Windows, it is just that I was pointing out that Linux still needs a lot of work to be done. Think about it, if people on /. and other geeks are surprised that this laptop works without any problems then imagine what the normal user's ideas about linux must be? they probably think it is a piece of garbage or that it is only something for servers. In many ways, the average user is not ready for linux (or to put it more accurately linux is not ready for them) a lot of work needs to be done if not only to the code but to the image of linux on the desktop.
Yea, I'm guessing my school has a site liscense, so that should extend to students as well. We can also get upgrades to XP for free too.
Honestly, no. I don't use it for anything other than a hobby so I can't really afford to buy it. Also, I get Office for free from my University.
Well, I think that using Wine would be considered a compromise. Running no native software on a laptop seems like I would sacrafice a lot of speed which is something I really don't want to do.