Yeah, sure. And where is the "dept." and icon in the RSS feed? Not everybody looks at the main page all that often. I browse through the RSS topics, read some (if the topic looks like something I care about) and only follow the link if the story seems interesting enough to merit RTFA and discussion. If I hadn't decided this story was worth reading in full, I would NEVER know this was a parody. It certainly seems plausible enough, knowing MPAA.
Hey, editors! Isn't that something that should be fixed in a hurry? "News for nerds" shouldn't mean misinformation! RSS without a way to indicate a known joke may turn a parody into FUD!
The thing is, we don't really know what is needed to create life. Assuming that it absolutely cannot emerge in a given environment is, well, unjustified. We have some theories (btw, according to them a somewhat "extreme" environment is actually helpful - it speeds up reactions, and creating organic matter and arranging it into a sort of protoorganism is a bit of a random process) - but that's it.
What's important is that this example shows that we also do not really know what is necessary to sustain life. Some things are obvious - the right kind of solvent, water being almost irreplaceable, some source of energy, etc. However, our understanding of the details is still insufficient. In this case we see that radiation, which is viewed as detrimental to life, even though life can adapt to tolerate it, can actually have an opposite role. Can life emerge with only radiation as an energy source? We don't really know, we can doubt it but we can't exlude it as a possibility. Once it's there, can it survive? Now we know, yes.
This opens new possibilities. For example, we have to be more careful when saying that some kind of object in space cannot support life. With what we learned from this, life could even exist on/in interstellar debris, comets etc., where there is definitely not enough sunlight, as long as there are some radioactive elements there - not too little, not too much, but how can we tell where to draw the line? I'm not saying that life exists in such places, only that now we have to accept such a possibility.
Well, there was such a project - the Eurofighter. A nice plane, and the only one currently in production that can be classified in the same generation as F-22. Slightly different initial design goals, but an equally ambitious project. Some of the parameters are really comparable, and for a long time it looked like the two would be quite nearly tied for the first place as the best universal fighter plane.
Of course, this is the EU, a joint effort. Every potential user asking what his money is spent on, every one with different goals for the fighter, and of course everyone concerned with the growing costs... So now we have a plane which is quite powerful and very interesting, but not nearly as good as it was supposed to be. The committitis strikes again, a horrible disease...
What psychology are you using to support your argument that people prepared to commit suicide by explosion will be deterred from doing so by the possibility of being discovered before they actually board the plane ?
Simple. If you are willing to sacrifice your life for a goal, you don't want to waste it. If you are caught with your bomb, you either die killing few enemies, if you manage to set off the bomb (not so easy to do, if the bomb is suppsed to be hidden effecively), or you are arrested and the whole plan fails.
You are right, young Muslim males are definitely more likely to be potential terrorists, willing to die on a plane taking as many people as possible with them. However, does it mean they are that much more likely to actually be the attackers?
A terrorist attack on a plane is not easy, it's much more likely to be organized by a well prepared group of people, with a good plan. The whole group is risking their freedom and possibly lives, and the actual attackers know they will die - a risk of failure is a big problem for them. So, if you prepared such an attack, wouldn't you commit all possible resources to find an attacker who is more likely to pass the profiling and deal a successful strike?
In my opinion profiling doesn't matter. Without it, the most likely terrorists will simply attack, knowing there isn't much they can do to lower the risk. With it, the terrorists will more actively seek out candidates likely to pass the screening, making the profile less effective. Furthermore, the attacks will be better prepared, because you get more people who would be glad to do it themselves, helping those, who have a greater chance of success.
You skipped billiard for 10^15. Some speak about trilliards, but as far as I remember it's not really used, it's (in Polish) milion-miliard-bilion-biliard-trylion-kwadrylion.. .
And put a stress on the word _most_ (of Europe) - the Brits are going to flame you to hell.;-)
The european (incl. polish) system is actually worse - it would be just as good if it was coherent (quintilliard, etc.), but - as it is - it only introduces confusion. Especially now, that not-quite-well-educated journalists translate US news, constantly making that sort of mistakes, so we learn about e.g. (true story, a few years ago, the $$$ might be a bit off though) the B2 stealth bomber costing "okolo 2 biliony dolarow za sztuke" - that would be "about 2 trillion dollars per plane" (!), a bit much... The US could probably afford about one every 2 years, if they seized funding anything else with their current military budget.
