I'm baffled as to why you insensitive clods modded this parent as funny - everything Neil says is deadpan true.
This is actually a very common technique in the commercial software world, advocated at least as early as 95 by Alan Cooper in The Essentials of User Interface Design: look at your project schedule, try to project what kind of hardware will be common by the time you ship, and plan for it. It's not rocket science, just common sense. And as others have pointed out, the specs they are targeting should be standard by 2006, let alone by 2008 when the beta program will end.
BTW, as an official Longhorn beta tester, I can confirm that this story is not a hoax: I was given these specs over a year ago at some of the early beta launch meetings, and while they've bumped the RAM up from 1 GB to 2, nothing else has changed.
BTW2, at WinHEC this week the graphics vendors are complaining that Longhorn won't be using enough of the vast amounts of GPU power they will be providing by 2006...
Well, judging from your blog you probably don't need to be told this, but if you think CNN and the NY Times are left-leaning you must be so far right of center that you haven't even seen it in a while.
If you want to see some real left wing propaganda go check out Z Magazine. And if you are interested in exactly how the media control mechanisms work read Chomsky & Herman's Manufacturing Consent, one of the more prophetic books written in the 20th century.
Speaking as an actual liberal (not one of these pansy Lieberman/Dean wimps) I have to say that I am completely unrepresented in the American media. I know, I know your violin is bringing tears to your own eyes. But honestly, I think many liberals in this country are completely fed up with the Democratic party, the "liberal" media and the complete lack of political discourse on subjects that actually matter. That's why Michael Moore's Bowling For Columbine was so wildly popular. Frankly I wouldn't be too surprised to see a liberal media movement, quite similar to the conservative one you described, start to really flare up in the next year.
Umm, Project Guttenberg can only legally use public domain works. If you know of any 100+ year old novels typeset in Tex lets hear about it. Even if a modern reprint was done recently, do you think the publisher would really want to give away all that hard work so that everyone can get it for free instead of buying their spiffy new edition?
You'll have to kill me first! I can see getting enough money to go it alone and start my own business, but come on who wants to sit around on their ass all day? That's how you get old, years have nothing to do with it!
And I don't see that being in computers makes it any easier or harder. Sure you've got to retrain every year, but we've got it easy compared to doctors, and even your average factory job changes enough that it's an issue there too. Stop learning and you die, first mentally then physically!
Why does everyone assume that the only alternative to capitalism is communism? (Why does everyone assume that because I'm not a Republican I'm a Democrat?)
What the man said was there are other viable alternatives to distributing our collective abundant wealth. Since it is well established that we do have more than enough food, medicine, and music to go around then it is hard to discredit the idea that the only reasons there are hungry people in the world are social issues. No, I'm not arguing for global communism, but are you arguing for letting food rot so that we can preserve the world's population of starving children?
For a detailed and extremely pragmatic (albeit idealistic and some might say naive) non-communist instruction manual on this subject please read R. Buckminster Fuller's book Critical Path. You never know, it just might open your eyes a bit and get you to think outside the capitalist/communist good/evil black/white world view.
Re:Granted in 2002, NOT filed!
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Oops, mea culpa. Still doesn't change the prior art status though, I was chatting on Fidonet in 89, and thousands of other people were doing the same on Unix even earlier.
The gaming industry right now seems to be grinding to a halt in terms of innovation. How many more NFL or run 'n' gun games do we need? Miyamoto at least is strong enough to keep the marketing mooks who are rapidly taking control away from the true creative spirits from dominating Nintendo! And to my way of thinking that's a very very good thing.
We used to be able to, and I think I probably still could for major releases, but for the interim NT builds it's getting more and more difficult. But I'm pretty sure I still have the whole kernel. Of course, with longhorn etc even that will definitely change!:-D
Actually, it will be little harder than that. I've got access to the Windows source at work, and it's not like you just get the source tree as files. Access is through a special viewer that requires a smart card with the correct certificate to be inserted while viewing, and then only allows particular files to be viewed through a special GUI.
