The problem with Xenocide is that the first half of the book made no sense without knowledge from the second half of the book. I liked the end of Xenocide, I also thought Children of the Mind was pretty good, but it wasn't really the same without Ender.
I guess this is comparable to Arthur C. Clarke's Rama series - good overall, but the books are so different that you're bound to hate at least one of them. (Now watch as I go off on a tangent.) I went and bought the computer game Rama because I liked the series - it's too bad that the game was mostly based on the one book I hated (Rama II). Oh, that and the fact that the non-playable demo was more fun than the game itself. --
Star Wars and Ender's Game are waaaaay too similar already to have the same actor. Here are all the similarities I can think of - note that I haven't seen the movies or read the books recently, so this may not all be accurate:
They start with one story, and then there is a gap, and then three more stories.
There's a {sequel|retelling} of the first story in the works.
Anakin starts out good and turns evil. Ender starts out evil (unknowingly) and turns good. The legend of "Ender the Xenocide" starts out good and turns evil.
{Anakin|Ender} is a {slave|Third}, making him an outcast from normal society.
{Luke|Ender}, I am your {father|brother}
There's something funny going on between {Luke|Ender} and his sister.
{Death Star|M.D. Device}
The last 3 {movies|books} are about a rebellion against {the Empire|Starways Congress}
{The Force|Jane, the mind of the ansibles} is within {Luke|Ender}.
{The Force|the ansible network} is made up of little tiny things that are inside everything.
The bad guys can use {the Force|the ansible network} too.
Cool space battles.
If I missed an obvious comparison, or if I'm just dead wrong about something, suggest what you would have put on this list. --
No, what he said actually works. The "fringes of legality" divide legality from illegality. He claims never to come close to those fringes, so he must stay on one side (legality) or the other (illegality), which is a bit ambiguous, but from context you can figure out it's legality. --
Well, this is very nice to hear, but I'm sure this news would have a much better impact if it was somewhere other than Slashdot. I realize that many Slashdot users don't use Linux - I was one of them not too long ago - but I assume anyone who has read more than 2 articles on Slashdot realizes how successful Linux is becoming. Posting an article on Slashdot about this is preaching to the choir. --
Oh Come On!!! Do you really pass through life believing that you saved hers? Do you really think that giving coffee and salt to someone who 'has dangerously low blood pressure' is in any way a medically sane option?
Listen to yourself. Jethro tried to help his friend, and you insult him. I think that Jethro should get credit for being concerned about Tracy. It may not seem likely, but there is a chance that Jethro did save Tracy's life. And the possibility of saving someone's life outweighs just about any risk of doing it. I'm sure you probably know something better to do for someone with dangerously low blood pressure, but do you think you'd remember what to do in a stressful situation like that? I applaud Jethro for doing anything at all. The world needs more people like this. He doesn't deserve to be insulted, especially since you haven't said what you would have done instead. --
Geekdom is even fond of completely wrong forms, as we can probably see. I have a friend who actually took Latin in school but insists that the plural of "Unix" is "Unixii". --
Re:How do you determine longitude with pre-elec te
on
GPS Rollover Tonight
·
· Score: 1
Uh, get a lot of timepieces and hope one of them doesn't fail?
Well, you could do some complicated constructions with an astrolabe, a compass, and a really big chart of magnetic declinations. It'd probably be easier to reinvent electricity, though. --
It's amazing how much Al Fasoldt has changed. I'm a regular reader of his column (though after getting Linux I stopped for a bit), and before a few months ago the column was entirely Windows-centric. I remember him getting excited about Windows 95, and before that about Windows 3.11, and even trying to print a batch file in the newspaper once. (It didn't work - the typesetting had no backslash glyph). And several months ago, he was lamenting about how unstable Windows was, but how we had no choice, and he added in parentheses: "(Well, there's Linux, but only the weird kid next door uses that.)"
