"We've provided direct quotes, photgraphic evidence, & links to authoritative sources detailing the indisputable facts that;"
No you haven't. Do a simple google search for Reichsautobahnen.
"A) Ancient cultures built advanced highway systems for military & commercial purposes;"
You are wrong. No ancient culture built highway systems in the modern sense. There *road* networks that were advanced for their time, but nobody built overpasses and cloverleafs until the 20th century. You yourself pointed out that the cloverleaf was not invented until the 1920s. Then you also make the ridiculous claim that romans had overpasses, which is cleary you mistaking aqueducts for overpasses (more on that later). All I'm saying is that Hitler made a *national system* out of the techniques available to him.
"B) That other Western nations built highway systems incorporating overpasses, clover leaves and other modern highway structures prior to the Nazi's;"
Yes, but my point is that Hitler systematized them, as no one else had done before.
"and C) That the notion of organizing highway traffic flows couldn't possibly have originated with Hitler or the Nazis."
Duh. You are only arguing with yourself here. This is called a straw man technique. I'm only claiming that hitler build the first modern highway system. It's modern in the sense that no other nation has improved on Hitler's design, and they have all basically copied it. It's a highway system in the sense that it connects the entire nation, and has things such as cloverleafs and overpasses so that traffic does not have to stop.
"
Still--you maintain the just opposite-- without offering a shred of documentation to backup you claims."
If you would have bothered to research my claims even a little bit, before you went off half-cocked, you wouldn't have to defend yourself in these ludicrous positions now. You are arguing against statements I didn't make, and you made a claim about the romans building overpasses which you have failed to back up, and you tried to backpedal when I called you out on it.
"How about you start now? Give us some links to *authoritative sources* that Hitler was an innovative visionary & civil engineering genius? (Links to Aryan Unity Magazine & skinheadnation.org don't count)"
"Plans for the autobahn date to the 1920's. Construction of the first segment (Cologne-Bonn) began in 1929 and was dedicated by Mayor Konrad Adenauer of Cologne on August 6, 1932. When Adolph Hitler assumed power as Chancellor of the Third Reich in 1933, he took the program over, claiming it for his own. "We are setting up a program," he said later that year, "the execution of which we do not want to leave to posterity."
Hitler's autobahn construction began in September 1933... By December 1941, when wartime needs brought construction to a halt, Germany had completed 2,400 miles (3,860 km), with another 1,550 miles (2,500 km) under construction.
At the outset of World War II in Europe, the autobahn proved to be a key asset to Germany. The German blitzkrieg ("lightning war"), which involved massive coordinated air and ground attacks to stun opponents into defeat, was a key to the German defeat of Poland in 1939, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands in 1940, and the Soviet Army in 1941. The highway network also enhanced Germany's ability to fight on two fronts-Europe in the west, the Soviet Union in the east."
"As the Allies pursued the German forces across Germany, the autobahn proved invaluable, especially to the supply trucks racing behind the troops. [referring to sections of the autobahn captured by the allies] "
"Oh, I get it--your central thesis is that *OVERPASSES* are what distinguish modern highway systems from what came before!"
NO! You don't get it! Overpasses are just *one part* of a modern highway system. Along with cloverleafs, asphalt, and other modern building techniques, none of which Hitler invented, but put to good use.
For the fifth time, This is my central thesis: Hitler and Nazi Germany developed the modern highway system. Other civilizations built road systems, but Hitler took all the modern techniques, and put them together in a systematic, comprehensive plan, and carried it out. What we have in Europe and the US is the system that Nazi Germany developed. Not the Romans, not the Incas, but Nazi Germany. We copied it directly from them. I didn't say they were the first to do it, or that they were the only ones who did it, but that they did THE MODERN VERSION.
"Speaking of overgeneralizing! Hitler & the Nazis certainly *did* use the best civil engineering, planning, & road building technology available during the mid-twentyth century--just as the Romans did when they built straight, wide, flat, paved roads *thousands* of years prior."
Yes, but the romans did not utilize overpasses and cloverleafs (or do you still think that aqueducts are overpasses?). And, how does overgeneralizing relate to this?
My point is not that Nazi Germany was the first empire to build a road system, but that they built the first *modern* *highway* (cloverleafs, overpasses, and roads strong enough to handle large vehicles) system, the same system that has been copied all over the modern world.