You could copy and paste each file out of the GUI and build your own source tree, but since we're talking about hundreds of thousands of files and gigabytes of data it would probably take a little more than six hours. At least until they automated it.
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This is actually a very common technique in the commercial software world, advocated at least as early as 95 by Alan Cooper in The Essentials of User Interface Design: look at your project schedule, try to project what kind of hardware will be common by the time you ship, and plan for it. It's not rocket science, just common sense. And as others have pointed out, the specs they are targeting should be standard by 2006, let alone by 2008 when the beta program will end.
BTW, as an official Longhorn beta tester, I can confirm that this story is not a hoax: I was given these specs over a year ago at some of the early beta launch meetings, and while they've bumped the RAM up from 1 GB to 2, nothing else has changed.
BTW2, at WinHEC this week the graphics vendors are complaining that Longhorn won't be using enough of the vast amounts of GPU power they will be providing by 2006...
We may actually have an election, just like a real democracy!
If you want to see some real left wing propaganda go check out Z Magazine. And if you are interested in exactly how the media control mechanisms work read Chomsky & Herman's Manufacturing Consent, one of the more prophetic books written in the 20th century.
Speaking as an actual liberal (not one of these pansy Lieberman/Dean wimps) I have to say that I am completely unrepresented in the American media. I know, I know your violin is bringing tears to your own eyes. But honestly, I think many liberals in this country are completely fed up with the Democratic party, the "liberal" media and the complete lack of political discourse on subjects that actually matter. That's why Michael Moore's Bowling For Columbine was so wildly popular. Frankly I wouldn't be too surprised to see a liberal media movement, quite similar to the conservative one you described, start to really flare up in the next year.
Umm, Project Guttenberg can only legally use public domain works. If you know of any 100+ year old novels typeset in Tex lets hear about it. Even if a modern reprint was done recently, do you think the publisher would really want to give away all that hard work so that everyone can get it for free instead of buying their spiffy new edition?
ScienceDaily has a story today "Study Is First To Confirm Link Between Exercise And Changes In Brain", basically saying that using your body keeps your brain functioning. It's like love: the more you give, the more you've got. Humans have few limits except the ones we place on ourselves.
And I don't see that being in computers makes it any easier or harder. Sure you've got to retrain every year, but we've got it easy compared to doctors, and even your average factory job changes enough that it's an issue there too. Stop learning and you die, first mentally then physically!
Hey, no one has ever accused me of having a sense of humor, even when the joke is clearly labelled! :-)
What the man said was there are other viable alternatives to distributing our collective abundant wealth. Since it is well established that we do have more than enough food, medicine, and music to go around then it is hard to discredit the idea that the only reasons there are hungry people in the world are social issues. No, I'm not arguing for global communism, but are you arguing for letting food rot so that we can preserve the world's population of starving children?
For a detailed and extremely pragmatic (albeit idealistic and some might say naive) non-communist instruction manual on this subject please read R. Buckminster Fuller's book Critical Path. You never know, it just might open your eyes a bit and get you to think outside the capitalist/communist good/evil black/white world view.
Oops, mea culpa. Still doesn't change the prior art status though, I was chatting on Fidonet in 89, and thousands of other people were doing the same on Unix even earlier.
The gaming industry right now seems to be grinding to a halt in terms of innovation. How many more NFL or run 'n' gun games do we need? Miyamoto at least is strong enough to keep the marketing mooks who are rapidly taking control away from the true creative spirits from dominating Nintendo! And to my way of thinking that's a very very good thing.
We used to be able to, and I think I probably still could for major releases, but for the interim NT builds it's getting more and more difficult. But I'm pretty sure I still have the whole kernel. Of course, with longhorn etc even that will definitely change! :-D
Actually, it will be little harder than that. I've got access to the Windows source at work, and it's not like you just get the source tree as files. Access is through a special viewer that requires a smart card with the correct certificate to be inserted while viewing, and then only allows particular files to be viewed through a special GUI. You could copy and paste each file out of the GUI and build your own source tree, but since we're talking about hundreds of thousands of files and gigabytes of data it would probably take a little more than six hours. At least until they automated it.
The last useful function they served has now been usurped.