I did a lot of development on early Apple machines, of one flavor or another, and I had one assembler library that would run fine on the original MOS Technology chips but not on either Rockwell's or Synertek's parts. I remember that that particular program had some self-modifying page-zero code. The routine that copied the code down there mangled one byte, and it happened that the resulting illegal instruction did nothing on the MCS6502. It must have done something on the others because the program would lock up. Never did figure out exactly what was going on. I couldn't believe it when I finally realized that it was the damn processor causing the problem.
If there's anything that history has shown us, it is that communal hatred lasts much longer than the event(s) which caused it.
{sigh} True enough... I'd go further and say, such hatred lasts well after the original event(s) have been forgotten.
The GP is correct. Military forces have always been able to command the lion's share of research funds (that's the case with any major power that would like to remain a major power.) That's the case in peacetime, and when there's a conflict on, particularly when dealing with an enemy at or near technological parity, the military usually demands (and gets!) even more funding.
However, our military is one of the comparative few that has regularly spun off non-sensitive research into commercial applications. The old BMDO (Ballistic Missile Defense Organization) group (they've since changed their name) was primarily charged with seeding commercial ventures with government-funded research results. Worked rather well over the past couple decades.
So yes, if all that money simply goes into bigger and better weapons it could be considered a waste from a civilian perspective. But when it is shared and used to improve the private sector, it is anything but.
it's that iTunes is even more capable... and it's a more profitable place to put that functionality, if they were going to do it at all.
Like I said, a central server (iTunes) to handle payments and authorization, and a swarming protocol to handle the actual distribution. Doesn't matter one bit what computer the user accesses iTunes from, but if the person doesn't have a regular PC around there's no reason that he can't use the ATV to access iTunes and download his shows.
Well, I haven't used OS/2 in ten years but I remember being impressed that I could read and write to a floppy and have no apparent effect on other tasks.
We had one. It was called "Waco". I watched it on TV. It didn't end well.
In any event, I believe the GP wasn't quite right. The Right to Bear Arms has little to do with "affecting Government policies or methods" other than as a deterrent. If you want to see what happens when people use firearms to directly influence the political process, there are plenty of places in the world where that goes on regularly. It also rarely ends well. We call those situations "coups".
The Second Amendment is there for the time when We, The People of these United States, have given up on the political process, can no longer tolerate our Federal Government's policies or methods, and have set out to replace it and them. Without weapons that is infinitely more difficult. The Second also serves a deterrent, so that the government (any government, local, state or Federal) can't get too overbearing. And what I've been seeing lately, in my State, indicates that more of us need to keep and bear arms. The face of government that most of us see are the police, and they are starting to get out of hand. Power corrupts and all that.
Point being, if we ever reach the point where we need those guns, en-masse, to overthrow our own government, the Second Amendment will no longer matter. But its existence for all this time (and our observance of it) will have given us the chance to try again.
At least, that's the theory. Time will tell if the Founders were right once again.
On the other hand, a lot of those parts were probably built to specs that no commercial entity could afford. You might be better off with used mil-spec and NASA parts.
IBM got a number of things right, prior to the release of the original IBM Personal Computer. I was working in a computer store at the time, in 1981, working in both sales and service. I was sent to Boca Raton in the first wave of salespeople and technicians for training on the as-yet-unannounced "IBM PC". I was unusual in that I was sent to both week-long classes, because the company couldn't decide whether I was a salesman or a service tech.
It was a very interesting week. One question that came up early was, "that's great, but is it going to be another Apple ][, where we have to try and sell people a computer that won't do anything unless they write their own software?" Yes, I know, at that point the Apple ][ was already well-established but when it was first released it really had little application support. However, the IBM folks pointed to a shelf full of business software that they had already had ported to their new machine. BPI and Peachtree accounting, a couple of word processors and a bunch of other stuff. Smart, very smart.
So, in combination with the magic letters IBM and plenty of common business apps including mainframe terminal emulation, it was hard not to sell the things. And this was when the only video out available was the IBM Monochrome Display and Printer Adapter! The original CGA card followed fairly quickly but we still sold a ton of those things with just the original green monochrome text-only display. It was all that businesses needed back then.
