Not my worst, but my favourite:) ~ I was playing an adventure game involving lots of heat, sand, starvation... it was all rather gloomy and surreal, and I had lit a couple candles and was so "into" it that it took me a while until I noticed my other monitor was actually burning. I found this so amusing I had to email the author about it. (Got a reply two minutes later.) The monitor still works, just has a hole. The ionised omega particles will eventually kill me, but who cares.
The worst was something in my new super duper A3 photo printer breaking off while I was printing my homework (due now). The homework would have involved some scissors-and-glue work, wasn't anything I could've printed at school. Of course everyone knows "computer failure" never works as an excuse.
I'm convinced I saw something that looked like a pair of cheap mobile CB radios carrying the red-and-blue C= logo in some snail-mail spam brochure two months ago or four. For all I know the Commodore brand has been back for a while now.
I would hope so! This Starter Edition is beginning to look really attractive. I've been missing out on so much: no virus/spyware/adware/whatever scanner has ever found any nastyware on my computer, and it doesn't even crash all the time. I don't know what I'm doing wrong! My Key Windows Applications lack purpose! This is an outrage. I have to use Linux whenever I want to feel like an utterly helpless idiot! And even then I might start to pick up a couple more clues, and I'll probably start to like it! Sheesh, I guess I need a lobotomy.
Deals like these abound, at least in Germany (local computer stores, eBay, etc., though the $80 are something I still associate with spammers), but they aren't telling you the whole truth.
1) No support from MS. It's your OEM who's supposed to support OEM versions, but in this case you'll kinda be the OEM. This doesn't matter for home users, I suppose, as there're plenty web forums, magazine articles, MS' public newsgroups, et cetera.
2) Something about warranty. Dunno.
3) The main difference, however, is in the license and thereby the (lack of) generosity of product activation. An OEM version is supposed to be tied to the computer'S BIOS, though this might not happen unless the OEM pre-installs and -activates it for you in some special, convenient but ultimately annoying way. This is a.k.a. SLP ("System-Locked Preinstallation"). With SLP, you won't have to activate at all - you can rebuild your entire computer as long as the motherboard continues to 'match'. Or so they say.
I don't know how to install XP that way, though, nor whether I'd want to considering how outdated this no-name mainboard is. So I didn't.
Either way, you're not supposed to transfer an OEM license to a different machine, unlike the retail version. (Still not on two computers at the same time, naturally. That'd be too useful.)
Furthermore, it seems you can't update OEM versions (not talking about patches or service packs, only migrations to new versions of Windows or perhaps from XP Home to XP Professional; but of course you don't want XP Home in the first place)
I've been told that after 4 months (some say 6?) of no reinstalling (shouldn't be a problem, usually), I should be able to install my OEM version on a new computer (might have to beg for it on the phone and explain my computer went up in flames, though, so still no way to use it on two machines without crackzzz).
In my experience, WPA isn't that restricting. I never had to re-activate, and I upgraded RAM, removed and installed CD/DVD drives, changed video cards, and so on. But this whole thing still ticks me off so much I think I'm gonna go with Win2K next time, bells 'n whistles be damned.
Ahh. I see. The German translation I read has that as voegeln -- hardly formal, but gentler, more obviously humourous, and not a word one would scr*mbl* (under most circumstances). So it didn't stick out too much. However, I didn't think it was a particularly necessary passage either. I guess I can see how some would find it a little too...smug.
I've not read the originals very attentively -- I almost always prefer the originals, but HHGG sounds better in German for some reason, at least to me. Makes words like "Kill-O-Zap" seem even sillier:)
As for Dirk Gently, I'm not even sure I recall those well enough to comment on any loose ends. I guess I simply went along for the ride as I did with Planet of the Apes (I only yesterday noticed how little sense some of it makes, but I still didn't really care)
So I suppose I'm generally forgiving with regard to inconsistencies...
