This is slashdot. The submission was worded so that it sounds like the guy was "dissing" linux, hence all the hate and stupidity from the zealots.
If he said "Crays are faster than dual G5 PowerMacs", he'd be completely right, but the Apple astroturfers would be all over the comments talking about megahertz myths and other moronic tripe.
I've always thought of "supercomputer" and "cluster" as two completely separate tools for largely seperate applications.
Myself, I can't wait to see what kind of magic juju Cray has that could be included into the linux kernels of tomorrow.
If you're talking about commodity PC hardware, ultimately whatever interconnect you use is going to be hampered by the PCI bus.
There's interconnect stuff more efficient, protocol wise, than giga ethernet, you can lower latencies and do compression and stuff, but in the end, it's the PCI bus that creates the bottleneck.
Now, come up with a BUS that operates closer to CPU speeds, and now we're talking. That's (a part) of what a Cray does that a pile of G5 X-servers cant.
The zealots can calm down. This would be like a Ford rep saying "cars are good for some things, but nothing beats a F150 if you want to move a whole lot of dirt cost-effectively".
They don't scale for applications that require shared memory access.
Something like SETI@home could scale almost infinitely. The data elements are completely unrelated.
But if every node needed access to the same chunk of data, then the more nodes you add, the more they "fight" over that chunk of data.
Ultimately, with a PC cluster solution, only one node at a time can be accessing any given section of "shared" memory.
That's what he means, and he's right...offtopic..
Look at the slashbots who can't understand the article throwing a fit because of a percieved "diss" against linux. This place really makes me laugh sometimes. Hell, Cray's new gear is using linux. Cray is a card-carrying linux loving company, and have been for quite awhile.
And Cray's got some friggin crazy tech. I can't wait to see what they have to kick back into the kernel.
Clusters are really only good when what you're doing is massively parallelizable, like 3D rendering or folding@home types of applications.
For stuff thats not, algorithms that only work sequentially, nothing beats a crazy-insane-fast CPU, memory and system BUS.
You'd think that'd be a no-brainer to the "computer experts" here at slashdot, but you'd be wrong to assume that/.ers are actually "computer experts" when they're merely crusaders for their favorite OS.
Cray isn't "scared" of linux clusters. They just can't do what a Cray does.
Go ahead and get those silly patents. Then try to use them, and the courts will toss them out.
It really isn't the USPTOs job to weed through prior art and do all that investigative legwork. That would be nearly impossible, they'd need to employ top experts in every scientific and industrial discipline.
No, it's up to your peers to challenge your patents by showing prior art or obviousness to a judge. The problem as I see it, are the financial barriers that keep the small guy out of court, not the USPTO or the notion of patents themselves.
It's not true, not in the way the Register suggests.
Say I have an patent from 1970. I can't "extend" it and tack on TCP/IP and then claim I have a patent on the internet.
The Register suggests that Nintendo looked at Xbox live, rubbed their little hands together, and tacked it onto an old patent in some evil world domination scheme. Which isn't true. They patented a specific device, and amended it to more accurately reflect the technical details of that specific device.
And know why they filed it? To stop third party addons like CD64 or DR64, or others. Just like they patented NES cartridge keying, and used the patents as a club against things like unlicensed third party games and Game Doctor.
This is slashdot, let 'em overreact. It's funny to watch. "OMFG they patented teh online gaming!" "Nintendo are greedy assholes, thats why I'm buying teh Sonly Praystration!" Heh.
The patent is for a console add-on device, specifically the mega-flop that was the 64DD.
If that stuff is integrated into the console, the patent doesn't apply.
No doubt they filed this to stop third parties from offering their own add-on devices, like lets say, CD-64 rom copying units.
It's the same strategy they took with NES and SNES. They patented the "keying" mechanisms that authenticated real NES carts, and sent the hordes of lawyers after third parties who tried to release products. Game Doctor, etc..
