Hey, if you have time to lock the bastard down and turn on an alarm, wouldn't you also have time to press the suspend button, close it up, and carry it with you? You could save enough money to maybe go to a nicer coffee shop where people don't jack your laptop all the time too.:-)
With 2 of the 3 major consoles being IBM and ATI based (more or less), some interesting things may happen. Sadly, all I anticipate happening is higher profits for game makers and the hardware providers (the bastards that so kindly license their technology for our addiction and ultimate rejection). This is because regardless of how different the hardware from Nintendo and Microsoft may be, they will still be infinitely more similar now than they were in previous generations. Especially with Microsoft moving towards Nintendo's make-it-cheap-because-no-one-needs-a-6-gig-hd-in-a -console-anyway attitude. I know that even if the consoles used the exact same processors there still would be some effort expended in porting, especially since Microsoft will probably do a dual processor system with one being the dedicated DRM manager (joke, but still...) More power to them for making it better for game developers, who are sadly overworked and probably underpaid for the awesome stuff we are seing today (at least some of it).
I just don't see why we here even care what the hardware is in these boxes. In general, the user experience between all 3 of the current consoles is nearly identical. The Xbox is more geared toward online gaming than the others, but that's about it. I first played this one game on PS2 a couple months ago, and even though I am new to owning a console, I knew that I most likely would be able to get the exact same game for my GameCube and it would look and feel the same. Sure enough, I picked it up for the same price and it was essentially the same game. Considering the GameCube media has maybe a third of the storage capacity of the full DVD media found in the other 2 consoles, this is kind of surprising, but shows that games still aren't that huge on the most part.
What I am really trying to get at here is we can admire and debate the specs of these consoles, but these specs have little to do with the fact that there hasn't really been any innovation since the first game console, unless you consider 3D and vibrating controllers amazing innovations (no, I'm not discrediting these ideas, but little has been done to make games more enjoyable to play, they're only more enjoyable to look at).
I appreciate the positive discussion I read here, but I have to disagree with the tone you're using when saying a concept hit rate of 2 in 15 is bad. Sure, it is bad, but not in comparison to anybody else. Microsoft has only had maybe a couple of hits ever. Really, the only thing they ever achieved widespread use with that they could even claim was halfway their own is Office. Apple, on the other hand, actually is willing to take risks and has made a lot of money doing so. Everyone seems to consider them unsuccessful simply because they have a low market share. In a multibillion dollar market, I would consider myself successful if I maintained even a fraction of a percent of the market share. Considering the things Apple has put itself through, it is remarkably successful now and will continue to be because it innovates.
Well a GPS is nice, but a GPS is not a homing device in and of itself. GPS devices recieve, they do not transmit. The only reason that services like OnStar work is by integrating a [analog] cell phone into the system somehow. If this was external, it would be simply to sever it from the laptop. If this device was internalized, laptops would have to increase noticeably in size and weight. Though this would be cool, it would involve monthly/yearly fees as well as weight and power tradeoffs. Most laptop users wouldn't want those tradeoffs. I know I wouldn't. If can simply not be lazy and put the damned thing in standby and bring it with you when it needs to be out of eyesight, it will never have the chance of being stolen. Cool, huh?
Projections and claims of low false alarms are most assuredly false themselves. Pretty much everything any product developer/manufacturer says is an exaggeration. We all know this.
Re:I go to Simon Fraser University
on
Stolen Laptop Alarms
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
How true though. Honestly, do we need another car alarm type of device? I live in a very high density urban setting, and we are plagued with car alarms constantly. As my uncle once put it, they are the most ignored (yet annoying) sound in America. The police only care about them because of the noise. I am willing to wager my life on at least 99% of the actual, real-world car alarm soundings are false alarms of one sort or another. And I'm not just talking about worthless (except for car finding for the inept) panic buttons. We're trying to deal with air pollution, we're looking at light pollution, now let's save our ears with less noise pollution. Please!
Ok, so I read the article a little more closely, and yes, their idea is good, but it's also pretty costly for what it does. Basically, a little common sense is all you need. No security system is failproof. Everyone knows that even though it's unlikely, your home could get broken into this very night. Still, you'll leave your laptop unsecured on a desk or in a bag or wherever seems fit. However, if you're in a library or a coffee shop or wherever you wouldn't normally leave your laptop unoccupied, would you really want to get up and go to the bathroom assuming it is protected by a $95 hack? I wouldn't, and I consider myself trusting. But I sure as hell am not going to trust my PowerBook to any security device other than my watchful eye. Oh, and could there ever be insurance if it failed to operate? If the product came with a big disclaimer, that should raise red flags right away.