Funny. That's by far my favourite Douglas Adams novel, and I still like the Dirk Gently books better than "Life,..." (which I also like despite the silliness with the beard-bone and cricket). I enshrine according to my personal tastes of course, won't claim to be objective. Just like how it slowed down a bit and showed us a more relaxed, more experienced Arthur Dent. Perhaps another rapid-fire succession of gags with a help- and hapless earthling lost in the scenery would've gotten tiresome. Though it's always been "ha ha, only serious" rather than "ROFLMAO" in my opinion. Blah blah blah, sorry. Which inexplicable swearing are you referring to, by the way?
I think they best "captain" character has to be from Firefly.
No, no, no. It's Stan "The Man" Tweedle, the traumatized, reviled, cowardly, selfish, lonely, horny reject, arch-traitor and captain-by-accident whose threats and bragging evoke more pity than fear or awe. You just gotta love him when he demonstrates that he is capable of caring about his friends.
But Star Trek is about order and a universe one might actually be able to live in, not about being a real badass (unless you can do it with nanoprobes), so, eh, whatever. No, I don't have a point.
Bajorans... I'm still not sure what their religion is about, besides worshipping the wormhole fiends (...no, wait, that was somebody's username). Most of the "religious" episodes seemed to focus on the power struggles behind the religion and Sisko's issues with being the emissary.
Overall, the Bajorans bored me more than the Klingons. Or maybe I just haven't watched enough Trek to get it, which is a disctinct possibility. Dunno. The most interesting "religion" episode (that I can remember) was the one that had technobabble fail its arch-hierophant Janeway, Sacred Ground.
Why, yes, I could watch Voyager without cringing too much. DS9 was the better series in almost every way, but Voyager was more sci-fi and less politics/warfare which was what I liked about Trek in the first place (even if much of it was rehashed and Chakotay is bland and Janeway's voice grates on my senses). Not taking it too seriously (continuity? whut?) probably helped, too:)
The image that "replaces" the cloaked object is coming from a video camera, so if the camera is pointed at the bookshelf, that's what gets projected onto the "brick" and sphere. I think. Maybe if they took off the cloak and waved it about a bit, it'd achieve the same effect -- not sure I understand it myself, but having a full face mask like that would be neat. If only it were more portable.
When they are accustomed to the apps, the change of OS isn't much worse than a Windows upgrade.
Yah, I'm using all of those (and several other) Linuxy apps on Windows (plus the two handfuls that will, for the time being, keep me there) and generally don't much care what OS they're running on if that OS itself "just works".
I've run into plenty pretty strange problems getting Linux to just work and often wished for some more transparency. The little graphical helpers were indeed nice to have, but they didn't suffice, and they often seemed to obscure the underlying "truths" for the sake of a somewhat superficial user-friendliness. (It's similar with the Windows registry, of course, but in my experience digging through it is mostly for fine-tuning)
If a GUI config tool could display, for example, the actual, plain text conf file, in before/after states, complete with path/filename and perhaps a few links to relevant docs or even websites -- that would help. (Hide it behind some "Advanced" tab if you must, every Windows user already knows it translates to "All Useful Options Hidden Here".) If manual editing isn't necessary, fine, it'll still be "educational" and ease the confusion and general lost-ness.
Sometimes you don't even know what exactly you have to learn more about before you can get on with your own life.
I hear lots of ripping on linux docs, but, let us be honest, Windows help ain't much to brag about.
Windows' "Help and Support Center" has never since Win95 helped me with anything. (Are you sure the computer is currently turned on? Yes. Did that solve the problem? No. Please go annoy someone who has a clue. Or something like that.) It does, however, get people who've never heard of usenet in touch with real human beings who voluntarily answer help requests for free without forcing anyone to read or understand anything. Sometimes that even works, it seems.
Well... sorry about the terrible digressions. I wouldn't be surprised if my little pseudofeature idea has already been implemented here and there.
If you're walking down the street or into a store or crossing the green light on some intersection, you are exposing yourself to be seen by others. If you don't mind others seeing you, why do you mind if a person sitting behind a camera does???