Oh, I get it. They didn't really make overpasses. You were just making a false claim to bolster your argument, and now you are trying to backpedal and say that what you said earlier isn't really what you said.
It's easy to make a water overpass, because it only has to bear the weight of the water. An overpass that can handle pedestrians, carts, chariots and armies wasn't developed until Nazi Germany.
For a civilization that engineered overpasses at will, as you claim, funny how none of them survived. Maybe out of all the buildings, roads, aqueducts and bridges, only the stone overpasses perished. But what's even funnier about that is how no Roman history ever mentions an overpass.
My guess is the image of an aqueduct was stuck in your mind when you made the earlier posting, but you thought it was an overpass. Then, when you looked it up and found out it wasn't an overpass at all, but really just an aqueduct, you came up with this baloney.
"C'mon. Everyone built roads for moving goods and armies."
"Indeed--and certainly before Hitler & the Nazis 'invented' highways. Are you done splitting hairs?"
This is not splitting hairs. This is my point, which you keep missing. Hitler and the Nazis did invent highways. I didn't say roads. You are overgeneralizing. A highway is not a road!
Hitler invented the modern highway system, which is a conglomeration of the best technologies available. He did the same project that the Romans did, which is using the best tech available to make a transportation system. But my point is that modern world uses Hitler's system, not the Romans'. What I am claiming is that Hitler developed the modern highway system, used all around the modern world. I didn't say he was the first person to build roads, or that he was the first person to move around goods and armies on roads.
Ealier I asked you to claim that the Romans invented cloverleafs and overpasses. You claimed they did invent overpasses. I found evidence of this in a google search, and Wikipedia's article on Roman roads does not mention Roman overpasses. Care to back that up?
"In fact the ancient Romans *did* build highway *systems* for moving goods *and* armies, using the most advanced technologies of the day."
The Romans had a complete, national plan for highway construction, or they just built a road here and there, upgraded and improved as needed? C'mon. Everyone built roads for moving goods and armies.
" Had you intended to make a point about the importance of overpasses & cloverleafs, you would have said so in your first post."
I didn't make that point in my first post, because it wasn't my point. My point was about a national highway system (of which overpasses and clover leafs were a *part* of), unlike anything that ever came before. Of course other previous empires had roads. Duh. Hitler just invented the modern system. I brought up the overpasses and cloverleafs to counter your argument that he had done nothing different than the Romans.
"Additionally, it would be stretching a point to imply that modern highway structures are somehow inherently evil even if they *were* thought of by Hitler--which is clearly the point you were trying to make. In any event, such a distinction would be irrelevant to the escense NYT story about economic, social & cultural change; not civil ngineering."
I didn't say anything about highways being evil. I said Hitler's vision was evil. I wanted to say this because anytime you speak about Hitler in any positive way (i.e. he buit the first modern highway system) people might think you are a Neo Nazi or a white supremacist. I wrote this for others reading our conversations.
"But those are about as vulnerable to bombing as railroads."
You keep missing my point. Yes, they are susceptable to bombing, just like railroads. But, when a cloverleaf or overpass is bombed, just just bulldoze a new path through the rubble *and the cars go around* while the damage is repaired. Traffic is slowed. When the railway is bombed, traffic is *stopped* until the railway is fixed. A modern interchange system is a more efficient, flexible system.
"Not to mention that the first cloverleaf I was able to find reference to was built in 1929 in New Jersey by Edward Delano" Again, I'm talking about a national highway *system*, not just a road, or an interchange, or an overpass. Hitler was the first person to make a National Highway/Interchange System. Delano built the first cloverleaf, yes, and maybe he envisioned a national system. But Hitler was the first person to make it happen. He built the dream. In that sense he was a visionary and a leader.
Of course he was also an evil monster, and all of his efforts were to realize a vision of totalitarianism and genocide, which I don't condone or respect in the least.
"You never ascribed roads to Hitler? To quote: 'Highways were first thought up by Hitler [...]'. It is unclear how a "modern highway system" is different from a well-paved road circa the Roman days."
You are right. I honestly thought that Hitler had invented roads. I had no idea that people got around on roads before the 1930s. I thought everyone carried machetes and hacked through plants in order to get around, which is why travel was so dangerous back then.