The Apple grew out of the needs of the original hacker community, where everyone wrote their own software, and developed into a serviceable business system because developers jumped on-board and provided the applications software. IBM recognized this need, and made sure that there were enough good apps out for the PC before they even announced its existence. Some of them were rough ports, in a couple of cases obvious conversions from well-known Apple ][ software. But that didn't matter: business wanted an IBM computer system and it had programs that worked. End of story.
I worked at a game development house in the mid-eighties: that company developed the original graphics demonstration that was shipped with every Commodore Amiga. I didn't get to write code for it, as a matter of fact it had no native development tools and the two guys that were coding for it had to work on a couple of Sparcs (the two machines were in a room with an electronic lock, nobody was allowed in, all very hush-hush.) The prototype Amiga 1000's came in hand-built plywood cases, and didn't even have a power-on/reset circuit.
Anyway, as impressive a platform as the Amiga was, from both a hardware and operating system perspective, it suffered from a distinct lack of applications and an even more distinct lack of marketing. Commodore could have taken the lead and blown everyone else out of the water, but they apparently made the mistake of assuming that technological superiority would carry the day. It didn't then, and it doesn't now... even the best products still have to be useful, and still have to be marketed. Commodore never really figured that out.
I remember their one TV ad, where the sonorous announcer's voice said, "Only Amiga makes it possible." Makes what possible. The ad didn't say, and really was more confusing than anything else.
I guess it depends entirely upon your definition of "useful".
From my perspective as developer of both real-time data acquisition systems and graphical user interfaces, I would say that it is difficult to make Windows do anything "useful". At least, it's often way more difficult than it ought to be. And no, I'm not a god, but there are times when I sit at my workstation and wish that I was.
I took the GP's point to be less that little kids are always innocent and can do no wrong but that, in the public's eye, they are perceived as being innocent unless shown otherwise. And that's pretty much true... even if that little bastard shot you with his Daddy's revolver just because he could, nobody is going to believe it unless there were plenty of witnesses.
Regarding parents: if you're a parent, legally responsible for your children, that means you are legally responsible for your children. If they screw up... it means you screwed up, and you get to take the heat. That's one of the many risks one accepts as a parent in this country.
AppleTV isn't even potentially part of any "real-time swarming video distribution system.
It's a computer and it has an Ethernet jack (wi-fi too, I believe, although I didn't RTFA.) So it most certainly is a potential part of any distribution scheme Apple comes up with. Or more likely, already has waiting in the wings. It would just take some additional software and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if it were already in there.
Given the absolutely phenomenal success of the Bit Torrent protocol at distributing large files by, well, distributing the bandwidth... I'd say it's a good bet that ATV will eventually work along those lines. They'd have to add an encryption layer, and maybe a central server to handle payment processing and authorization. In any event, this wouldn't be Bit Torrent per se, I'm sure, it would be a proprietary form of it. However, swarming works pretty well for schlepping big files around. Why should Apple pay all the bandwidth charges if they can get us to provide all of it, for free?
As I remember, Valve hired Bram Cohen to work on their Valve Steam Content Distribution System, on the swarming aspects of their protocol. Really, there's no other way to distribute vast amounts of content to even vaster numbers of users other than making the users serve... as servers.
Yes, well, pretty much everyone who's fortunate enough to have created a gravy train will do anything to stay on it. Doesn't make it right, but it does make it common.
Many problems are averted by the pre-emptive application of a lawyer. That is, dot the i's and cross the t's before you walk into a business situation that might have negative consequences. Generally, only someone intimately familiar with the applicable law can do that for you.
Sometimes you can operate on a handshake, but unless you have a certain degree of trust (and history) between you and your customer, it's generally best to put it on paper. I've always found that the people that did not want to have a business arrangement committed to a written contract were the ones intended to shaft me later. Fifteen years as a contract developer taught me that much.