I would definitely vote for switching to the simple american system (EU could probably force that), but it would take many years of serious confusion. Not that it's something we didn't see before - just look at the "fun" the USA is having with the metric system, and how well the change is going...
I agree completely. There is just one other powerful editor with similar capabilities and all the advantages of vim - emacs. Which is better is a matter of preference and just like I never could master the piano, I can't make myself feel comfortable with the weird "chords" used in emacs, vim seems much more intuitive once you get used to it. The result? Today I couldn't quit emacs if asked to, I don't even remember the combination for that. But again, this is just a preference.
But there is another reason for vim instead of emacs. Emacs is huge. When I install a new Linux, whatever distro, vim is just a small addon (even though it is rather large for a vi clone). Emacs? Even with large disks it's noticeable. It is large enough to make a difference in installation time. So - no emacs on my computers. It's just not worth it for me.
If you don't like it, fine, don't use it. But don't say it's a throwback - once you learn it well enough it just doesn't give competition a fighting chance. Pure power in a small package.
There's that, of course, but don't forget computing grids. It's a scientific network afterall. Look at the european Geant network and how crucial it is for the CERN's grid projects. When you have petabytes of data, hundreds of scientists in many places, a single data center just won't cut it. A fast network, which allows multiple high-throughput (latency and jitter aren't important) connections to petabytes of storage and teraflop supercomputers is a very nice thing. For some scientific projects it's a must.
Just look what EU is doing: EGEE. As an application see e.g. LCG. Without a fast network this just would not be possible.
Even better: a nice, well laid out bra, a large dildo, and... a less exposed pipe bomb, or something like that. Now that is a test! Plus, it's likely to happen - if you're going to risk getting a suspicious item on the plane this way, the least you can do to raise your chances is provide a distraction.
Yes, this is different from reactive armor, but parent wasn't speaking about reactive armor at all. Drozd and Arena are active defense systems, intercepting the rounds before they reach the target. And they are already deployed, while this is still being tested. So, nothing new really. Maybe some gradual improvement, but not a breakthrough.
Re:Big multinationals
on
Google's DNA
·
· Score: 1
In fact there were such companies already, an guess what - it doesn't work all that well in the long run. Just see Daewoo. Cars, CRTs, microwave ovens, steel, you name it. Remember what happened a few years ago? Cuts, cuts, cuts...
Well, maybe the problem wasn't that they did everything, just that they overexpanded... But this is easier to correct if you have a well defined primary business area. There is a limit to growth - expand too fast and you're a dead company. It's difficult to see whether you overinvest if your bussiness is so diverse.
Of course software is quite a bit different, but the dotcom bomb proved that it's not as different as we tend to think.
You know the polish word for a large syndicate/corporation (hmm, what's the right word...) like Daewoo? Koncern. Interesting coincidence.;-)
How about a "power manager"? You often get many devices on stand by in one place, e.g. TV+DVD+sat+whatever. Just make a power strip with a remote control, disconnecting power to connected devices. One device on stand by instead of three (or more). Another great advantage - it lets you control the power for devices lacking a remote control. The only problem is, it would have to be cheap to sell.
I'd be surprised if something like this wasn't already in production (and patented), but I've never seen it.
Nah, wrong. I had a phase in my life when games were FUN. And I had a "fun period of time", as you call it. Problem? These are two separate periods. I had lots of fun not playing games and I've seen a lot of fascinating games in a bleak period of life. I play those games from time to time and guess what - they're great! Original, enjoyable, focused on gameplay, not FX. Replaying them somehow didn't shatter my memories.
I'm not saying that good games are not made anymore - I just don't have the time to search for them. Most of the ones I've seen are less than satisfactory though.
Well, they claim that they get very little code from the community. This suggests that most people are just using it and there are no active, commited developers. Who will fork? I you fork with codebase you hardly know, it'll take time before you're ready to take on v.3.
So forget "insane tricks" - their strategy is risky but sane.
You must be joking. I have a P2/400MHz/128MB laptop at home running Slackware 9 and it works like a charm - plays movies (mplayer), browses the web (Opera), edits anything I need (vim/OpenOffice), compiles and runs everything I need (C,C++,Java,Python,Octave...). Doesn't seem sluggish at all. Ok, maybe Open Office is a bit slow, but not in a way that would make working with it uncomfortable. The only thing I miss is a larger HDD and a working battery - it's a laptop, but a stationary one.;-) More memory might be useful for heavy multitasking, but I don't really have that problem.
