Clearly popups don't work in an effective way, yet programmers continue to use them for the wrong purposes.
It isn't just Windows either. Apps in Gnome, KDE and OpenOffice also open up stupid dialogs.
It is unreasonable to consider training users to be driven by popups. What would make more sense is for programmers to design their pop up use better so that it is more meaningful for the user.
It's OK for "Serious" people with the maturity to not abuse any holes they find. But putting a point-and-click level device in the hands of irresponsible people is in itself irresponsible.
Sure it is a BurgerFlipper degree, but there are already so many other useless study areas already. Universities love serving up shit like this because it's an easy way to get funding for having lots of students without having to have pesky stuff like chemistry labs and professors that know a thing or two.
Perhaps this is at least stupid enough that it gets the attention of parliament etc to rethink the role of universaities.
We are always trying to find patterns. Some of these might bear up against scrutiny and some might not. Some might have corner cases and some might not.
Kid drops lollipop and learns about gravity and slowly builds up an idea that if you drop something it falls. Hand the kid a hydrogen balloon and you'll see that "WTF!" look when it goes up when you let it go.
Kid learns that rocks sink when you throw them in water. I still remember that "WTF!" look on my 4 year old son's face when handed him a chunk of pumice to throw in the water and it floated!
When a pattern is beyond our ability to comprehend then it becomes a superstition: 6 is my lucky number and green is an unlucky color for me; if I dream about snakes then bad stuff is going to happen.
Perhaps these days pseudo-science has largely replaced straight-out superstition. People believe crap like cellphones can pop popcorn.
ndiswrapper does not support all the Windows driver calls, but I raise that as an example that it is possible to wrap drivers. Of course a full driver wrapper would be required. With MS's full access to the code it would be possible to write a full wrapper layer.
MS should have set up a far better defined driver architecture than they did. Even better they should have provided a backward compatibility mode for existing drivers. If ndiswrapper can support (some) Windows drivers under Linux, then it should have been a simple matter to support XP drivers under Vista.
No, instead MS adopted their normal "fuck you all" attitude and forced a new, ill conceived driver model onto the IHVs.
Sure, XP driver support would probably not been a good long term solution, but it would have been a good idea for a year or two: enough time to make the transition slicker.
Sure a lot of basic algorithms, learning to program in C# etc gets incorrectly labelled as Computer Science, but true Computer Science does actually exist.
Your examples are a bit misleading. Take for example gravity: people have been using it since Ugg dropped a rock on his toe. Gravity has been well characterized and used by engineers since Egyptian times (and before). Netwon helped imnprove the characterization. Yes there are still a bunch of theoretical physicist doing real work experiments to understand it better.
are the places where there is both coal and limestone. The same place that was once a forest that got fossilized then got covered by the sea. Scratch through the limestone and you find fossilized sea shells etc. Go deeper and you find fossilized twigs and leaves.
Like all asynchronous data, texts can be squished into idle network time. In a predominantly isochronous system (voice dominated) there has to be some spare capacity to keep the isochronous flow going. This space capacity can be used to transport text etc. Thus, the network cost of supporting text is zero, or damn close.
But the price they charge customers will depend on what customers are prepared to pay. Network operators charge more, per amount of data moved, for text than they do for voice (a single SMS uses less bandwidth than a second of voice, yet costs about 20x voice on most plans). Since it is waste, they can afford to discount heavily to bulk buyers (who don't mind their SPAM taking a bit longer to get there).
Thus, network operators love text: it converts their waste into something more valuable than their main product. How cool is that!
The ones doing research at universities and writing papers for journals are. The computer science grads that go to write software in the software development marketplace generally are not.
Of course I could have used pretty much any case where researchers are funded by people who will turn off the tap if they don't get the results they want. These days that includes many universities.
The old days Scientific Method of objecttively searching for truth is more or less obsolete.
These days most scientists have to work hard to keep their funding: publishing, making sure that they don't say things that offend their benefactors, etc.
If you don't believe me, go listen to the CMU podcast about Bill Gates. They suck up to him so badly it is embarrassing just to listen to it. So much for what was once a leading Computer Science department.
As much as we might dislike it, that is the New Scientific Method.
One problem about discussing the network here is that most slashdotters are unlikely to be typical customers.
Most customers moving off dial up are happy with doing a bit of email, browsing, youtubing and getting a few podcasts. In that case most of them really just want to have their phone line back. You can easily satisfy those customers with low GB caps.
Of course many of these people will slowly get into more bandwidth heavy usage and their wants will change. That might take a few years though.
Animals moved from a harsh environment to a more benign one might suffer, but many others will flourish.
Here is New Zealand many introduced species (like the Australian Brush Tail Possum) do very, very well. Many introduced birds do far better than the native birds too.
No doubt some of this is due to the fact than most introduced birds are more "street wise" and aggressive, as well as breeding faster, to survive in environments with more predators. They soon displace NZ birds which are tuned to very few predators, are far too trusting and breed far more slowly.