Those "others" are most likely random people just like me going about their respective businesses. Even if they're police, they have better things to do than follow me around with video cameras all the damn time, which is what a network of surveillance cameras could amount to. You couldn't tell the next best camera to quit doing that.
In the end, the only argument I can see against the use of these cameras in public places will come from people who have something to hide when in public... like criminals.
I (should) have every right to hide something precisely because I'm not a criminal.
I'm not feeling comfortable in public, I'm not feeling comfortable with hidden eyes on me and don't need the additional stress of feeling as though I was trespassing on somebody else's planet.
That said it doesn't concern me all that much if there're a few cameras here and there, but I can see it eventually take over as "the public" gets used to it, until they're everywhere and you need a pass to enter the wilderness and...uhm, what movie script are we in again?
with microsofts crappy web interface, you cant use a cron job to upgrade. i dont see any tool like apt, yum, slapt, swaret, emerge, emerde, etc, that could do this.
Unless you're talking about something else entirely and I just don't get it, which isn't too improbable, it's called Automatic Updates. The real problem seems to be that a lot of people never use it (or at least the crappy web interface)
Wouldn't it make more sense if a Windows user group patented that? It could be the greatest pyramid scheme ever and would immediately make instability financially rewarding, i.e. a feature. Or maybe I just haven't had my coffee yet.
I tried running as a regular user on Windows XP Home edition before. Unfortunately, about 90% of programs are impossible to run after installing them as an Adiminstrator user under Windows XP.
This doesn't seem to be part of Windows folklore yet; I mean, whenever you install Linux, you're made paranoid about running as root, but in Windows all you notice is how you can't install stuff, burn CDs, or bring up the flipping calendar anymore. Not a word about threats from the outside. People look at me funny when I bring it up. "About 90%", though? It's mostly games and (mostly older) Windows free-/shareware in my experience; Linuxy open source stuff generally behaves. And usually all the "bad" programs really want is write to their directories; they don't require admin privileges any more than writing to "my documents" does. Your mileage may vary, of course; maybe I'm just using an entirely different set of apps.
XP Home addition also has a very poorly designed system of user rights for admin vs. regular users. You can't even set folder permissions!
You mean you couldn't even, say, make a misbehaving app's folder writable for the 'users' group? Ouch. Well, couldn't you install these apps on a per-user basis then, a la "%userprofile%\nastybadprograms\(appname)"?
Slashdot Mirror
Are you doing that by foot or does it involve awk, ick, eep and various strategically placed pipes? Hm... okay, I'll be a-googling
The worst was something in my new super duper A3 photo printer breaking off while I was printing my homework (due now). The homework would have involved some scissors-and-glue work, wasn't anything I could've printed at school. Of course everyone knows "computer failure" never works as an excuse.
Not all that bad either, I guess. Yawn.
Damn, I wanted to get an Asus nForce 2 based computer next. Any further traps? I heard Radeons don't work well with that chipset in Linux?
I'm convinced I saw something that looked like a pair of cheap mobile CB radios carrying the red-and-blue C= logo in some snail-mail spam brochure two months ago or four. For all I know the Commodore brand has been back for a while now.
Wait till you get stuck in Hold & Modify mode.
I would hope so! This Starter Edition is beginning to look really attractive. I've been missing out on so much: no virus/spyware/adware/whatever scanner has ever found any nastyware on my computer, and it doesn't even crash all the time. I don't know what I'm doing wrong! My Key Windows Applications lack purpose! This is an outrage. I have to use Linux whenever I want to feel like an utterly helpless idiot! And even then I might start to pick up a couple more clues, and I'll probably start to like it! Sheesh, I guess I need a lobotomy.
1) No support from MS. It's your OEM who's supposed to support OEM versions, but in this case you'll kinda be the OEM. This doesn't matter for home users, I suppose, as there're plenty web forums, magazine articles, MS' public newsgroups, et cetera.
2) Something about warranty. Dunno.