Hitler was in fact a road visionary. His MODERN HIGHWAY SYSTEM includes things like OVERPASSES and CLOVERLEAFS. No vehicle would ever need stop on its route on account of traffic, but only to refuel.
Now please go ahead and tell me that the Romans were building overpasses and cloverleafs.
I never ascribed roads to Hitler. I only ascribed modern highway systems to him. Highways offer incredible flexilibty over the modern tech of the day: railroads. As other posters pointed out railways and long trains are subject to bombing, and the railway has to be repairs. Automobiles are fairly flexible and can easily be diverted around a crater. Plus, automobiles are ultimately what will deliver supplies to the front lines, so you don't necessarily incur an extra unload/load cycle (although you still might have to move from large vehicles to smaller ones.)
"o no, Hitler as visionary of road building is kind of a laugh.
It is. Where in the world did you come up with that gem?
Highways were first thought up by Hitler to aid the Blitzkrieg technique and move armies and supplies quickly around Germany. He correctly imagined that the bottleneck in modern industrial warfare was not in the factory at all but in the delivery in the goods to the battlefield.
Truman developed the US highway system to prepare for war with the USSR. The long east-west highways would be the long supply chains bringing supplies from northeastern factories (i.e. Detroit) to the Western front/staging area in California. Highways out west were designed to be wide enough and have a long enough straight line to allow for a B52 bomber to land and be refueled. They still practice this to this day.
Slashdotters are fond of posting that porn and warfare drive technology. Highway systems are driven by warfare.
"Wiseman and his five-person crew tried to make it both personal for people who only want to trade among family, friends and colleagues"
Who the hell would want to do this? Just give it to one of them. I would want a service where I can post a classified to people who *aren't* family, friends, and colleagues.
"What do you do with ANY of the custom apps used on the desktop. Most large companies have at least a few apps their internal developers built for them, and I'll bet they weren't built with cross-platform use in mind. Sure, it may work for now in WINE, but what about when it throws a weird error?"
I would think that placing a home-brew app in WINE would be a *more* stable environment, as opposed to the next incarnation of windows. You can set up any version of WINE with any run-time options you want. Good luck getting that with the next incarnation of Windows.
If it works in WINE now, why would it stop working in the future? You're not going to get WINE updates crammed down your throat like you would Windows.
" What about when a new feature is needed? Recoding the app isn't really an option for most place."
This is the problem you have with crufty old VB apps that were developed on Win95 regardless of what version of Windows you are running now. If the app is going to be updated, just throw it back into your WINE environment. It seems like WINE would in fact be a better solution than Windows.
"Oh so now you want things to be added to the OS? I thought that this was slashdot that doesn't believe that IE should be part of the OS, make up your freaking mind."
Hey, just read what *I* say what when you are arguing with me. You are posting on slashdot too, so don't you have to agree the Slashdot Hive mind also?
"Personally I think thats a good thing, the only thing that change from one release to another that the user should see, is hardware support. Most of the rest should be in parts that the user doesn't normally see."
You just made my point for me. Ancestor asked for someone who thinks that Win98 and Win2K are even remotely similar. I said they are, and here you are agreeing with me. Under the hood they are different beasts, but the seats, the dash, the steering wheels, and the gauges are practically identical.
Theres nothing wrong with it per se, it's just not what I'm looking for.
There is a difference between primitiveness and flexibility. Let me ask you this: why would you ever need two file folder windows overlapping? Why would I need that 'flexibility'?
A. I never need them overlapping. I don't want to open two windows then right click and choose 'tile vertically'. That's not flexibility, that's redundancy.
Just give me two Window Explorer windows next to each other, so I can drag and drop stuff between this. Fill up the whole screen, dammit, I don't need a useless frame of the desktop poking through around the window.
It's not flexible, it's just primitive. It will do things that no one needs done. For instance, if you open two folders, they will be overlapping and there will be some of the desktop poking through around both of them. What a waste. You have to start moving things around to get the screen in a usable state again.
You are missing my point. I am talking about the Windows GUI and user-interface paradigm.