Hint - scrap KDE, Gnome, Mozilla/Netscape (especially old editions), stick with Xfce, Opera (or Firefox, but I haven't even tried it there, may be slow, who knows) and you're all set. Really, once you get past 300MHz you CAN do almost everything comfortably (ok, 400MHz for most movies, 500+ for some).
Ok, it's slow when it comes to number crunching, which is my job. NS2 simulations also take a lifetime. On the other hand, in this area no computer is fast enough.;-) But the system as such is not sluggish at all, and since I have access to a better machine for computations, I don't really need anything more. Maybe if I was a gamer...
Opera doesn't pass. Yet. However, Opera Software knows the test and they bragged recently in a changelog about improvements - quite rightly, they are huge. In 7.5 the test was a mess, now, in 8.02 it looks almost right. I'm not sure if they will be going for full compatibility though. Afterall, the other browsers are not better (yet) in that accept (maybe Konq, I haven't checked).
Hmmm... Nice idea. A d20-shaped mp3+ogg (of course!) player with good weight distribution... And preferably wireless headphones... Press a button, then throw - fun way to pick a random song.;-) Only works for 128MB versions though - larger would store too many songs.
This is one example why open-source Firefox+extensions is not intrinsically better (or worse, for that matter) than closed-source monolithic Opera. Yes, you get the freedom to choose, but incompatibilities are not the only problem. Firefox itself is popular, so the the "many eyes" rule works, but it's not so for individual extensions, there open source may not be an advantage - and how do you judge, which are ok?
That's the risk of this architecture, only to be expected.
You're right, of course. Over the years I learned the basic rule - if you write a program, focus on the basic task and make it (also) work as a unix-style filter (or at least 100% command line controllable) or one day you will wish you had.
However, so far the glue doesn't work and Opera, as a commercial company, has to do it this way if they want to add BitTorrent to their browser and do it fast. On the other hand, you still have a choice - you can define helper programs for different protocols, so if you want to pass BitTorrent links to a different app - go ahead. I hope this works, the options are there, but I haven't used them for a long time.
So far I'm generally satisfied with the way Opera is doing things. And if you like to connect different pieces of software, well, use Firefox - I'm fed up with this, I wan't a complete package, tested, small and fast. I'm not a fanatic - I love Opera, but you're free to use whatever you like. Isn't that what we all want - choice?
Because Opera has a unified UI for downloads, with a "Transfers" panel, etc. So, you have a few downloads running, one using FTP, one HTML, one BitTorrent. Why look at 3 different windows if you can have it all in one list - progress bars, current speed, estimated time left...
It's akin to asking why Acrobat provides a plugin - after all if I click on pdf Acrobat would start anyway...
"web browsers are not stable"? You must be using FireFox;-) (just kidding, don't get excited).
I get to work, fire up Opera, shut it down after 10 hours or so (or not, if I don't log out for some reason). One crash last month. Is that unstable for you?
Besides, Opera generally comes up from a crash in the same state as before, with pages open, transfers remembered (though you must activate them manually)... I they do this right, a crash won't hurt you. Unless BitTorrent can't continue a stopped transfer - I never used it, I don't know, but come on, that would be braindead for something that's supposed to be way better than FTP.
Mod this as you like, but I just accidentaly gave the parent a +1 Underrated and now I have to fix that mistake somehow. One bad click and now some other guys will lose the karma from my mods - but there's no way _that_ gets a +1 from me. This is the most "we-are-the-best-at-everything-and-you-all-owe-us" post I've seen in a long time.
The Internet might have been a national project, but it is now definitely global. At the same time, most of the infrastructure is based in US. The parent seems to think this is a good thing - not really. There's nothing inherently good about this. Yes, the current administrator may be good, but I don't see why they should be better than non-US ones, this is just veiled nationalism. Besides, with the kind of lawmaking the US has shown in the last few years this is a threat to all Internet businesses in the world. The US is becoming more and more unpredictable.
Yes, I'm overreacting, but hey, I wouldn't write this if I didn't have to. Mod me as you like, or even better - just don't.
I actually expected that 75% number. I watch movies almost only at a theatre and what do I see? A large room, half filled with people, 90% of them clustered in the back, far from the screen (it looks like a large TV from there). With popcorn. Whispering all the time, obviously wishing they could talk. No wonder they would rather watch movies at home, given a good quality home theatre setup.