But is there actually a need for a truly relational database? Granted, there are a lot of people out there creating databases and apps on top of them who don't really know what they're doing, but that is beside the point. Just because an inexperienced programmer could more quickly create a useful, reliable app in AppleScript than in C++ does not suggest that C++ is wrong. OK, so this is a poor comparison, but the point is that either way you need to grasp database design fundamentals to make a good, solid database.
Not to get really pissy here, especially since my reply is somewhat tardy, but your statement "In any rate, because SQL allows you to create a table *without* a primary key (which then means that result sets can have duplicate rows) then it is not relational. End of story." is complete garbage. Relational does not refer to restrictions that the software imposes on the developer. Any database product that allows a developer to relate a record in one table to a record in another table is relational. "End of story." I can whip up a shitty Python app that satisfies this definition in a few minutes, and just because it isn't a ROFLSTFUIANALIMHODBMS doesn't mean it's not relational. Relational is an idea. Please try to understand that. I don't know where you get your ideas from, but you seem to have a sadly anal (and incorrectly so) way of looking at this. The first real thing I learned about databases was the difference between single-table, flat-file databases and multi-table, relational databases. Can you honestly tell me that what I do for a living is not develop relational databases just because you have such a narrow definition? I do not mean to offend, but I cannot let your statement stand uncorrected. I also apologize for using an "end of story" line in any way, as there often isn't anything definitive about computers or software.
I'll bet pretty much anything it's either complete vapor or we'll never see anything like it. The fact that not even Toshiba has released such a device doesn't look promising for this company. I know that major PC manufacturers aren't always right about everything, but they do essentially determine what we are allowed to want and what the market is allowed to carry. Sony's Picturebook (I think) series is the closest to this I have ever seen, and with those machines' low usability and fairly lame specs for a price well over US$2000, why bother? Frankly, this is the direction we should be going with computing. John Dvorak predicted something like it years back, where we have a palm-sized device that is the core computer and offers some functionality on a portable level, but then we dock it into it's docking station and we have a fully functional, powerful desktop machine. The problem is this is years from becoming reality, but it is what will happen. Right now, the best you can do is a combination of devices. Grab a Sidekick from T-Mobile (or something like it), a laptop from Apple, and a Shuttle box, and you will have achieved bliss. (Wait, shit, no.... but you get the idea)
Bluetooth is pretty lame. It does get its job done about as efficiently as can be expected, but considering its relative cost and effort spent implementing it, it's a complete waste. If it was at least, say 100x faster, it would be worth something. Modem speeds with less range than 802.11? Who would want this? Why wasn't this idea rejected outright? It's great for input devices, device sync, and using modems/GPRS from cell phones with various devices. But you know what, we already had infrared for that, and in my experience it's faster. I don't mean to bitch and moan about this, but please. This stuff is lame. Let's see some FireWireless. That would be interesting.
Those are adjectives, as they specify what kinda of variable you are dealing with. "This" would be the most common pronoun in object-oriented languages, at least the ones I have used recently. Operators are definitely a good example of verbs, as has been mentioned. Identifiers are nouns, as they have the same function as nouns have in human languages (i.e. one word to refer to a typically much more complicated concept). An identifier typically refers to a memory address. But ya'll knew that anyway. Prepositions have their place, mainly borrowed directly from English (or whatever human language the computer language is based on), such as "as," "from," etc.
...OSDN registers "scodot.org" so we can have all of the aimless SCO news there, and then maybe we can see something else on Slashdot. I suppose then we could only use Slashdot to gripe about the new Microsoft Office commercials, since they clearly pose more of a threat to Linux than SCO ever will. Clearly.
Yes, it certainly is a possibility for Cingular to improve with this acquisition; I'm not discounting or discrediting this idea because I am very hopeful that they will improve seeing as I also have a Cingular account.
When you say memory chip, are you referring to the SIM card in the phone? If you are, AT&T does have that for most phones now as it's part of GSM service, which most providers are using now except for Sprint and I'm assuming Verizon (the cocky bastards). Anything else they claim to have is bullshit anyway, because there is no other standard "memory chip" across the various phone brands that Cingular supports except for SIM cards.