As far as a server, a little machine sitting all by itself, Win2K is completely different from Win98. But, as far as what the user sees in front of them, Win2K+ is basically Win98 that doesn't crash. Although the code base is totally different, the WinNT GUI is a clone of Win95. The way you interface with your computer using Win98, Win2K and WinXP is basically the same, except Win98 crashes frequently.
"I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone that can say with a straight face that Windows 98 remotely compares to the 2000/XP line"
2000 and XP are basically both win98 fixed. As far as the GUI, as far as what the user seesm there really isn't a heck of a lot of difference. Yes, I know that MS and its users don't want to learn a new system, so they are trying to keep it the same. But that's my point -- for the home user, XP/2000 are just 98 that works.
Hell, Windows doesn't even have a native Midnight Commander style interface to drag and drop objects from one place to another. The Windows GUI seems incredibly crufty too me (same goes for Jaguar, Gnome, KDE, and all these other desktop clones). There are a few minor improvements, such as "Open With", etc. But there is absolutely no innovation there.
It's interesting that the What and Why are confusing here. I've been thinking about the 5 Ws and what they tell us about our perception of reality. Here's what I'm thinking:
Who - What human or intelligent agents are involved.
What - Things that are involved, or a synopsis of events in noun form (i.e. a killing, a breach of contract).
When - At what time events took place.
Where - At what location events happened.
Why - The motives of the actors involved.
How - The mechanics of purely physical events (i.e. a tree falling and hitting a roof), or the steps a 'Who' took to accomplish a goal or plan.
If the 5 Ws are all we can verbally use to inquire into reality, it's interesting to me that we have one that deals specifically with motive and planning. This is like the 'intuitive psychology' that evolutionary psychologists say are hard-wired into our brains.
I think I'm getting my Ws confused here. How would you differentiate the Why and the What of code? Right now I'm thinking that the What is plain-English pseudocode. Would you agree?
The code is the 'How'. What the reader needs to know is 'Why' you are taking these steps. What larger goal are you accomplishing? What is the purpose of this code? What is its justification for existance?
Fill in this blank: "If were weren't running this code right here right now, we wouldn't be able to do _____. We could have done it this other way, but we chose this method because of X, Y, and Z.
In a real world example, code is like "Turn left, Go to High Street, turn right, continue on to 1122 High St, pull into the driveway, and park the vehicle." Those are the steps taken, but the goal you are acommplishing is "We want to return the library books, so we are going to drive the books to the library using the car."
OK, so why are we taking the books to the library? Ultimately all comments will filter up to the goals of the application. They are all nested subgoals of the design specs.
Slashdot Mirror
I never said that the Autobahn was Hitler's idea. You said that. The Reichsautobahnen, which I asked you to google, was Hilter's idea.
Checkmate, game and match. Thank you, and good night!
No you haven't. Do a simple google search for Reichsautobahnen.
"A) Ancient cultures built advanced highway systems for military & commercial purposes;"
You are wrong. No ancient culture built highway systems in the modern sense. There *road* networks that were advanced for their time, but nobody built overpasses and cloverleafs until the 20th century. You yourself pointed out that the cloverleaf was not invented until the 1920s. Then you also make the ridiculous claim that romans had overpasses, which is cleary you mistaking aqueducts for overpasses (more on that later). All I'm saying is that Hitler made a *national system* out of the techniques available to him.
"B) That other Western nations built highway systems incorporating overpasses, clover leaves and other modern highway structures prior to the Nazi's;"
Yes, but my point is that Hitler systematized them, as no one else had done before.
"and C) That the notion of organizing highway traffic flows couldn't possibly have originated with Hitler or the Nazis."
Duh. You are only arguing with yourself here. This is called a straw man technique. I'm only claiming that hitler build the first modern highway system. It's modern in the sense that no other nation has improved on Hitler's design, and they have all basically copied it. It's a highway system in the sense that it connects the entire nation, and has things such as cloverleafs and overpasses so that traffic does not have to stop.
" Still--you maintain the just opposite-- without offering a shred of documentation to backup you claims
If you would have bothered to research my claims even a little bit, before you went off half-cocked, you wouldn't have to defend yourself in these ludicrous positions now. You are arguing against statements I didn't make, and you made a claim about the romans building overpasses which you have failed to back up, and you tried to backpedal when I called you out on it.