I sit in one of the first rows. The screen is huge, I feel immersed in the movie. Sound is great. The popcorn-munching smelly talkers are far away in the back, so I can concentrate on the movie. Home theatre? I couldn't possibly buy one that would offer me THIS. Besides, the theatre reduces distractions. I don't feel like going to the kitchen, I go to the toilet if I must, a phone won't ring (the mobile is off), no neighbours at the door... I want to see the movie, goddammit, not "spend time"!
Oh, well. I should learn to enjoy Hollywood crap, I wouldn't be so weird.
And another thing. 75% might prefer home theatres, but the night sessions at a nearby cinema, 23:00-7:00, 3-4 movies, on 3-4 screens, are almost always packed. Hundreds of people. The moviegoers are still a strong minority!
Because there were many variants before anyone thought of this (JavaScript, JScript). But there is a standard - ECMAScript. It's basically the greatest common subset of those. I know Opera usess this as a reference for scripting implementation.
That's also the main selling point for desktop dual-core chips - without a realtime OS the second processor keeps the GUI running smoothly even under load. I sometimes use my friend's old dual Pentium 300, and under load it actually feels marginally faster than my (way faster) single chip Athlon. If the price, noise and energy consumption weren't so high I'd buy one for home use - and dual core may be the solution to those problems (plus, dual-core notebooks are a possibility, dual-chip - hardly). I also worked with QNX - nice...
In short - I want realtime Linux on my desktop NOW! I wish I wasn't that lazy and would actually do something about it...
Depends on what you're doing. As long as I just write code, run loooong computations, look at results (simple graphs of numbers), or do office jobs, LCDs are great - clear picture, easy on the eyes, lots of desk space for papers... But for graphics, games and such - I'd take my trusty 19" over any LCD, even new ones.
The push is coming from the industry and the shops, of course. Simple reason? SPACE! Not desk space, but storage space. It's costly, you know. Plus, well packed LCD are less likely to get heavily damaged by careless handling, plus transport is easier and cheaper (more LCDs fit in a truck) and carrying LCDs to the shelves is less likely to cause any harm to the workers...
Put simply, LCDs are easier and cheaper to store and sell.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, sure. And where is the "dept." and icon in the RSS feed? Not everybody looks at the main page all that often. I browse through the RSS topics, read some (if the topic looks like something I care about) and only follow the link if the story seems interesting enough to merit RTFA and discussion. If I hadn't decided this story was worth reading in full, I would NEVER know this was a parody. It certainly seems plausible enough, knowing MPAA.
Hey, editors! Isn't that something that should be fixed in a hurry? "News for nerds" shouldn't mean misinformation! RSS without a way to indicate a known joke may turn a parody into FUD!
The thing is, we don't really know what is needed to create life. Assuming that it absolutely cannot emerge in a given environment is, well, unjustified. We have some theories (btw, according to them a somewhat "extreme" environment is actually helpful - it speeds up reactions, and creating organic matter and arranging it into a sort of protoorganism is a bit of a random process) - but that's it.
What's important is that this example shows that we also do not really know what is necessary to sustain life. Some things are obvious - the right kind of solvent, water being almost irreplaceable, some source of energy, etc. However, our understanding of the details is still insufficient. In this case we see that radiation, which is viewed as detrimental to life, even though life can adapt to tolerate it, can actually have an opposite role. Can life emerge with only radiation as an energy source? We don't really know, we can doubt it but we can't exlude it as a possibility. Once it's there, can it survive? Now we know, yes.
This opens new possibilities. For example, we have to be more careful when saying that some kind of object in space cannot support life. With what we learned from this, life could even exist on/in interstellar debris, comets etc., where there is definitely not enough sunlight, as long as there are some radioactive elements there - not too little, not too much, but how can we tell where to draw the line? I'm not saying that life exists in such places, only that now we have to accept such a possibility.
Well, there was such a project - the Eurofighter. A nice plane, and the only one currently in production that can be classified in the same generation as F-22. Slightly different initial design goals, but an equally ambitious project. Some of the parameters are really comparable, and for a long time it looked like the two would be quite nearly tied for the first place as the best universal fighter plane.
Of course, this is the EU, a joint effort. Every potential user asking what his money is spent on, every one with different goals for the fighter, and of course everyone concerned with the growing costs... So now we have a plane which is quite powerful and very interesting, but not nearly as good as it was supposed to be. The committitis strikes again, a horrible disease...