Similarly, by being able to survive in harsher environments, the mutant water bears could survive more marginal conditions, giving them an edge on other water bugs.
Slashdot Mirror
It isn't just Windows either. Apps in Gnome, KDE and OpenOffice also open up stupid dialogs.
It is unreasonable to consider training users to be driven by popups. What would make more sense is for programmers to design their pop up use better so that it is more meaningful for the user.
It's OK for "Serious" people with the maturity to not abuse any holes they find. But putting a point-and-click level device in the hands of irresponsible people is in itself irresponsible.
Like lots of software, obsolescence often comes before stability.
A statically linked Linux system with no USB etc can boot in 3 or so seconds to a command line, even on a 100MHz CPU.
Cost is variable depending on what you want.
There's also a wide range of power and flexibility too.
Many of these will boot in less than 3 sec to a command console.
Money is power. With money you can "lobby" the politicians for anything you want.
Bah!
Scaling power is hardly ever linear. Does a car engine cost 100x as much as a chainsaw engine? I think not.
Perhaps this is at least stupid enough that it gets the attention of parliament etc to rethink the role of universaities.
I think there is a text chat plug-in for lynx.
"How to speed" is pretty damn obvious. Perhaps "how to bump a lock and commit a burglary" would be a better analogy.
Kid drops lollipop and learns about gravity and slowly builds up an idea that if you drop something it falls. Hand the kid a hydrogen balloon and you'll see that "WTF!" look when it goes up when you let it go.
Kid learns that rocks sink when you throw them in water. I still remember that "WTF!" look on my 4 year old son's face when handed him a chunk of pumice to throw in the water and it floated!
When a pattern is beyond our ability to comprehend then it becomes a superstition: 6 is my lucky number and green is an unlucky color for me; if I dream about snakes then bad stuff is going to happen.
Perhaps these days pseudo-science has largely replaced straight-out superstition. People believe crap like cellphones can pop popcorn.
Don't let science or facts stand in the way of business.
Unfortunately this serves as "science" for the unwashed masses where public opinion and being fashionable count more than the quest for "truth".
ndiswrapper does not support all the Windows driver calls, but I raise that as an example that it is possible to wrap drivers. Of course a full driver wrapper would be required. With MS's full access to the code it would be possible to write a full wrapper layer.
I was going to switch to one of those plastic blow up dolls until I found out that they're loaded with carbon too!
No, instead MS adopted their normal "fuck you all" attitude and forced a new, ill conceived driver model onto the IHVs.
Sure, XP driver support would probably not been a good long term solution, but it would have been a good idea for a year or two: enough time to make the transition slicker.
Your examples are a bit misleading. Take for example gravity: people have been using it since Ugg dropped a rock on his toe. Gravity has been well characterized and used by engineers since Egyptian times (and before). Netwon helped imnprove the characterization. Yes there are still a bunch of theoretical physicist doing real work experiments to understand it better.
are the places where there is both coal and limestone. The same place that was once a forest that got fossilized then got covered by the sea. Scratch through the limestone and you find fossilized sea shells etc. Go deeper and you find fossilized twigs and leaves.
But the price they charge customers will depend on what customers are prepared to pay. Network operators charge more, per amount of data moved, for text than they do for voice (a single SMS uses less bandwidth than a second of voice, yet costs about 20x voice on most plans). Since it is waste, they can afford to discount heavily to bulk buyers (who don't mind their SPAM taking a bit longer to get there).
Thus, network operators love text: it converts their waste into something more valuable than their main product. How cool is that!
Of course I could have used pretty much any case where researchers are funded by people who will turn off the tap if they don't get the results they want. These days that includes many universities.
These days most scientists have to work hard to keep their funding: publishing, making sure that they don't say things that offend their benefactors, etc.
If you don't believe me, go listen to the CMU podcast about Bill Gates. They suck up to him so badly it is embarrassing just to listen to it. So much for what was once a leading Computer Science department.
As much as we might dislike it, that is the New Scientific Method.
Most customers moving off dial up are happy with doing a bit of email, browsing, youtubing and getting a few podcasts. In that case most of them really just want to have their phone line back. You can easily satisfy those customers with low GB caps.
Of course many of these people will slowly get into more bandwidth heavy usage and their wants will change. That might take a few years though.
Here is New Zealand many introduced species (like the Australian Brush Tail Possum) do very, very well. Many introduced birds do far better than the native birds too.
No doubt some of this is due to the fact than most introduced birds are more "street wise" and aggressive, as well as breeding faster, to survive in environments with more predators. They soon displace NZ birds which are tuned to very few predators, are far too trusting and breed far more slowly.
Similarly, by being able to survive in harsher environments, the mutant water bears could survive more marginal conditions, giving them an edge on other water bugs.
http://www.esquire.com/features/recycle-e-ink-cover