"How about you start now? Give us some links to *authoritative sources* that Hitler was an innovative visionary & civil engineering genius? (Links to Aryan Unity Magazine & skinheadnation.org don't count)"
Is The US Department of Transportation's page about the Reichsautobahnen authoritative enough?
Here a few select quotes:
"Oh, I get it--your central thesis is that *OVERPASSES* are what distinguish modern highway systems from what came before!"
NO! You don't get it! Overpasses are just *one part* of a modern highway system. Along with cloverleafs, asphalt, and other modern building techniques, none of which Hitler invented, but put to good use.
For the fifth time, This is my central thesis: Hitler and Nazi Germany developed the modern highway system. Other civilizations built road systems, but Hitler took all the modern techniques, and put them together in a systematic, comprehensive plan, and carried it out. What we have in Europe and the US is the system that Nazi Germany developed. Not the Romans, not the Incas, but Nazi Germany. We copied it directly from them. I didn't say they were the first to do it, or that they were the only ones who did it, but that they did THE MODERN VERSION.
"Speaking of overgeneralizing! Hitler & the Nazis certainly *did* use the best civil engineering, planning, & road building technology available during the mid-twentyth century--just as the Romans did when they built straight, wide, flat, paved roads *thousands* of years prior."
Yes, but the romans did not utilize overpasses and cloverleafs (or do you still think that aqueducts are overpasses?). And, how does overgeneralizing relate to this?
My point is not that Nazi Germany was the first empire to build a road system, but that they built the first *modern* *highway* (cloverleafs, overpasses, and roads strong enough to handle large vehicles) system, the same system that has been copied all over the modern world.
Oh, I get it. They didn't really make overpasses. You were just making a false claim to bolster your argument, and now you are trying to backpedal and say that what you said earlier isn't really what you said.
It's easy to make a water overpass, because it only has to bear the weight of the water. An overpass that can handle pedestrians, carts, chariots and armies wasn't developed until Nazi Germany.
For a civilization that engineered overpasses at will, as you claim, funny how none of them survived. Maybe out of all the buildings, roads, aqueducts and bridges, only the stone overpasses perished. But what's even funnier about that is how no Roman history ever mentions an overpass.
My guess is the image of an aqueduct was stuck in your mind when you made the earlier posting, but you thought it was an overpass. Then, when you looked it up and found out it wasn't an overpass at all, but really just an aqueduct, you came up with this baloney.
"C'mon. Everyone built roads for moving goods and armies."
"Indeed--and certainly before Hitler & the Nazis 'invented' highways. Are you done splitting hairs?"
This is not splitting hairs. This is my point, which you keep missing. Hitler and the Nazis did invent highways. I didn't say roads. You are overgeneralizing. A highway is not a road!
Hitler invented the modern highway system, which is a conglomeration of the best technologies available. He did the same project that the Romans did, which is using the best tech available to make a transportation system. But my point is that modern world uses Hitler's system, not the Romans'. What I am claiming is that Hitler developed the modern highway system, used all around the modern world. I didn't say he was the first person to build roads, or that he was the first person to move around goods and armies on roads.
Ealier I asked you to claim that the Romans invented cloverleafs and overpasses. You claimed they did invent overpasses. I found evidence of this in a google search, and Wikipedia's article on Roman roads does not mention Roman overpasses. Care to back that up?
I can't find anything about ancient romans makeing/using the overpass. Can you provide a link?
"In fact the ancient Romans *did* build highway *systems* for moving goods *and* armies, using the most advanced technologies of the day."
The Romans had a complete, national plan for highway construction, or they just built a road here and there, upgraded and improved as needed? C'mon. Everyone built roads for moving goods and armies.
" Had you intended to make a point about the importance of overpasses & cloverleafs, you would have said so in your first post."
I didn't make that point in my first post, because it wasn't my point. My point was about a national highway system (of which overpasses and clover leafs were a *part* of), unlike anything that ever came before. Of course other previous empires had roads. Duh. Hitler just invented the modern system. I brought up the overpasses and cloverleafs to counter your argument that he had done nothing different than the Romans.
"Additionally, it would be stretching a point to imply that modern highway structures are somehow inherently evil even if they *were* thought of by Hitler--which is clearly the point you were trying to make. In any event, such a distinction would be irrelevant to the escense NYT story about economic, social & cultural change; not civil ngineering."