3) The main difference, however, is in the license and thereby the (lack of) generosity of product activation. An OEM version is supposed to be tied to the computer'S BIOS, though this might not happen unless the OEM pre-installs and -activates it for you in some special, convenient but ultimately annoying way. This is a.k.a. SLP ("System-Locked Preinstallation"). With SLP, you won't have to activate at all - you can rebuild your entire computer as long as the motherboard continues to 'match'. Or so they say.
I don't know how to install XP that way, though, nor whether I'd want to considering how outdated this no-name mainboard is. So I didn't.
Either way, you're not supposed to transfer an OEM license to a different machine, unlike the retail version. (Still not on two computers at the same time, naturally. That'd be too useful.)
Furthermore, it seems you can't update OEM versions (not talking about patches or service packs, only migrations to new versions of Windows or perhaps from XP Home to XP Professional; but of course you don't want XP Home in the first place)
I've been told that after 4 months (some say 6?) of no reinstalling (shouldn't be a problem, usually), I should be able to install my OEM version on a new computer (might have to beg for it on the phone and explain my computer went up in flames, though, so still no way to use it on two machines without crackzzz).
In my experience, WPA isn't that restricting. I never had to re-activate, and I upgraded RAM, removed and installed CD/DVD drives, changed video cards, and so on. But this whole thing still ticks me off so much I think I'm gonna go with Win2K next time, bells 'n whistles be damned.
More WPA details here
I thought that was actually marketingspeak for SP 2, which is after all much more than a bunch of patches.
Here you'll find a couple dozen versions/ports/clones. Teletype not included, though.
Sounds more like a ...nonbie.
I've not read the originals very attentively -- I almost always prefer the originals, but HHGG sounds better in German for some reason, at least to me. Makes words like "Kill-O-Zap" seem even sillier :)
As for Dirk Gently, I'm not even sure I recall those well enough to comment on any loose ends. I guess I simply went along for the ride as I did with Planet of the Apes (I only yesterday noticed how little sense some of it makes, but I still didn't really care)
So I suppose I'm generally forgiving with regard to inconsistencies...
Just imagine it's being performed live on stage, not in a studio.
Funny. That's by far my favourite Douglas Adams novel, and I still like the Dirk Gently books better than "Life,..." (which I also like despite the silliness with the beard-bone and cricket). I enshrine according to my personal tastes of course, won't claim to be objective. Just like how it slowed down a bit and showed us a more relaxed, more experienced Arthur Dent. Perhaps another rapid-fire succession of gags with a help- and hapless earthling lost in the scenery would've gotten tiresome. Though it's always been "ha ha, only serious" rather than "ROFLMAO" in my opinion. Blah blah blah, sorry. Which inexplicable swearing are you referring to, by the way?
No, no, no. It's Stan "The Man" Tweedle, the traumatized, reviled, cowardly, selfish, lonely, horny reject, arch-traitor and captain-by-accident whose threats and bragging evoke more pity than fear or awe. You just gotta love him when he demonstrates that he is capable of caring about his friends.
But Star Trek is about order and a universe one might actually be able to live in, not about being a real badass (unless you can do it with nanoprobes), so, eh, whatever. No, I don't have a point.
Overall, the Bajorans bored me more than the Klingons. Or maybe I just haven't watched enough Trek to get it, which is a disctinct possibility. Dunno. The most interesting "religion" episode (that I can remember) was the one that had technobabble fail its arch-hierophant Janeway, Sacred Ground.
Why, yes, I could watch Voyager without cringing too much. DS9 was the better series in almost every way, but Voyager was more sci-fi and less politics/warfare which was what I liked about Trek in the first place (even if much of it was rehashed and Chakotay is bland and Janeway's voice grates on my senses). Not taking it too seriously (continuity? whut?) probably helped, too :)
The image that "replaces" the cloaked object is coming from a video camera, so if the camera is pointed at the bookshelf, that's what gets projected onto the "brick" and sphere. I think. Maybe if they took off the cloak and waved it about a bit, it'd achieve the same effect -- not sure I understand it myself, but having a full face mask like that would be neat. If only it were more portable.