US patent 6,769,989, which was granted on the 3rd of August, refers to a console add-on device which would modify an existing system to include "additional communication and storage capability via a modem and hard disk drive."
blah blah blah
However, despite only being granted this month, the original patent was actually filed back in 1999, and the picture attached to the patent clearly displays a 64DD unit attached to an N64. The ill-fated peripheral offered many of the functions described by the patent, but was unpopular with consumers and was rapidly discontinued by Nintendo.
blah blah blah
This isn't to say that some of that functionality won't make it into Revolution, although in general Nintendo has aimed for pure game devices rather than trying to compete with Sony's vision for building a home media empire based on the PlayStation brand.
Sure they got the patent, it doesn't fit with their plans. And since the patent is for a CONSOLE ADD ON DEVICE, it doesn't apply to XBox or PCs, which have hard drives and ethernet integrated. Like the article said, it really doesn't fit with Nintendo's plans whatsoever.
Did you know Konami has more video game patents than anyone else? Makes sense, with all their specialty arcade hardware. Followed by Sega, then Ninteno.. MSFT is wayyyyy down near the bottom of the list, lower than folks like Tiger Electronics (game.com roxorz!) Just something interesting I stumbled over while googling for that link. Pretty much irrelevant and offtopic, though.
Every Nintendo system, back to the Famicom, was "online" in one form or the other.
Nintendo's always done business this way, and they have a very large library of patents. Like MS, they've never used them aggressively.
They've had a long history of locking in third party publishers.. Remember the "good old days" when Capcom's deal with Nintendo forced them to only support Nintendo?
This is no big deal, and hardly the end of online gaming.
They don't have to tell you anything. The TSA is exempt from the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) which says that all government laws, rules and regulations are to be available to the public.
But, like I said, they snuck in a "notwithstanding article blah blah" clause into the TSA, so they just toss out any FOIA requests about the system or its rules.
Is there just one list? Several lists? Who knows.
The TSA's scope is potentially much bigger than just airports, too. Just wait until there are TSA patrol cars out on the highways, and you can be pulled over, searched and arrested on "secret" laws or rules.
Maybe it's illegal to drive a hybrid civic with a "defeat Bush in '04" sticker. Who knows. They could make a regulation making it illegal to be any blacker than Will Smith.
Sure, it violates your constitutional right to due process. That is, being able to read and understand the laws you're charged with violating, which some lawyers might argue is somewhat important to presenting a defense.
I said I like the interface, just the way it was set up out of the box was kind of dopey. There was a popup menu of "configuration" stuff in the bottom bar, and the same menu reappeared in the main menu, etc..
Too many letters and numbers on the screen, most of the time they were just redundant. They system config stuff appearing everywhere was especially silly, since once the machine is set up, how often am I going to need to reconfigure arts?
It should maybe jam that stuff into one link, like Windows does with Control Panel.
Don't know why I was modded troll. I said I like KDE, and I like the UI, I just didn't like the way it was configured out of the box. I didn't feel like figuring out how to reconfigure all that stuff, and just used gnome instead.
I'm waiting for MMOFPS's or a massively multiplayer GTA3.. Yeah, I know about the online mod, but 64 players isn't "massive".
Huge technical challenge to try and get 1000's of people onto the same FarCry (for example) map, but it would really be cool.
I think of GTA because it has to be somewhat pointless. Not like a RTCW:ET setup where you have teams and roles. I can't play that, I have no idea what to do and the knobs who play it can't tolerate a "noob".
I want to just run around, shooting guys, throwing rocks, smashing up cars, flipping the bird, etc..
Naw, it's a ridiculously obvious cash grab. 50 bucks for the game, 10 bucks a month, and in a few months, another 50 bucks for the "expansion pack"..
I'd give some a shot, like City of Heroes or SWG, and I wouldnt mind burning 10 bucks for the first month if I decided the game sucked. But it'd cost me 60 bucks minimum to find out that the game sucks. Actually City of Villains, the sequel, sounds even better, since I'd much rather be Venom than Spidey, or Sinestro than Lantern, etc..