My beef isn't so much with attorneys themselves (who, after all, are just paid employees, corporate tools like the rest of us) but with the suits who own them using them as a first line of defense, rather than as a matter of last resort. Granted, the lawyers often encourage that kind of thinking.
Sometimes it works out. I was on a contract job about twenty years ago where we delivered on our milestones for the project, and (as you might think) expected to get paid. The customer started coming up with lots of additional things that he wanted to have included in the program (stuff not in the spec)... we added a few, as a matter of goodwill, but called a halt when the hours started adding up. Next thing I know I get a call from their company attorney. He was pleasant enough, actually, but wanted to know why we had chosen not to fulfill our obligations. I said we had fulfilled all of them to date, that I'd be happy to prove that if he wished, and that we only wanted his employer to fulfill their obligations.
Apparently, the manager of the project had actually lied to the lawyer, thinking that we would immediately cave in because of the implied legal threat. This guy was interesting though, and really tried to serve as a negotiator, asked me "come on, I still sense some enthusiasm for the project, isn't there any way we can work this out?" I told him, sure, enthusiasm isn't the issue, money is the issue. We're a business too, and we expect to get paid for our trouble. Once he realized that I wasn't kidding, that he'd been lied to... well, he told me he'd call back. He did, and said I could drop by and pick up a check. I was more than a little surprised at the outcome, but the rest of the project went much more smoothly.
I got the feeling some attitudes adjustments got made. Lawyers don't like being made into fools. However, I was impressed that this lawyer didn't come down like a ton of bricks right off the bat: he tried to get all the facts first.
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I did a lot of development on early Apple machines, of one flavor or another, and I had one assembler library that would run fine on the original MOS Technology chips but not on either Rockwell's or Synertek's parts. I remember that that particular program had some self-modifying page-zero code. The routine that copied the code down there mangled one byte, and it happened that the resulting illegal instruction did nothing on the MCS6502. It must have done something on the others because the program would lock up. Never did figure out exactly what was going on. I couldn't believe it when I finally realized that it was the damn processor causing the problem.
buttons are cheaper than pots or shaft encoders. Consequently, they're going to be around for a long, long time.
They're no big deal if you're Joe Corporate with a school of sharks on retainer.
If there's anything that history has shown us, it is that communal hatred lasts much longer than the event(s) which caused it. ... I'd go further and say, such hatred lasts well after the original event(s) have been forgotten.
{sigh} True enough
Thank you.
The GP is correct. Military forces have always been able to command the lion's share of research funds (that's the case with any major power that would like to remain a major power.) That's the case in peacetime, and when there's a conflict on, particularly when dealing with an enemy at or near technological parity, the military usually demands (and gets!) even more funding.
However, our military is one of the comparative few that has regularly spun off non-sensitive research into commercial applications. The old BMDO (Ballistic Missile Defense Organization) group (they've since changed their name) was primarily charged with seeding commercial ventures with government-funded research results. Worked rather well over the past couple decades.
So yes, if all that money simply goes into bigger and better weapons it could be considered a waste from a civilian perspective. But when it is shared and used to improve the private sector, it is anything but.
"Would you like to pet my pussy?"
"Sure. Move the cat."
72. You missed the one from his ex-wife's new boyfriend.
In some respects that's not too far from the truth, but at the rate we're losing those freedoms I figure they'll eventually stop hating us.
If there was ever an example of the bully syndrome at work, this would seem to be it.
Just on the off chance that you're not crazy, I ordered myself a copy.
He has an ebook available on his site too, although he says it's Windows only, so it is probably in Microsoft's format. $14.95.
Not that the U.S. is an Empire, in the traditional sense, but that's pretty much how all empires end.
it's that iTunes is even more capable... and it's a more profitable place to put that functionality, if they were going to do it at all.
Like I said, a central server (iTunes) to handle payments and authorization, and a swarming protocol to handle the actual distribution. Doesn't matter one bit what computer the user accesses iTunes from, but if the person doesn't have a regular PC around there's no reason that he can't use the ATV to access iTunes and download his shows.