Yah, I'm using all of those (and several other) Linuxy apps on Windows (plus the two handfuls that will, for the time being, keep me there) and generally don't much care what OS they're running on if that OS itself "just works".
I've run into plenty pretty strange problems getting Linux to just work and often wished for some more transparency. The little graphical helpers were indeed nice to have, but they didn't suffice, and they often seemed to obscure the underlying "truths" for the sake of a somewhat superficial user-friendliness. (It's similar with the Windows registry, of course, but in my experience digging through it is mostly for fine-tuning)
If a GUI config tool could display, for example, the actual, plain text conf file, in before/after states, complete with path/filename and perhaps a few links to relevant docs or even websites -- that would help. (Hide it behind some "Advanced" tab if you must, every Windows user already knows it translates to "All Useful Options Hidden Here".) If manual editing isn't necessary, fine, it'll still be "educational" and ease the confusion and general lost-ness.
Sometimes you don't even know what exactly you have to learn more about before you can get on with your own life.
I hear lots of ripping on linux docs, but, let us be honest, Windows help ain't much to brag about.
Windows' "Help and Support Center" has never since Win95 helped me with anything. (Are you sure the computer is currently turned on? Yes. Did that solve the problem? No. Please go annoy someone who has a clue. Or something like that.) It does, however, get people who've never heard of usenet in touch with real human beings who voluntarily answer help requests for free without forcing anyone to read or understand anything. Sometimes that even works, it seems.
Well... sorry about the terrible digressions. I wouldn't be surprised if my little pseudofeature idea has already been implemented here and there.
Sounds reasonable! After all, once all the public (?) places have been pacified, crime is likely to become an indoor activity.
Those "others" are most likely random people just like me going about their respective businesses. Even if they're police, they have better things to do than follow me around with video cameras all the damn time, which is what a network of surveillance cameras could amount to. You couldn't tell the next best camera to quit doing that.
In the end, the only argument I can see against the use of these cameras in public places will come from people who have something to hide when in public... like criminals.
I (should) have every right to hide something precisely because I'm not a criminal.
I'm not feeling comfortable in public, I'm not feeling comfortable with hidden eyes on me and don't need the additional stress of feeling as though I was trespassing on somebody else's planet.
That said it doesn't concern me all that much if there're a few cameras here and there, but I can see it eventually take over as "the public" gets used to it, until they're everywhere and you need a pass to enter the wilderness and ...uhm, what movie script are we in again?
Unless you're talking about something else entirely and I just don't get it, which isn't too improbable, it's called Automatic Updates. The real problem seems to be that a lot of people never use it (or at least the crappy web interface)
Search for "Tierra Entertainment" (yes, that really is a "T"). No KQ3+ though, I suppose.
And here's a link to nearly all of the new text-based adventure games. Enjoy!
(*groan*)
Wouldn't it make more sense if a Windows user group patented that? It could be the greatest pyramid scheme ever and would immediately make instability financially rewarding, i.e. a feature. Or maybe I just haven't had my coffee yet.
This doesn't seem to be part of Windows folklore yet; I mean, whenever you install Linux, you're made paranoid about running as root, but in Windows all you notice is how you can't install stuff, burn CDs, or bring up the flipping calendar anymore. Not a word about threats from the outside. People look at me funny when I bring it up. "About 90%", though? It's mostly games and (mostly older) Windows free-/shareware in my experience; Linuxy open source stuff generally behaves. And usually all the "bad" programs really want is write to their directories; they don't require admin privileges any more than writing to "my documents" does. Your mileage may vary, of course; maybe I'm just using an entirely different set of apps.
XP Home addition also has a very poorly designed system of user rights for admin vs. regular users. You can't even set folder permissions!
You mean you couldn't even, say, make a misbehaving app's folder writable for the 'users' group? Ouch. Well, couldn't you install these apps on a per-user basis then, a la "%userprofile%\nastybadprograms\(appname)"?
~Commander Obvious (sorry)