What psychology are you using to support your argument that people prepared to commit suicide by explosion will be deterred from doing so by the possibility of being discovered before they actually board the plane ?
Simple. If you are willing to sacrifice your life for a goal, you don't want to waste it. If you are caught with your bomb, you either die killing few enemies, if you manage to set off the bomb (not so easy to do, if the bomb is suppsed to be hidden effecively), or you are arrested and the whole plan fails.
You are right, young Muslim males are definitely more likely to be potential terrorists, willing to die on a plane taking as many people as possible with them. However, does it mean they are that much more likely to actually be the attackers?
A terrorist attack on a plane is not easy, it's much more likely to be organized by a well prepared group of people, with a good plan. The whole group is risking their freedom and possibly lives, and the actual attackers know they will die - a risk of failure is a big problem for them. So, if you prepared such an attack, wouldn't you commit all possible resources to find an attacker who is more likely to pass the profiling and deal a successful strike?
In my opinion profiling doesn't matter. Without it, the most likely terrorists will simply attack, knowing there isn't much they can do to lower the risk. With it, the terrorists will more actively seek out candidates likely to pass the screening, making the profile less effective. Furthermore, the attacks will be better prepared, because you get more people who would be glad to do it themselves, helping those, who have a greater chance of success.
You skipped billiard for 10^15. Some speak about trilliards, but as far as I remember it's not really used, it's (in Polish) milion-miliard-bilion-biliard-trylion-kwadrylion.. .
;-)
And put a stress on the word _most_ (of Europe) - the Brits are going to flame you to hell.
The european (incl. polish) system is actually worse - it would be just as good if it was coherent (quintilliard, etc.), but - as it is - it only introduces confusion. Especially now, that not-quite-well-educated journalists translate US news, constantly making that sort of mistakes, so we learn about e.g. (true story, a few years ago, the $$$ might be a bit off though) the B2 stealth bomber costing "okolo 2 biliony dolarow za sztuke" - that would be "about 2 trillion dollars per plane" (!), a bit much... The US could probably afford about one every 2 years, if they seized funding anything else with their current military budget.
I would definitely vote for switching to the simple american system (EU could probably force that), but it would take many years of serious confusion. Not that it's something we didn't see before - just look at the "fun" the USA is having with the metric system, and how well the change is going...
I agree completely. There is just one other powerful editor with similar capabilities and all the advantages of vim - emacs. Which is better is a matter of preference and just like I never could master the piano, I can't make myself feel comfortable with the weird "chords" used in emacs, vim seems much more intuitive once you get used to it. The result? Today I couldn't quit emacs if asked to, I don't even remember the combination for that. But again, this is just a preference.
But there is another reason for vim instead of emacs. Emacs is huge. When I install a new Linux, whatever distro, vim is just a small addon (even though it is rather large for a vi clone). Emacs? Even with large disks it's noticeable. It is large enough to make a difference in installation time. So - no emacs on my computers. It's just not worth it for me.
If you don't like it, fine, don't use it. But don't say it's a throwback - once you learn it well enough it just doesn't give competition a fighting chance. Pure power in a small package.
There's that, of course, but don't forget computing grids. It's a scientific network afterall. Look at the european Geant network and how crucial it is for the CERN's grid projects. When you have petabytes of data, hundreds of scientists in many places, a single data center just won't cut it. A fast network, which allows multiple high-throughput (latency and jitter aren't important) connections to petabytes of storage and teraflop supercomputers is a very nice thing. For some scientific projects it's a must.
Just look what EU is doing: EGEE. As an application see e.g. LCG. Without a fast network this just would not be possible.
Even better: a nice, well laid out bra, a large dildo, and... a less exposed pipe bomb, or something like that. Now that is a test! Plus, it's likely to happen - if you're going to risk getting a suspicious item on the plane this way, the least you can do to raise your chances is provide a distraction.
Yes, this is different from reactive armor, but parent wasn't speaking about reactive armor at all. Drozd and Arena are active defense systems, intercepting the rounds before they reach the target. And they are already deployed, while this is still being tested. So, nothing new really. Maybe some gradual improvement, but not a breakthrough.
In fact there were such companies already, an guess what - it doesn't work all that well in the long run. Just see Daewoo. Cars, CRTs, microwave ovens, steel, you name it. Remember what happened a few years ago? Cuts, cuts, cuts...