Well, I haven't used OS/2 in ten years but I remember being impressed that I could read and write to a floppy and have no apparent effect on other tasks.
Maybe a 'test case' is in order....
We had one. It was called "Waco". I watched it on TV. It didn't end well.
In any event, I believe the GP wasn't quite right. The Right to Bear Arms has little to do with "affecting Government policies or methods" other than as a deterrent. If you want to see what happens when people use firearms to directly influence the political process, there are plenty of places in the world where that goes on regularly. It also rarely ends well. We call those situations "coups".
The Second Amendment is there for the time when We, The People of these United States, have given up on the political process, can no longer tolerate our Federal Government's policies or methods, and have set out to replace it and them. Without weapons that is infinitely more difficult. The Second also serves a deterrent, so that the government (any government, local, state or Federal) can't get too overbearing. And what I've been seeing lately, in my State, indicates that more of us need to keep and bear arms. The face of government that most of us see are the police, and they are starting to get out of hand. Power corrupts and all that.
Point being, if we ever reach the point where we need those guns, en-masse, to overthrow our own government, the Second Amendment will no longer matter. But its existence for all this time (and our observance of it) will have given us the chance to try again.
At least, that's the theory. Time will tell if the Founders were right once again.
On the other hand, a lot of those parts were probably built to specs that no commercial entity could afford. You might be better off with used mil-spec and NASA parts.
IBM got a number of things right, prior to the release of the original IBM Personal Computer. I was working in a computer store at the time, in 1981, working in both sales and service. I was sent to Boca Raton in the first wave of salespeople and technicians for training on the as-yet-unannounced "IBM PC". I was unusual in that I was sent to both week-long classes, because the company couldn't decide whether I was a salesman or a service tech.
... even the best products still have to be useful, and still have to be marketed. Commodore never really figured that out.
It was a very interesting week. One question that came up early was, "that's great, but is it going to be another Apple ][, where we have to try and sell people a computer that won't do anything unless they write their own software?" Yes, I know, at that point the Apple ][ was already well-established but when it was first released it really had little application support. However, the IBM folks pointed to a shelf full of business software that they had already had ported to their new machine. BPI and Peachtree accounting, a couple of word processors and a bunch of other stuff. Smart, very smart.
So, in combination with the magic letters IBM and plenty of common business apps including mainframe terminal emulation, it was hard not to sell the things. And this was when the only video out available was the IBM Monochrome Display and Printer Adapter! The original CGA card followed fairly quickly but we still sold a ton of those things with just the original green monochrome text-only display. It was all that businesses needed back then.
The Apple grew out of the needs of the original hacker community, where everyone wrote their own software, and developed into a serviceable business system because developers jumped on-board and provided the applications software. IBM recognized this need, and made sure that there were enough good apps out for the PC before they even announced its existence. Some of them were rough ports, in a couple of cases obvious conversions from well-known Apple ][ software. But that didn't matter: business wanted an IBM computer system and it had programs that worked. End of story.
I worked at a game development house in the mid-eighties: that company developed the original graphics demonstration that was shipped with every Commodore Amiga. I didn't get to write code for it, as a matter of fact it had no native development tools and the two guys that were coding for it had to work on a couple of Sparcs (the two machines were in a room with an electronic lock, nobody was allowed in, all very hush-hush.) The prototype Amiga 1000's came in hand-built plywood cases, and didn't even have a power-on/reset circuit.
Anyway, as impressive a platform as the Amiga was, from both a hardware and operating system perspective, it suffered from a distinct lack of applications and an even more distinct lack of marketing. Commodore could have taken the lead and blown everyone else out of the water, but they apparently made the mistake of assuming that technological superiority would carry the day. It didn't then, and it doesn't now
I remember their one TV ad, where the sonorous announcer's voice said, "Only Amiga makes it possible." Makes what possible. The ad didn't say, and really was more confusing than anything else.
I guess it depends entirely upon your definition of "useful".
From my perspective as developer of both real-time data acquisition systems and graphical user interfaces, I would say that it is difficult to make Windows do anything "useful". At least, it's often way more difficult than it ought to be. And no, I'm not a god, but there are times when I sit at my workstation and wish that I was.