BTW - rollover minutes sound nice, but hey, if you're not using those minutes month after month, when are you going to use them? It's basically a cheap trick because they're not going to lose any money. If you need more minutes each month, you're going to need a higher plan anyway. Who uses more minutes exactly every other month? Sure, it makes me feel good too, because it is a very nice, very large margin for error to prevent ever going over, but it's not really even something to consider when choosing a provider. Basically, everyone will get the job done, and you'll have service at least 21 days out of the month, but basically be very skeptical about any really good sounding deals from wireless providers as they all suck terribly (in the US) compared to other fully developed nations, at least from my experiences.
If you have AT&T Wireless, get out NOW. Cingular has the most awful, broken billing system ever. They will shut down your account if your bill is one day late and charge you an activation fee to turn it back on. Their highest national plan still does not give you anywhere near unlimited national service. Not to mention it takes them about a day to get a phone activated right. Unfortunately, AT&T Wireless, one of the better (but still not good compared to what Asia has) wireless providers will most likely cease to exist as we know it. This can be a really good thing for Cingular, as they were the most logical buyer, but they will likely botch this. I have AT&T Wireless; as soon as I saw they were up for sale I started looking for another provider and am now in the switch process. Good luck.
...if Apple jumps on it. What they need to do is rework existing open source Palm OS connectivity solutions to work with Palm OS 6 and their existing iApps (iCal, Address Book, iSync). This would be better for Mac users as it would make things a little more unified. Sure, there's already a conduit for the current Mac Hotsync and iSync, but that's more of a kludge than the elegant solution we could see here. Palm could really just make this necessary software themselves at little effort anyway. All they need to do is adhere to whatever standards seem to be used already with phones and so on for synchronization. Either way, let's get rid of Palm Desktop for Mac OS and let's see more integration with better-made apps.
...if you pay employees to properly set up and audit your software. No software is truly "free" for an organization that pays employees, since that software has to be installed and maintained somehow. Even for my personal use, free software is not really free because I have to spend a considerable amount of time setting it up and I do value my time (somewhat). I do get what I pay for though, because it's worth the time and effort investment to have more solid, secure, and reliable software.
... it would be more customizable, useful, and worthwhile if you built one of these yourself. I imagine it would not be all that difficult to attach some gauges to a computer and make it display what you want. Granted, they have done everything for you, but this really isn't all that valuable in its current state, other than as an idea I can rip off for myself.
This AC raises a good point, as it is not really Google that is impacting businesses but rather individuals' choices. Google might increase or decrease your exposure, but it's just one of many advertising options (even though it is rather unique in this sense), and that's just one part of what makes a business successful. Google has become quite powerful as a tool because it can find most anything, however, it is not without its flaws. Ads create a small bias in the system, but that's how Google makes money. In any event, I'd take Google over anything else out there simply because it looks and works the best. And if anybody thinks anything is questionable about Google, just look at the others.
... you can convince the landlord to install wired ethernet which would actually make your games worthwhile (i.e. much less latency). Not to mention the per-machine cost is lower. This is actually an attractive idea as a landlord could technically (though not necessarily legally/without pissing off the ISP) provide an internet connection as part of the included utilities, for a small (say $10) bump in the rent. Just a thought. I have, on the other hand, seen wireless networks work great in 2 and 3 unit buildings, as long as the access point is in the middle floor and latency is not a huge concern (i.e. casual, non-gaming users).
Thank you for your very insightful comments on this. While I agree with what you're saying and appreciate that you know a lot about this, I must also say that regardless of what you can do with 802.11, not everyone is going to be pushing it to its limits. I am certain that you realize that, because it has to be obvious that most people don't know how to install a directional antenna, mainly because most people don't know what that is. I do not know all the variables involved in signal quality, but I do know that with something like TCP/IP over radio the signal has to be pretty damn good for it to be at all usable. Most importantly, regardless of how good your signal is and how well you planned everything out, 802.11 latency is still too high for many applications. It's good enough for most average users in many cases, but anyone who actually notices latency goes insane even working 5 feet from a base station.