I didn't say anything about highways being evil. I said Hitler's vision was evil. I wanted to say this because anytime you speak about Hitler in any positive way (i.e. he buit the first modern highway system) people might think you are a Neo Nazi or a white supremacist. I wrote this for others reading our conversations.
"But those are about as vulnerable to bombing as railroads."
You keep missing my point. Yes, they are susceptable to bombing, just like railroads. But, when a cloverleaf or overpass is bombed, just just bulldoze a new path through the rubble *and the cars go around* while the damage is repaired. Traffic is slowed. When the railway is bombed, traffic is *stopped* until the railway is fixed. A modern interchange system is a more efficient, flexible system.
"Not to mention that the first cloverleaf I was able to find reference to was built in 1929 in New Jersey by Edward Delano" Again, I'm talking about a national highway *system*, not just a road, or an interchange, or an overpass. Hitler was the first person to make a National Highway/Interchange System. Delano built the first cloverleaf, yes, and maybe he envisioned a national system. But Hitler was the first person to make it happen. He built the dream. In that sense he was a visionary and a leader.
Of course he was also an evil monster, and all of his efforts were to realize a vision of totalitarianism and genocide, which I don't condone or respect in the least.
"You never ascribed roads to Hitler? To quote: 'Highways were first thought up by Hitler [...]'. It is unclear how a "modern highway system" is different from a well-paved road circa the Roman days."
You are right. I honestly thought that Hitler had invented roads. I had no idea that people got around on roads before the 1930s. I thought everyone carried machetes and hacked through plants in order to get around, which is why travel was so dangerous back then.
Hitler was in fact a road visionary. His MODERN HIGHWAY SYSTEM includes things like OVERPASSES and CLOVERLEAFS. No vehicle would ever need stop on its route on account of traffic, but only to refuel.
Now please go ahead and tell me that the Romans were building overpasses and cloverleafs.
"So ascribing this idea to Hitler is a bit much."
I never ascribed roads to Hitler. I only ascribed modern highway systems to him. Highways offer incredible flexilibty over the modern tech of the day: railroads. As other posters pointed out railways and long trains are subject to bombing, and the railway has to be repairs. Automobiles are fairly flexible and can easily be diverted around a crater. Plus, automobiles are ultimately what will deliver supplies to the front lines, so you don't necessarily incur an extra unload/load cycle (although you still might have to move from large vehicles to smaller ones.)
"o no, Hitler as visionary of road building is kind of a laugh.
It is. Where in the world did you come up with that gem?
Highways were first thought up by Hitler to aid the Blitzkrieg technique and move armies and supplies quickly around Germany. He correctly imagined that the bottleneck in modern industrial warfare was not in the factory at all but in the delivery in the goods to the battlefield.
Truman developed the US highway system to prepare for war with the USSR. The long east-west highways would be the long supply chains bringing supplies from northeastern factories (i.e. Detroit) to the Western front/staging area in California. Highways out west were designed to be wide enough and have a long enough straight line to allow for a B52 bomber to land and be refueled. They still practice this to this day.
Slashdotters are fond of posting that porn and warfare drive technology. Highway systems are driven by warfare.
"Wiseman and his five-person crew tried to make it both personal for people who only want to trade among family, friends and colleagues"
Who the hell would want to do this? Just give it to one of them. I would want a service where I can post a classified to people who *aren't* family, friends, and colleagues.
Alright, alright, it's cool already. Sheesh.
OK, but where's the PVC?
Here is the PVC flamsthrower project. Great for frying Zerglings!
"What do you do with ANY of the custom apps used on the desktop. Most large companies have at least a few apps their internal developers built for them, and I'll bet they weren't built with cross-platform use in mind. Sure, it may work for now in WINE, but what about when it throws a weird error?"
I would think that placing a home-brew app in WINE would be a *more* stable environment, as opposed to the next incarnation of windows. You can set up any version of WINE with any run-time options you want. Good luck getting that with the next incarnation of Windows.
If it works in WINE now, why would it stop working in the future? You're not going to get WINE updates crammed down your throat like you would Windows.
" What about when a new feature is needed? Recoding the app isn't really an option for most place."
