I wouldn't be too sure about that. For example, here in Italy lots of people choose to use the DSL service provided by Telecom (the leading, former monopolist, phone company) for the simple reason that that's what they already have at home. Even if Telecom's ADSL is not at all more convenient that much of the competition (Libero, Tiscali, Fastweb).
First-hand experience, I recently moved and had to do all the usual attachments: electricity, phone and, of course, ADSL. I would have loved to skip the phone attachment and use VoIP (Tiscali offers that bundled in one of their ADSL offers), but I found out I could not get ADSL if I didn't get Telecom to hook up my phone line first.
Now, I'm a stubborn one so I got Telecom phone but Tiscali's ADSL. Talking with much of my acquaitances, an usual question was why I hadn't gone with Telecom's ADSL, since I had to hook up with them anyway.
So my guess is that electricity provides might have an edge if they handle this right.
In short, patents no longer protect the inventor of any unique process from copying. Instead, they protect large companies from any competition whatsoever! Ahhh, our forefathers must be revolving in their graves at about 5000 RPM!
>If he wanted emacs to act like vi, there's nothing stopping him from customizing it that way or using something like viper-mode.
Only an Emacs user who never actually used vim can think that the viper-mode for Emacs comes anywhere close to something usable.
I had to learn vim because I'm using a laptop, and thus nonalpha keys are clumsy to reach at best. Then I got so used to it I started having hjkldddxxcta things everywhere in other programs:)
Emacs has an enormous appeal for me (for TeX editing, AUC-TeX & friends is awfully close to Nirvana), but I simply can't use it. I value my hands too much. And no, viper-mode, even in the most vi-ish mode, doesn't cut it.
G.B. Shaw once met a lady that told him "Oh, we should make a son; just think how wonderful would it be, someone with your brain and my looks"
"Yes, but what if he comes out with my looks and your brain?"
What makes sure that the cross-breed will have the best, and not the worst, of both worlds?
There is nothing contradictory in something being both fascist and socialist. The Italian Fascist Party stemmed out from the Socialist party. In a way, one could consider Fascism as the nationalist, tyrannical culturo-political side of the socioeconomical ideology which is socialism, as opposed to other culturo-political sides: socialdemocracy, international socialsm, anarco-communism, etc. Always keep in mind that you can basically build any culturo-political system on any socioeconomical ideology.
Depending on the game, it might work or not. There are many couples playing with Sea3D, for example. I've heard of gals enjoying BZFlag too. I don't know if you can convince them for that game you're talking about, though. Worth a try.
There is a PNG brother format called JNG, with JPEG-like compression. Is it affected by the patent? If not, it's time JNG took the guidance role over JPEG like PNG did with GIF.
Also the animated MNG format, IIRC, is a superset of JNG. Again, does this patent affect it?
Crashes on my Windows XP box.
(BTW, when first writing this comment, Slashdot complained I was too fast... looks I need some of those pills to last longer?)
"What's the point of this?"
Well, for starters, WordPerfect is much more flexible and powerful than any other wordprocessing program I've ever used, and from MultiMate Advantage to Word, KWord, AbiWord *and* OpenOffice.org/StarOffice Writer. It's far from "Perfect" (despite its name), and it surely sucks if you are a non-latin-script user, but for the "western" market there *still* isn't anything as good. (I'm talking wordprocessing, so I'm *not* counting TeX-based software.)
In fact, older version of WordPerfect Office always used to sell for *considerably* less than the corresponding MS Office, but this never helped. And WordPerfect Office version 8 was *excellent* (probably the best version of WordPerfect for Windows *ever* released). This has meant a lot of revenue loss for Corel, and didn't help expand market share.
Ages ago (back when this was a Windows box) I downloaded a little thing for GIMP that let me make GIFs. This was legal because I live in Europe with no software patents as of yet (fingers crossed/touch wood).
You didn't read the article, did you? The patent has been filed in Europe (and NZ)
Yeah, the Google bomb for litigious bastards for SCO seems to have lost its effect (so soon?). We probably need some likely-named links from other websites.