;-)
Well, maybe the problem wasn't that they did everything, just that they overexpanded... But this is easier to correct if you have a well defined primary business area. There is a limit to growth - expand too fast and you're a dead company. It's difficult to see whether you overinvest if your bussiness is so diverse.
Of course software is quite a bit different, but the dotcom bomb proved that it's not as different as we tend to think.
You know the polish word for a large syndicate/corporation (hmm, what's the right word...) like Daewoo? Koncern. Interesting coincidence.
How about a "power manager"? You often get many devices on stand by in one place, e.g. TV+DVD+sat+whatever. Just make a power strip with a remote control, disconnecting power to connected devices. One device on stand by instead of three (or more). Another great advantage - it lets you control the power for devices lacking a remote control. The only problem is, it would have to be cheap to sell.
I'd be surprised if something like this wasn't already in production (and patented), but I've never seen it.
Nah, wrong. I had a phase in my life when games were FUN. And I had a "fun period of time", as you call it. Problem? These are two separate periods. I had lots of fun not playing games and I've seen a lot of fascinating games in a bleak period of life. I play those games from time to time and guess what - they're great! Original, enjoyable, focused on gameplay, not FX. Replaying them somehow didn't shatter my memories.
I'm not saying that good games are not made anymore - I just don't have the time to search for them. Most of the ones I've seen are less than satisfactory though.
"...whoever forks Nessus 2.x and keeps it free."
Well, they claim that they get very little code from the community. This suggests that most people are just using it and there are no active, commited developers. Who will fork? I you fork with codebase you hardly know, it'll take time before you're ready to take on v.3.
So forget "insane tricks" - their strategy is risky but sane.
You must be joking. I have a P2/400MHz/128MB laptop at home running Slackware 9 and it works like a charm - plays movies (mplayer), browses the web (Opera), edits anything I need (vim/OpenOffice), compiles and runs everything I need (C,C++,Java,Python,Octave...). Doesn't seem sluggish at all. Ok, maybe Open Office is a bit slow, but not in a way that would make working with it uncomfortable. The only thing I miss is a larger HDD and a working battery - it's a laptop, but a stationary one. ;-) More memory might be useful for heavy multitasking, but I don't really have that problem.
;-) But the system as such is not sluggish at all, and since I have access to a better machine for computations, I don't really need anything more. Maybe if I was a gamer...
Hint - scrap KDE, Gnome, Mozilla/Netscape (especially old editions), stick with Xfce, Opera (or Firefox, but I haven't even tried it there, may be slow, who knows) and you're all set. Really, once you get past 300MHz you CAN do almost everything comfortably (ok, 400MHz for most movies, 500+ for some).
Ok, it's slow when it comes to number crunching, which is my job. NS2 simulations also take a lifetime. On the other hand, in this area no computer is fast enough.
Opera doesn't pass. Yet. However, Opera Software knows the test and they bragged recently in a changelog about improvements - quite rightly, they are huge. In 7.5 the test was a mess, now, in 8.02 it looks almost right. I'm not sure if they will be going for full compatibility though. Afterall, the other browsers are not better (yet) in that accept (maybe Konq, I haven't checked).
Hmmm... Nice idea. A d20-shaped mp3+ogg (of course!) player with good weight distribution... And preferably wireless headphones... Press a button, then throw - fun way to pick a random song. ;-) Only works for 128MB versions though - larger would store too many songs.
Time to uninstall Firefox? ;-) Just kidding.
This is one example why open-source Firefox+extensions is not intrinsically better (or worse, for that matter) than closed-source monolithic Opera. Yes, you get the freedom to choose, but incompatibilities are not the only problem. Firefox itself is popular, so the the "many eyes" rule works, but it's not so for individual extensions, there open source may not be an advantage - and how do you judge, which are ok?
That's the risk of this architecture, only to be expected.
You're right, of course. Over the years I learned the basic rule - if you write a program, focus on the basic task and make it (also) work as a unix-style filter (or at least 100% command line controllable) or one day you will wish you had.
However, so far the glue doesn't work and Opera, as a commercial company, has to do it this way if they want to add BitTorrent to their browser and do it fast. On the other hand, you still have a choice - you can define helper programs for different protocols, so if you want to pass BitTorrent links to a different app - go ahead. I hope this works, the options are there, but I haven't used them for a long time.