The bandwidth specs listed on the box reflect maximum values under optimal conditions, and I thought that this was misunderstood. Granted, wireless ethernet device makers don't really mention this clearly on their packaging (as with 56k modems), but even with wired ethernet there has never been any guarantee of speed whatsoever. Typically, the faster the theoretical max, the faster the actual speeds will be, but they are usually only a fraction of that max.
No, 802.11 anything is not sufficient. Unless using specialized antennas at both ends, 802.11 would not even be adequate from the utility pole to the house in many circumstances. Anyone who has any experience with wireless ethernet knows that the range is never as good as it's hyped up to be, especially through walls and such.
The problem with this is that fitting rooms are to see how the particular garment actually fits. It's one thing to see how it looks on you, but to figure out whether you need a medium or large, you need to try the clothes on.
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Hey, if you have time to lock the bastard down and turn on an alarm, wouldn't you also have time to press the suspend button, close it up, and carry it with you? You could save enough money to maybe go to a nicer coffee shop where people don't jack your laptop all the time too. :-)
I just don't see why we here even care what the hardware is in these boxes. In general, the user experience between all 3 of the current consoles is nearly identical. The Xbox is more geared toward online gaming than the others, but that's about it. I first played this one game on PS2 a couple months ago, and even though I am new to owning a console, I knew that I most likely would be able to get the exact same game for my GameCube and it would look and feel the same. Sure enough, I picked it up for the same price and it was essentially the same game. Considering the GameCube media has maybe a third of the storage capacity of the full DVD media found in the other 2 consoles, this is kind of surprising, but shows that games still aren't that huge on the most part.
What I am really trying to get at here is we can admire and debate the specs of these consoles, but these specs have little to do with the fact that there hasn't really been any innovation since the first game console, unless you consider 3D and vibrating controllers amazing innovations (no, I'm not discrediting these ideas, but little has been done to make games more enjoyable to play, they're only more enjoyable to look at).
I appreciate the positive discussion I read here, but I have to disagree with the tone you're using when saying a concept hit rate of 2 in 15 is bad. Sure, it is bad, but not in comparison to anybody else. Microsoft has only had maybe a couple of hits ever. Really, the only thing they ever achieved widespread use with that they could even claim was halfway their own is Office. Apple, on the other hand, actually is willing to take risks and has made a lot of money doing so. Everyone seems to consider them unsuccessful simply because they have a low market share. In a multibillion dollar market, I would consider myself successful if I maintained even a fraction of a percent of the market share. Considering the things Apple has put itself through, it is remarkably successful now and will continue to be because it innovates.
Well a GPS is nice, but a GPS is not a homing device in and of itself. GPS devices recieve, they do not transmit. The only reason that services like OnStar work is by integrating a [analog] cell phone into the system somehow. If this was external, it would be simply to sever it from the laptop. If this device was internalized, laptops would have to increase noticeably in size and weight. Though this would be cool, it would involve monthly/yearly fees as well as weight and power tradeoffs. Most laptop users wouldn't want those tradeoffs. I know I wouldn't. If can simply not be lazy and put the damned thing in standby and bring it with you when it needs to be out of eyesight, it will never have the chance of being stolen. Cool, huh?
Projections and claims of low false alarms are most assuredly false themselves. Pretty much everything any product developer/manufacturer says is an exaggeration. We all know this.
How true though. Honestly, do we need another car alarm type of device? I live in a very high density urban setting, and we are plagued with car alarms constantly. As my uncle once put it, they are the most ignored (yet annoying) sound in America. The police only care about them because of the noise. I am willing to wager my life on at least 99% of the actual, real-world car alarm soundings are false alarms of one sort or another. And I'm not just talking about worthless (except for car finding for the inept) panic buttons. We're trying to deal with air pollution, we're looking at light pollution, now let's save our ears with less noise pollution. Please!
Ok, so I read the article a little more closely, and yes, their idea is good, but it's also pretty costly for what it does. Basically, a little common sense is all you need. No security system is failproof. Everyone knows that even though it's unlikely, your home could get broken into this very night. Still, you'll leave your laptop unsecured on a desk or in a bag or wherever seems fit. However, if you're in a library or a coffee shop or wherever you wouldn't normally leave your laptop unoccupied, would you really want to get up and go to the bathroom assuming it is protected by a $95 hack? I wouldn't, and I consider myself trusting. But I sure as hell am not going to trust my PowerBook to any security device other than my watchful eye. Oh, and could there ever be insurance if it failed to operate? If the product came with a big disclaimer, that should raise red flags right away.