Yeah ... like being able to access a floppy drive without the shell coming to a halt.
I took the GP's point to be less that little kids are always innocent and can do no wrong but that, in the public's eye, they are perceived as being innocent unless shown otherwise. And that's pretty much true ... even if that little bastard shot you with his Daddy's revolver just because he could, nobody is going to believe it unless there were plenty of witnesses.
... it means you screwed up, and you get to take the heat. That's one of the many risks one accepts as a parent in this country.
Regarding parents: if you're a parent, legally responsible for your children, that means you are legally responsible for your children. If they screw up
AppleTV isn't even potentially part of any "real-time swarming video distribution system.
... I'd say it's a good bet that ATV will eventually work along those lines. They'd have to add an encryption layer, and maybe a central server to handle payment processing and authorization. In any event, this wouldn't be Bit Torrent per se, I'm sure, it would be a proprietary form of it. However, swarming works pretty well for schlepping big files around. Why should Apple pay all the bandwidth charges if they can get us to provide all of it, for free?
... as servers.
It's a computer and it has an Ethernet jack (wi-fi too, I believe, although I didn't RTFA.) So it most certainly is a potential part of any distribution scheme Apple comes up with. Or more likely, already has waiting in the wings. It would just take some additional software and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if it were already in there.
Given the absolutely phenomenal success of the Bit Torrent protocol at distributing large files by, well, distributing the bandwidth
As I remember, Valve hired Bram Cohen to work on their Valve Steam Content Distribution System, on the swarming aspects of their protocol. Really, there's no other way to distribute vast amounts of content to even vaster numbers of users other than making the users serve
Yes, well, pretty much everyone who's fortunate enough to have created a gravy train will do anything to stay on it. Doesn't make it right, but it does make it common.
... we added a few, as a matter of goodwill, but called a halt when the hours started adding up. Next thing I know I get a call from their company attorney. He was pleasant enough, actually, but wanted to know why we had chosen not to fulfill our obligations. I said we had fulfilled all of them to date, that I'd be happy to prove that if he wished, and that we only wanted his employer to fulfill their obligations.
... well, he told me he'd call back. He did, and said I could drop by and pick up a check. I was more than a little surprised at the outcome, but the rest of the project went much more smoothly.
Many problems are averted by the pre-emptive application of a lawyer. That is, dot the i's and cross the t's before you walk into a business situation that might have negative consequences. Generally, only someone intimately familiar with the applicable law can do that for you.
Sometimes you can operate on a handshake, but unless you have a certain degree of trust (and history) between you and your customer, it's generally best to put it on paper. I've always found that the people that did not want to have a business arrangement committed to a written contract were the ones intended to shaft me later. Fifteen years as a contract developer taught me that much.
My beef isn't so much with attorneys themselves (who, after all, are just paid employees, corporate tools like the rest of us) but with the suits who own them using them as a first line of defense, rather than as a matter of last resort. Granted, the lawyers often encourage that kind of thinking.
Sometimes it works out. I was on a contract job about twenty years ago where we delivered on our milestones for the project, and (as you might think) expected to get paid. The customer started coming up with lots of additional things that he wanted to have included in the program (stuff not in the spec)
Apparently, the manager of the project had actually lied to the lawyer, thinking that we would immediately cave in because of the implied legal threat. This guy was interesting though, and really tried to serve as a negotiator, asked me "come on, I still sense some enthusiasm for the project, isn't there any way we can work this out?" I told him, sure, enthusiasm isn't the issue, money is the issue. We're a business too, and we expect to get paid for our trouble. Once he realized that I wasn't kidding, that he'd been lied to
I got the feeling some attitudes adjustments got made. Lawyers don't like being made into fools. However, I was impressed that this lawyer didn't come down like a ton of bricks right off the bat: he tried to get all the facts first.
I had one but I can't beat yours.
All I know is, if it can't run Duke Nukem Atomic Edition, Shadow Warrior or Blood it's useless.