So far I'm generally satisfied with the way Opera is doing things. And if you like to connect different pieces of software, well, use Firefox - I'm fed up with this, I wan't a complete package, tested, small and fast. I'm not a fanatic - I love Opera, but you're free to use whatever you like. Isn't that what we all want - choice?
(and yes, I meant http)
Because Opera has a unified UI for downloads, with a "Transfers" panel, etc. So, you have a few downloads running, one using FTP, one HTML, one BitTorrent. Why look at 3 different windows if you can have it all in one list - progress bars, current speed, estimated time left...
It's akin to asking why Acrobat provides a plugin - after all if I click on pdf Acrobat would start anyway...
"web browsers are not stable"? You must be using FireFox ;-) (just kidding, don't get excited).
I get to work, fire up Opera, shut it down after 10 hours or so (or not, if I don't log out for some reason). One crash last month. Is that unstable for you?
Besides, Opera generally comes up from a crash in the same state as before, with pages open, transfers remembered (though you must activate them manually)... I they do this right, a crash won't hurt you. Unless BitTorrent can't continue a stopped transfer - I never used it, I don't know, but come on, that would be braindead for something that's supposed to be way better than FTP.
Mod this as you like, but I just accidentaly gave the parent a +1 Underrated and now I have to fix that mistake somehow. One bad click and now some other guys will lose the karma from my mods - but there's no way _that_ gets a +1 from me. This is the most "we-are-the-best-at-everything-and-you-all-owe-us" post I've seen in a long time.
The Internet might have been a national project, but it is now definitely global. At the same time, most of the infrastructure is based in US. The parent seems to think this is a good thing - not really. There's nothing inherently good about this. Yes, the current administrator may be good, but I don't see why they should be better than non-US ones, this is just veiled nationalism. Besides, with the kind of lawmaking the US has shown in the last few years this is a threat to all Internet businesses in the world. The US is becoming more and more unpredictable.
Yes, I'm overreacting, but hey, I wouldn't write this if I didn't have to. Mod me as you like, or even better - just don't.
Exactly.
I actually expected that 75% number. I watch movies almost only at a theatre and what do I see? A large room, half filled with people, 90% of them clustered in the back, far from the screen (it looks like a large TV from there). With popcorn. Whispering all the time, obviously wishing they could talk. No wonder they would rather watch movies at home, given a good quality home theatre setup.
I sit in one of the first rows. The screen is huge, I feel immersed in the movie. Sound is great. The popcorn-munching smelly talkers are far away in the back, so I can concentrate on the movie. Home theatre? I couldn't possibly buy one that would offer me THIS. Besides, the theatre reduces distractions. I don't feel like going to the kitchen, I go to the toilet if I must, a phone won't ring (the mobile is off), no neighbours at the door... I want to see the movie, goddammit, not "spend time"!
Oh, well. I should learn to enjoy Hollywood crap, I wouldn't be so weird.
And another thing. 75% might prefer home theatres, but the night sessions at a nearby cinema, 23:00-7:00, 3-4 movies, on 3-4 screens, are almost always packed. Hundreds of people. The moviegoers are still a strong minority!
Because there were many variants before anyone thought of this (JavaScript, JScript). But there is a standard - ECMA Script. It's basically the greatest common subset of those. I know Opera usess this as a reference for scripting implementation.
That's also the main selling point for desktop dual-core chips - without a realtime OS the second processor keeps the GUI running smoothly even under load. I sometimes use my friend's old dual Pentium 300, and under load it actually feels marginally faster than my (way faster) single chip Athlon. If the price, noise and energy consumption weren't so high I'd buy one for home use - and dual core may be the solution to those problems (plus, dual-core notebooks are a possibility, dual-chip - hardly). I also worked with QNX - nice...
In short - I want realtime Linux on my desktop NOW! I wish I wasn't that lazy and would actually do something about it...
Depends on what you're doing. As long as I just write code, run loooong computations, look at results (simple graphs of numbers), or do office jobs, LCDs are great - clear picture, easy on the eyes, lots of desk space for papers... But for graphics, games and such - I'd take my trusty 19" over any LCD, even new ones.
The push is coming from the industry and the shops, of course. Simple reason? SPACE! Not desk space, but storage space. It's costly, you know. Plus, well packed LCD are less likely to get heavily damaged by careless handling, plus transport is easier and cheaper (more LCDs fit in a truck) and carrying LCDs to the shelves is less likely to cause any harm to the workers...
Put simply, LCDs are easier and cheaper to store and sell.