I kind of don't get it. Wheres the competition in CoH, besides telling everyone "nyah nyah I'm level 8". I mean, you're all good guys. I want to fight other players.
Besides, there are still plenty of ways to get an online gaming fix without spending a dime.
RPGs arent necessarily my bag in the first place. However, I'll pay to play the first MMOFPS. Or a MMOGTA, massively multiplayer online grand theft auto! Get to work, Rockstar.
I can't help but think that I'm feeling the same thing the mice felt when they told Deep Thought to find the answer to Life the Universe, and Everything, and it told them it would take 10 million years.
I will no doubt be equally impressed with the results as they were.
KDE's UI has some really nice looking elements, but altogether it's just cluttered and ugly. I'm talking about them jamming too much stuff in the menus, redundant menus, etc. Gnome's so much lighter and cleaner looking. Though, I like the lisa daemon (alot! why would I want to have to type mount "-t cifs//blah/blah" like some sort of caveman), and their sound thingie.
Slashdot Mirror
You dork, Crays are running linux. And a cluster is not a supercomputer.
And you've obviously never worked with either.
As for your explanations, this is exaclty the place for it. Tell us how you can magically share memory over a PCI bus as fast as a Cray does.
This is slashdot. The submission was worded so that it sounds like the guy was "dissing" linux, hence all the hate and stupidity from the zealots.
If he said "Crays are faster than dual G5 PowerMacs", he'd be completely right, but the Apple astroturfers would be all over the comments talking about megahertz myths and other moronic tripe.
I've always thought of "supercomputer" and "cluster" as two completely separate tools for largely seperate applications.
Myself, I can't wait to see what kind of magic juju Cray has that could be included into the linux kernels of tomorrow.
If you're talking about commodity PC hardware, ultimately whatever interconnect you use is going to be hampered by the PCI bus.
There's interconnect stuff more efficient, protocol wise, than giga ethernet, you can lower latencies and do compression and stuff, but in the end, it's the PCI bus that creates the bottleneck.
Now, come up with a BUS that operates closer to CPU speeds, and now we're talking. That's (a part) of what a Cray does that a pile of G5 X-servers cant.
The zealots can calm down. This would be like a Ford rep saying "cars are good for some things, but nothing beats a F150 if you want to move a whole lot of dirt cost-effectively".
They don't scale for applications that require shared memory access.
..offtopic..
Something like SETI@home could scale almost infinitely. The data elements are completely unrelated.
But if every node needed access to the same chunk of data, then the more nodes you add, the more they "fight" over that chunk of data.
Ultimately, with a PC cluster solution, only one node at a time can be accessing any given section of "shared" memory.
That's what he means, and he's right.
Look at the slashbots who can't understand the article throwing a fit because of a percieved "diss" against linux. This place really makes me laugh sometimes. Hell, Cray's new gear is using linux. Cray is a card-carrying linux loving company, and have been for quite awhile.
And Cray's got some friggin crazy tech. I can't wait to see what they have to kick back into the kernel.
Clusters are really only good when what you're doing is massively parallelizable, like 3D rendering or folding@home types of applications.
/.ers are actually "computer experts" when they're merely crusaders for their favorite OS.
For stuff thats not, algorithms that only work sequentially, nothing beats a crazy-insane-fast CPU, memory and system BUS.
You'd think that'd be a no-brainer to the "computer experts" here at slashdot, but you'd be wrong to assume that
Cray isn't "scared" of linux clusters. They just can't do what a Cray does.
Go ahead and get those silly patents. Then try to use them, and the courts will toss them out.
It really isn't the USPTOs job to weed through prior art and do all that investigative legwork. That would be nearly impossible, they'd need to employ top experts in every scientific and industrial discipline.
No, it's up to your peers to challenge your patents by showing prior art or obviousness to a judge. The problem as I see it, are the financial barriers that keep the small guy out of court, not the USPTO or the notion of patents themselves.
I'd thought by now everyone had seen this.