It's an awfully nice board game (especially more so if you consider the Seafarer extension and Cities & Knight extension). I suggest you get the board game (if you can friends to play it with), but there's a an amazing good implementation on the computer (Windows only, sorry) here.
Many of the good old adventures are fun too, even those now 'abandonware' (Eric the Unready) or otherwise hard to get going on modern computers (Questo for Glory I to IV).
There are two things you should keep in mind. Ok, three actually
I'd say they would/should go for OpenOffice.org; now, OpenOffice.org needs X and is not very "lean and mean". This means they do need some RAM and CPU power. As far as the RAM goes, 128 would probably suffice, but if you can go for 256 please do; more than that is most probably not needed. For the CPU, also consider the next point.
The choice is somewhat limited by what you can find around. I doubt you can get anything less than a PIV these days, at least if you go for new hardware. And of course, you can probably go for Athlon-based systems, which is cheaper and better. If you go for older (existing, recylced, donated) hardware keep in mind the next point.
Hardware obsoletes rapidly. Very rapidly. Among other things, this means that if something breaks, for any reason, the older the stuff the more difficult it is to find a spare part --which might lead to extra expenses because you need to basically buy a new computer for the simple fact that you cannot find a piece to replace the single thing that broke.
This all having being said, your best bet to tell them what they need and why is to show them.
For the media, I suggest something like IrfanView. There is also a Media Player Classic which you might like to look at; in fact, whereas Windows 9x comes with mplayer2.exe which is the good old MediaPlayer (as opposed to the WMP hog), the Windows NT series (NT, 2K, XP) does not, so this is the perfect replacement. Oh, and possibly have a look at BSPlayer too (for video only)
I would also like to add the following items to the list of needed software (under Windows):
The times are getting ripe for something like Sandblaster to be created. I'm not 100% sure of the name, but I'll keep it that way. It's a brand imagined by Gibson in his Idoru novel, a brand which produced hardware which was, at least how I understood it, the closest thing to open source for software.
There are still quite a few steps missing to get there, but at least some work is being done. For example, IIRC there is at least one open source BIOS in the works (anybody remember the links); next we need some kind of access to recycled/recyclable materian, and people willing to work at the asembly lines.
Many of the website that adhered to the protest have not physically shut down the system. Most of them have replaced their first page with a page saying "This is what could happen if the law passes" or something of the sort; this was for example the case of Total Commander's webpage (www.ghisler.com). Being informative without being "obstructionists", if I can say so. Maybe/. could do something like this too.
The weiredest "This page intentionally left blank" messages I've seen (apart from the "This note intentionally left, Blanc" joke in one of those Adventure-like games) was the online manual for Lucid3D.
Lucid3D, for those who don't remember it, was the first spreadsheet programs that supported "transparent" links between spreadsheets, long before Lotus or Quattro supported them. It wasn't really three-dimensional (there *was* a three-dimensional spreadsheet some time ago, but didn't get much notice, because it was somewhat clumsly to use on 2D screens...).
Lucid3D had a comprehensive online help system (callable via the mouse: the whole program was *designed* the mouse), showing single-page descriptions of all the features and functions it had. BUT, the help system could also be browsed like a book, starting from the first "screen" down to the bottom.
If you did follow this route (I discovered it by chance), you would actually see, once in a while, "screens" that had nothing to do with Lucid3D, but were rather quotes from books, poems, etc (mostly quotes on writing), just like if they had to "fill up" blank pages. The only one I remember is the famous quote from Omar Khayyam:
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it
Wonder if this is the oldest Easter Egg in computing?
> > how many nongeeks would laugh for the average www.userfriendly.org strip?
> Hell, I AM a geek and don't laugh at the average userfriendly strip. Not because I don't "get it," mind you...
Well, ok. Technically speaking UserFriendly does not (usually) incite to "roll oneself on the floor" and all that stuff. So I chose the wrong term. Yet I find UserFriendly quite humorous most of the time, maybe in a "non-explosive" fashion. Somewhat like the Peanuts by the late Charles M. Schultz.