Perhaps not exactly the same, but it's already been done for $50.
Not to get really pissy here, especially since my reply is somewhat tardy, but your statement "In any rate, because SQL allows you to create a table *without* a primary key (which then means that result sets can have duplicate rows) then it is not relational. End of story." is complete garbage. Relational does not refer to restrictions that the software imposes on the developer. Any database product that allows a developer to relate a record in one table to a record in another table is relational. "End of story." I can whip up a shitty Python app that satisfies this definition in a few minutes, and just because it isn't a ROFLSTFUIANALIMHODBMS doesn't mean it's not relational. Relational is an idea. Please try to understand that. I don't know where you get your ideas from, but you seem to have a sadly anal (and incorrectly so) way of looking at this. The first real thing I learned about databases was the difference between single-table, flat-file databases and multi-table, relational databases. Can you honestly tell me that what I do for a living is not develop relational databases just because you have such a narrow definition? I do not mean to offend, but I cannot let your statement stand uncorrected. I also apologize for using an "end of story" line in any way, as there often isn't anything definitive about computers or software.
I'll bet pretty much anything it's either complete vapor or we'll never see anything like it. The fact that not even Toshiba has released such a device doesn't look promising for this company. I know that major PC manufacturers aren't always right about everything, but they do essentially determine what we are allowed to want and what the market is allowed to carry. Sony's Picturebook (I think) series is the closest to this I have ever seen, and with those machines' low usability and fairly lame specs for a price well over US$2000, why bother? Frankly, this is the direction we should be going with computing. John Dvorak predicted something like it years back, where we have a palm-sized device that is the core computer and offers some functionality on a portable level, but then we dock it into it's docking station and we have a fully functional, powerful desktop machine. The problem is this is years from becoming reality, but it is what will happen. Right now, the best you can do is a combination of devices. Grab a Sidekick from T-Mobile (or something like it), a laptop from Apple, and a Shuttle box, and you will have achieved bliss. (Wait, shit, no.... but you get the idea)
Bluetooth is pretty lame. It does get its job done about as efficiently as can be expected, but considering its relative cost and effort spent implementing it, it's a complete waste. If it was at least, say 100x faster, it would be worth something. Modem speeds with less range than 802.11? Who would want this? Why wasn't this idea rejected outright? It's great for input devices, device sync, and using modems/GPRS from cell phones with various devices. But you know what, we already had infrared for that, and in my experience it's faster. I don't mean to bitch and moan about this, but please. This stuff is lame. Let's see some FireWireless. That would be interesting.
Those are adjectives, as they specify what kinda of variable you are dealing with. "This" would be the most common pronoun in object-oriented languages, at least the ones I have used recently. Operators are definitely a good example of verbs, as has been mentioned. Identifiers are nouns, as they have the same function as nouns have in human languages (i.e. one word to refer to a typically much more complicated concept). An identifier typically refers to a memory address. But ya'll knew that anyway. Prepositions have their place, mainly borrowed directly from English (or whatever human language the computer language is based on), such as "as," "from," etc.
...OSDN registers "scodot.org" so we can have all of the aimless SCO news there, and then maybe we can see something else on Slashdot. I suppose then we could only use Slashdot to gripe about the new Microsoft Office commercials, since they clearly pose more of a threat to Linux than SCO ever will. Clearly.
When you say memory chip, are you referring to the SIM card in the phone? If you are, AT&T does have that for most phones now as it's part of GSM service, which most providers are using now except for Sprint and I'm assuming Verizon (the cocky bastards). Anything else they claim to have is bullshit anyway, because there is no other standard "memory chip" across the various phone brands that Cingular supports except for SIM cards.
BTW - rollover minutes sound nice, but hey, if you're not using those minutes month after month, when are you going to use them? It's basically a cheap trick because they're not going to lose any money. If you need more minutes each month, you're going to need a higher plan anyway. Who uses more minutes exactly every other month? Sure, it makes me feel good too, because it is a very nice, very large margin for error to prevent ever going over, but it's not really even something to consider when choosing a provider. Basically, everyone will get the job done, and you'll have service at least 21 days out of the month, but basically be very skeptical about any really good sounding deals from wireless providers as they all suck terribly (in the US) compared to other fully developed nations, at least from my experiences.