Wow, I didn't know Marathon came with a hardware addon device for the Nintendo 64, which is what this patent is specifically about.
It's only lead at the moment is base and game selection.
Heh, what else does it need?
Gameboy has crushed many technically superior competitors. Lynx, GameGear, Nomad, TGXpress, NeoGeo Pocket Color, uber PC like high powered mega PDAs.
PSP with it's disc-based media sounds like something that skips if you're trying to play on the bus, and would drain batteries like a mofo. We'll see.
Besides, will PSP have Pokemon? That series has sold more gameboys than anything else. Will it have Mario, Zelda, Metroid?
There's plenty of legs in N's stable of exclusives. And frankly, they put out incredibly well-polished titles.
They may slip to #2, but I don't think it's time for Netcraft to confirm their death yet.
It's not true, not in the way the Register suggests.
Say I have an patent from 1970. I can't "extend" it and tack on TCP/IP and then claim I have a patent on the internet.
The Register suggests that Nintendo looked at Xbox live, rubbed their little hands together, and tacked it onto an old patent in some evil world domination scheme. Which isn't true. They patented a specific device, and amended it to more accurately reflect the technical details of that specific device.
And know why they filed it? To stop third party addons like CD64 or DR64, or others. Just like they patented NES cartridge keying, and used the patents as a club against things like unlicensed third party games and Game Doctor.
This is slashdot, let 'em overreact. It's funny to watch. "OMFG they patented teh online gaming!" "Nintendo are greedy assholes, thats why I'm buying teh Sonly Praystration!" Heh.
Get a brain, morans!
The patent is for a console add-on device, specifically the mega-flop that was the 64DD.
If that stuff is integrated into the console, the patent doesn't apply.
No doubt they filed this to stop third parties from offering their own add-on devices, like lets say, CD-64 rom copying units.
It's the same strategy they took with NES and SNES. They patented the "keying" mechanisms that authenticated real NES carts, and sent the hordes of lawyers after third parties who tried to release products. Game Doctor, etc..
Gamesindustry.biz has a long write up.
This patent was about the 64DD add-on device..
US patent 6,769,989, which was granted on the 3rd of August, refers to a console add-on device which would modify an existing system to include "additional communication and storage capability via a modem and hard disk drive."
blah blah blah
However, despite only being granted this month, the original patent was actually filed back in 1999, and the picture attached to the patent clearly displays a 64DD unit attached to an N64. The ill-fated peripheral offered many of the functions described by the patent, but was unpopular with consumers and was rapidly discontinued by Nintendo.
blah blah blah
This isn't to say that some of that functionality won't make it into Revolution, although in general Nintendo has aimed for pure game devices rather than trying to compete with Sony's vision for building a home media empire based on the PlayStation brand.
Sure they got the patent, it doesn't fit with their plans. And since the patent is for a CONSOLE ADD ON DEVICE, it doesn't apply to XBox or PCs, which have hard drives and ethernet integrated. Like the article said, it really doesn't fit with Nintendo's plans whatsoever.
Did you know Konami has more video game patents than anyone else? Makes sense, with all their specialty arcade hardware. Followed by Sega, then Ninteno.. MSFT is wayyyyy down near the bottom of the list, lower than folks like Tiger Electronics (game.com roxorz!) Just something interesting I stumbled over while googling for that link. Pretty much irrelevant and offtopic, though.
Every Nintendo system, back to the Famicom, was "online" in one form or the other.
Nintendo's always done business this way, and they have a very large library of patents. Like MS, they've never used them aggressively.
They've had a long history of locking in third party publishers.. Remember the "good old days" when Capcom's deal with Nintendo forced them to only support Nintendo?
This is no big deal, and hardly the end of online gaming.
It achieved it's real goal. Lots of hippies had their homes and property siezed, as mentioned, Tim Leary got a 10 year sentence, etc..
They don't have to tell you anything. The TSA is exempt from the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) which says that all government laws, rules and regulations are to be available to the public.