This is the problem you have with crufty old VB apps that were developed on Win95 regardless of what version of Windows you are running now. If the app is going to be updated, just throw it back into your WINE environment. It seems like WINE would in fact be a better solution than Windows.
"Oh so now you want things to be added to the OS? I thought that this was slashdot that doesn't believe that IE should be part of the OS, make up your freaking mind."
Hey, just read what *I* say what when you are arguing with me. You are posting on slashdot too, so don't you have to agree the Slashdot Hive mind also?
"Personally I think thats a good thing, the only thing that change from one release to another that the user should see, is hardware support. Most of the rest should be in parts that the user doesn't normally see."
You just made my point for me. Ancestor asked for someone who thinks that Win98 and Win2K are even remotely similar. I said they are, and here you are agreeing with me. Under the hood they are different beasts, but the seats, the dash, the steering wheels, and the gauges are practically identical.
Theres nothing wrong with it per se, it's just not what I'm looking for.
There is a difference between primitiveness and flexibility. Let me ask you this: why would you ever need two file folder windows overlapping? Why would I need that 'flexibility'?
A. I never need them overlapping. I don't want to open two windows then right click and choose 'tile vertically'. That's not flexibility, that's redundancy.
Just give me two Window Explorer windows next to each other, so I can drag and drop stuff between this. Fill up the whole screen, dammit, I don't need a useless frame of the desktop poking through around the window.
It's not flexible, it's just primitive. It will do things that no one needs done. For instance, if you open two folders, they will be overlapping and there will be some of the desktop poking through around both of them. What a waste. You have to start moving things around to get the screen in a usable state again.
You are missing my point. I am talking about the Windows GUI and user-interface paradigm.
As far as a server, a little machine sitting all by itself, Win2K is completely different from Win98. But, as far as what the user sees in front of them, Win2K+ is basically Win98 that doesn't crash. Although the code base is totally different, the WinNT GUI is a clone of Win95. The way you interface with your computer using Win98, Win2K and WinXP is basically the same, except Win98 crashes frequently.
It does not have a Midnight Commander style interface. One with the screen split by source and target folder.
"I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone that can say with a straight face that Windows 98 remotely compares to the 2000/XP line"
2000 and XP are basically both win98 fixed. As far as the GUI, as far as what the user seesm there really isn't a heck of a lot of difference. Yes, I know that MS and its users don't want to learn a new system, so they are trying to keep it the same. But that's my point -- for the home user, XP/2000 are just 98 that works.
Hell, Windows doesn't even have a native Midnight Commander style interface to drag and drop objects from one place to another. The Windows GUI seems incredibly crufty too me (same goes for Jaguar, Gnome, KDE, and all these other desktop clones). There are a few minor improvements, such as "Open With", etc. But there is absolutely no innovation there.
It's interesting that the What and Why are confusing here. I've been thinking about the 5 Ws and what they tell us about our perception of reality. Here's what I'm thinking:
Who - What human or intelligent agents are involved.
What - Things that are involved, or a synopsis of events in noun form (i.e. a killing, a breach of contract).
When - At what time events took place.
Where - At what location events happened.
Why - The motives of the actors involved.
How - The mechanics of purely physical events (i.e. a tree falling and hitting a roof), or the steps a 'Who' took to accomplish a goal or plan.
If the 5 Ws are all we can verbally use to inquire into reality, it's interesting to me that we have one that deals specifically with motive and planning. This is like the 'intuitive psychology' that evolutionary psychologists say are hard-wired into our brains.
I think I'm getting my Ws confused here. How would you differentiate the Why and the What of code? Right now I'm thinking that the What is plain-English pseudocode. Would you agree?
The code is the 'How'. What the reader needs to know is 'Why' you are taking these steps. What larger goal are you accomplishing? What is the purpose of this code? What is its justification for existance?
Fill in this blank: "If were weren't running this code right here right now, we wouldn't be able to do _____. We could have done it this other way, but we chose this method because of X, Y, and Z.
In a real world example, code is like "Turn left, Go to High Street, turn right, continue on to 1122 High St, pull into the driveway, and park the vehicle." Those are the steps taken, but the goal you are acommplishing is "We want to return the library books, so we are going to drive the books to the library using the car."
OK, so why are we taking the books to the library? Ultimately all comments will filter up to the goals of the application. They are all nested subgoals of the design specs.