When I read the first line of this post I instantly thought of the TeXbook. Knuth points out that most manuals are dull and boring, and goes on saying that this manual (the TeXbook, and similarly for the METAFONTbook) is different in that it contains jokes here and there. And in fact this is true, even though the jokes are very "technical". But is the really good technical fun, not the one that comes from misprints originated by typos or ignorance.
After all, how many nongeeks would laugh for the average www.userfriendly.org strip?
Slashdot Mirror
I wouldn't be too sure about that. For example, here in Italy lots of people choose to use the DSL service provided by Telecom (the leading, former monopolist, phone company) for the simple reason that that's what they already have at home. Even if Telecom's ADSL is not at all more convenient that much of the competition (Libero, Tiscali, Fastweb). First-hand experience, I recently moved and had to do all the usual attachments: electricity, phone and, of course, ADSL. I would have loved to skip the phone attachment and use VoIP (Tiscali offers that bundled in one of their ADSL offers), but I found out I could not get ADSL if I didn't get Telecom to hook up my phone line first. Now, I'm a stubborn one so I got Telecom phone but Tiscali's ADSL. Talking with much of my acquaitances, an usual question was why I hadn't gone with Telecom's ADSL, since I had to hook up with them anyway. So my guess is that electricity provides might have an edge if they handle this right.
me too ...
Oh, looks like they're catching up with Opera, finally. Wonder when will it be that they'll catch up with the download manager too?
Only an Emacs user who never actually used vim can think that the viper-mode for Emacs comes anywhere close to something usable.
I had to learn vim because I'm using a laptop, and thus nonalpha keys are clumsy to reach at best. Then I got so used to it I started having hjkldddxxcta things everywhere in other programs :)
Emacs has an enormous appeal for me (for TeX editing, AUC-TeX & friends is awfully close to Nirvana), but I simply can't use it. I value my hands too much. And no, viper-mode, even in the most vi-ish mode, doesn't cut it.
Bah. Old Stuff. A modest proposal by Jonathan Swift wasn't printed yesterday ...
G.B. Shaw once met a lady that told him "Oh, we should make a son; just think how wonderful would it be, someone with your brain and my looks" "Yes, but what if he comes out with my looks and your brain?" What makes sure that the cross-breed will have the best, and not the worst, of both worlds?
There is nothing contradictory in something being both fascist and socialist. The Italian Fascist Party stemmed out from the Socialist party. In a way, one could consider Fascism as the nationalist, tyrannical culturo-political side of the socioeconomical ideology which is socialism, as opposed to other culturo-political sides: socialdemocracy, international socialsm, anarco-communism, etc. Always keep in mind that you can basically build any culturo-political system on any socioeconomical ideology.
Depending on the game, it might work or not. There are many couples playing with Sea3D, for example. I've heard of gals enjoying BZFlag too. I don't know if you can convince them for that game you're talking about, though. Worth a try.
There is a PNG brother format called JNG, with JPEG-like compression. Is it affected by the patent? If not, it's time JNG took the guidance role over JPEG like PNG did with GIF. Also the animated MNG format, IIRC, is a superset of JNG. Again, does this patent affect it?
Crashes on my Windows XP box. (BTW, when first writing this comment, Slashdot complained I was too fast ... looks I need some of those pills to last longer?)
"What's the point of this?" Well, for starters, WordPerfect is much more flexible and powerful than any other wordprocessing program I've ever used, and from MultiMate Advantage to Word, KWord, AbiWord *and* OpenOffice.org/StarOffice Writer. It's far from "Perfect" (despite its name), and it surely sucks if you are a non-latin-script user, but for the "western" market there *still* isn't anything as good. (I'm talking wordprocessing, so I'm *not* counting TeX-based software.)
In fact, older version of WordPerfect Office always used to sell for *considerably* less than the corresponding MS Office, but this never helped. And WordPerfect Office version 8 was *excellent* (probably the best version of WordPerfect for Windows *ever* released). This has meant a lot of revenue loss for Corel, and didn't help expand market share.