But, like I said, they snuck in a "notwithstanding article blah blah" clause into the TSA, so they just toss out any FOIA requests about the system or its rules.
Is there just one list? Several lists? Who knows.
The TSA's scope is potentially much bigger than just airports, too. Just wait until there are TSA patrol cars out on the highways, and you can be pulled over, searched and arrested on "secret" laws or rules.
Maybe it's illegal to drive a hybrid civic with a "defeat Bush in '04" sticker. Who knows. They could make a regulation making it illegal to be any blacker than Will Smith.
Sure, it violates your constitutional right to due process. That is, being able to read and understand the laws you're charged with violating, which some lawyers might argue is somewhat important to presenting a defense.
But hey, we're fighting terror.
Hell, Nixon put the entire "War on Drugs" we have today into motion, largely to punish the anti-war hippies who were driving him out of office.
No, they'd type:
/mnt/cdrom
/sbin/supermount /sbin/mount /sbin/umount ... etc etc
/mnt/cdrom
#~> unmount
unmount: command not found
#~> which unmount
which: unmount not found
#~> man unmount
man: no entry for unmount(8)
#~>find / | grep *mount
#~>umount
umount: device busy
AND SO ON AND SO ON
I said I like the interface, just the way it was set up out of the box was kind of dopey. There was a popup menu of "configuration" stuff in the bottom bar, and the same menu reappeared in the main menu, etc..
Too many letters and numbers on the screen, most of the time they were just redundant. They system config stuff appearing everywhere was especially silly, since once the machine is set up, how often am I going to need to reconfigure arts?
It should maybe jam that stuff into one link, like Windows does with Control Panel.
Don't know why I was modded troll. I said I like KDE, and I like the UI, I just didn't like the way it was configured out of the box. I didn't feel like figuring out how to reconfigure all that stuff, and just used gnome instead.
I'm waiting for MMOFPS's or a massively multiplayer GTA3.. Yeah, I know about the online mod, but 64 players isn't "massive".
Huge technical challenge to try and get 1000's of people onto the same FarCry (for example) map, but it would really be cool.
I think of GTA because it has to be somewhat pointless. Not like a RTCW:ET setup where you have teams and roles. I can't play that, I have no idea what to do and the knobs who play it can't tolerate a "noob".
I want to just run around, shooting guys, throwing rocks, smashing up cars, flipping the bird, etc..
Naw, it's a ridiculously obvious cash grab. 50 bucks for the game, 10 bucks a month, and in a few months, another 50 bucks for the "expansion pack"..
I'd give some a shot, like City of Heroes or SWG, and I wouldnt mind burning 10 bucks for the first month if I decided the game sucked. But it'd cost me 60 bucks minimum to find out that the game sucks. Actually City of Villains, the sequel, sounds even better, since I'd much rather be Venom than Spidey, or Sinestro than Lantern, etc..
I kind of don't get it. Wheres the competition in CoH, besides telling everyone "nyah nyah I'm level 8". I mean, you're all good guys. I want to fight other players.
Besides, there are still plenty of ways to get an online gaming fix without spending a dime.
RPGs arent necessarily my bag in the first place. However, I'll pay to play the first MMOFPS. Or a MMOGTA, massively multiplayer online grand theft auto! Get to work, Rockstar.
Sure does. Under cygwin.
Can't see any reason it couldnt be ported to run natively under any Win32 based X server.
My favorite is "umount". How much productivity is gained by not having to type that pesky extra "n"?
"Your honor, the two youts..."
I can't help but think that I'm feeling the same thing the mice felt when they told Deep Thought to find the answer to Life the Universe, and Everything, and it told them it would take 10 million years.
//blah/blah" like some sort of caveman), and their sound thingie.
I will no doubt be equally impressed with the results as they were.
KDE's UI has some really nice looking elements, but altogether it's just cluttered and ugly. I'm talking about them jamming too much stuff in the menus, redundant menus, etc. Gnome's so much lighter and cleaner looking. Though, I like the lisa daemon (alot! why would I want to have to type mount "-t cifs