If you have AT&T Wireless, get out NOW. Cingular has the most awful, broken billing system ever. They will shut down your account if your bill is one day late and charge you an activation fee to turn it back on. Their highest national plan still does not give you anywhere near unlimited national service. Not to mention it takes them about a day to get a phone activated right. Unfortunately, AT&T Wireless, one of the better (but still not good compared to what Asia has) wireless providers will most likely cease to exist as we know it. This can be a really good thing for Cingular, as they were the most logical buyer, but they will likely botch this. I have AT&T Wireless; as soon as I saw they were up for sale I started looking for another provider and am now in the switch process. Good luck.
...if Apple jumps on it. What they need to do is rework existing open source Palm OS connectivity solutions to work with Palm OS 6 and their existing iApps (iCal, Address Book, iSync). This would be better for Mac users as it would make things a little more unified. Sure, there's already a conduit for the current Mac Hotsync and iSync, but that's more of a kludge than the elegant solution we could see here. Palm could really just make this necessary software themselves at little effort anyway. All they need to do is adhere to whatever standards seem to be used already with phones and so on for synchronization. Either way, let's get rid of Palm Desktop for Mac OS and let's see more integration with better-made apps.
...if you pay employees to properly set up and audit your software. No software is truly "free" for an organization that pays employees, since that software has to be installed and maintained somehow. Even for my personal use, free software is not really free because I have to spend a considerable amount of time setting it up and I do value my time (somewhat). I do get what I pay for though, because it's worth the time and effort investment to have more solid, secure, and reliable software.
... it would be more customizable, useful, and worthwhile if you built one of these yourself. I imagine it would not be all that difficult to attach some gauges to a computer and make it display what you want. Granted, they have done everything for you, but this really isn't all that valuable in its current state, other than as an idea I can rip off for myself.
This AC raises a good point, as it is not really Google that is impacting businesses but rather individuals' choices. Google might increase or decrease your exposure, but it's just one of many advertising options (even though it is rather unique in this sense), and that's just one part of what makes a business successful. Google has become quite powerful as a tool because it can find most anything, however, it is not without its flaws. Ads create a small bias in the system, but that's how Google makes money. In any event, I'd take Google over anything else out there simply because it looks and works the best. And if anybody thinks anything is questionable about Google, just look at the others.
... you can convince the landlord to install wired ethernet which would actually make your games worthwhile (i.e. much less latency). Not to mention the per-machine cost is lower. This is actually an attractive idea as a landlord could technically (though not necessarily legally/without pissing off the ISP) provide an internet connection as part of the included utilities, for a small (say $10) bump in the rent. Just a thought. I have, on the other hand, seen wireless networks work great in 2 and 3 unit buildings, as long as the access point is in the middle floor and latency is not a huge concern (i.e. casual, non-gaming users).
Yea, you should have been modded up considerably.
Thank you for your very insightful comments on this. While I agree with what you're saying and appreciate that you know a lot about this, I must also say that regardless of what you can do with 802.11, not everyone is going to be pushing it to its limits. I am certain that you realize that, because it has to be obvious that most people don't know how to install a directional antenna, mainly because most people don't know what that is. I do not know all the variables involved in signal quality, but I do know that with something like TCP/IP over radio the signal has to be pretty damn good for it to be at all usable. Most importantly, regardless of how good your signal is and how well you planned everything out, 802.11 latency is still too high for many applications. It's good enough for most average users in many cases, but anyone who actually notices latency goes insane even working 5 feet from a base station.
The bandwidth specs listed on the box reflect maximum values under optimal conditions, and I thought that this was misunderstood. Granted, wireless ethernet device makers don't really mention this clearly on their packaging (as with 56k modems), but even with wired ethernet there has never been any guarantee of speed whatsoever. Typically, the faster the theoretical max, the faster the actual speeds will be, but they are usually only a fraction of that max.
No, 802.11 anything is not sufficient. Unless using specialized antennas at both ends, 802.11 would not even be adequate from the utility pole to the house in many circumstances. Anyone who has any experience with wireless ethernet knows that the range is never as good as it's hyped up to be, especially through walls and such.
The problem with this is that fitting rooms are to see how the particular garment actually fits. It's one thing to see how it looks on you, but to figure out whether you need a medium or large, you need to try the clothes on.