Ages ago (back when this was a Windows box) I downloaded a little thing for GIMP that let me make GIFs. This was legal because I live in Europe with no software patents as of yet (fingers crossed/touch wood). You didn't read the article, did you? The patent has been filed in Europe (and NZ)
Yeah, the Google bomb for litigious bastards for SCO seems to have lost its effect (so soon?). We probably need some likely-named links from other websites.
And who's to set those limits?
It's an awfully nice board game (especially more so if you consider the Seafarer extension and Cities & Knight extension). I suggest you get the board game (if you can friends to play it with), but there's a an amazing good implementation on the computer (Windows only, sorry) here. Many of the good old adventures are fun too, even those now 'abandonware' (Eric the Unready) or otherwise hard to get going on modern computers (Questo for Glory I to IV).
- I'd say they would/should go for OpenOffice.org; now, OpenOffice.org needs X and is not very "lean and mean". This means they do need some RAM and CPU power. As far as the RAM goes, 128 would probably suffice, but if you can go for 256 please do; more than that is most probably not needed. For the CPU, also consider the next point.
- The choice is somewhat limited by what you can find around. I doubt you can get anything less than a PIV these days, at least if you go for new hardware. And of course, you can probably go for Athlon-based systems, which is cheaper and better. If you go for older (existing, recylced, donated) hardware keep in mind the next point.
- Hardware obsoletes rapidly. Very rapidly. Among other things, this means that if something breaks, for any reason, the older the stuff the more difficult it is to find a spare part --which might lead to extra expenses because you need to basically buy a new computer for the simple fact that you cannot find a piece to replace the single thing that broke.
This all having being said, your best bet to tell them what they need and why is to show them.An analysis of these amendments is available here
There are still quite a few steps missing to get there, but at least some work is being done. For example, IIRC there is at least one open source BIOS in the works (anybody remember the links); next we need some kind of access to recycled/recyclable materian, and people willing to work at the asembly lines.
Many of the website that adhered to the protest have not physically shut down the system. Most of them have replaced their first page with a page saying "This is what could happen if the law passes" or something of the sort; this was for example the case of Total Commander's webpage (www.ghisler.com). Being informative without being "obstructionists", if I can say so. Maybe /. could do something like this too.
The weiredest "This page intentionally left blank" messages I've seen (apart from the "This note intentionally left, Blanc" joke in one of those Adventure-like games) was the online manual for Lucid3D.
...).
Lucid3D, for those who don't remember it, was the first spreadsheet programs that supported "transparent" links between spreadsheets, long before Lotus or Quattro supported them. It wasn't really three-dimensional (there *was* a three-dimensional spreadsheet some time ago, but didn't get much notice, because it was somewhat clumsly to use on 2D screens
Lucid3D had a comprehensive online help system (callable via the mouse: the whole program was *designed* the mouse), showing single-page descriptions of all the features and functions it had. BUT, the help system could also be browsed like a book, starting from the first "screen" down to the bottom.
If you did follow this route (I discovered it by chance), you would actually see, once in a while, "screens" that had nothing to do with Lucid3D, but were rather quotes from books, poems, etc (mostly quotes on writing), just like if they had to "fill up" blank pages. The only one I remember is the famous quote from Omar Khayyam:
The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it
Wonder if this is the oldest Easter Egg in computing?
> > how many nongeeks would laugh for the average www.userfriendly.org strip?
> Hell, I AM a geek and don't laugh at the average userfriendly strip. Not because I don't "get it," mind you...
Well, ok. Technically speaking UserFriendly does not (usually) incite to "roll oneself on the floor" and all that stuff. So I chose the wrong term. Yet I find UserFriendly quite humorous most of the time, maybe in a "non-explosive" fashion. Somewhat like the Peanuts by the late Charles M. Schultz.
When I read the first line of this post I instantly thought of the TeXbook. Knuth points out that most manuals are dull and boring, and goes on saying that this manual (the TeXbook, and similarly for the METAFONTbook) is different in that it contains jokes here and there. And in fact this is true, even though the jokes are very "technical". But is the really good technical fun, not the one that comes from misprints originated by typos or ignorance. After all, how many nongeeks would laugh for the average www.userfriendly.org strip?