But Al has finally seen the light - he now runs many columns about Linux. Contrary to the pessimists who say Microsoft has a monopoly over our minds, this is a victory. It was pretty much his job to give advice on Windows, but he's converted to Linux anyway. --
Re:I think they are going in the wrong direction h
on
The Future of KDE
·
· Score: 1
First of all, let me clarify that I love KDE and it is what I use. Re-arranging widgets is definitely nice. But I was trying to re-arrange the window widgets (program menu, sticky, maximize, minimize, close) and discovered that you can rearrange them a little, but not much from where they're expected to be. Do you want to put minimize to the right of maximize? You're out of luck. Do you want the program menu on the right side of the window? Sorry. You can click the button there but the menu still opens up on the LEFT side. And then there's the completely arbitrary restriction that you can't have more than 3 widgets on each side of the window. I wanted to put EVERYTHING on the right side, because of the way I often lose the upper left corner of a window behind the top-left taskbar. Sorry, only 3 per side, and of course the program menu has to be on the left. But I dealt with it by getting rid of maximize, which I never use.
Anyway, I realize I'm complaining about TINY little things, but I hope that KDE 2.0 fixes these arbitrary restrictions. --
I remember those days... My friend had Win95 Beta on his computer, and I remember saying "Wow! You can play TWO.avi files at the SAME TIME? Without the computer crashing?! Amazing!"
I bet this time around (this friend is still a Windows nut) it'll be, "Wow, you can do (thing that crashed Win9x) without the computer crashing? *yawn* So can Linux." --
Wow! You actually got to within 9.7 days of the Microsoft Epoch Error! It's too bad you kicked that power cable, you could have told us how spectacularly it crashed on day 49.7. Has anyone ever had enough uptime to get to this error? If not: "To boldly crash where no computer has crashed before." --
While you're eradicating stupidity, why not eradicate your SmartQuotes too?
Anyway, it's be nice if Windows 2000 actually shipped in 2000, not 1999 or 2001 - it'd mean that, unlike car manufacturers, software companies actually do know what year it is. --
Oh, they could prevent an analog copy - simply introduce a sound format that's so secure, you can't play it! Attempting to play one of these files would make the analyzer bounce up and down, but the sound it would actually produce would be the Microsoft Sound over and over again. But optionally, for a small fee, you could click an 'ActiveListen' button which would cause Microsoft agents to barge into your house and point a secret device at your computer that would (a) make the music play, (b) delete any copies of Netscape on your computer, "for security reasons", and (c) check for anything recording the audio. If anything was detected, your personal information (and your Pentium III ID, if applicable) would be sent to Microsoft's servers, also "for security reasons". Oh great, I probably just gave them ideas. --
So what if IRC was first? If at first you don't succeed, try, try again... I keep hearing the occasional IRC advocate saying how IRC is better than any messaging client - but from my experiences with IRC, it's not that great. It takes forever to connect, if you can connect at all. Names aren't protected very well - even if someone registers their name, you can impersonate them for 60 seconds. Lag is sometimes measured in minutes. Sending spam messages to everyone online is common. Netsplits are abundant. And 99.9% of every server I've seen is pr0n/war3z.
The last time I used IRC was for the "Final Chat" with MST3K cast members. It was a mess. I now wholeheartedly avoid IRC. --
Eep! I never heard of them wanting to make their own OS. That's scary. Following the traditional naming schemes, it should probably be called "AOL Instant Bob". --
I bet that on the anti-Earth, anti-Linus Torvalds has a monopoly over the anti-computer industry, except that a subculture of anti-geeks use a product called "Windows" that would be the anti-killer app if it would only gain acceptance by the anti-public. --
"What do you MEAN you've never been to Alpha Centauri? For heaven's sake mankind, it's only four light-years away you know. I'm sorry, but if you can't even be bothered to take an interest in local affairs that's your own lookout. Energize the demolition beams." - Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
So Alpha Centauri could be where the FAQ is. We should build a spaceship to go there now - or would the aliens laugh at us and call us "rocket kiddies"? --
Maybe the Indians saw some ships going by on some of the early explorations, when the Europeans didn't make much contact with the natives. An Indian who saw a European ship would claim that he saw a UFO (Unidentified Floating Object), and everyone else would just say that he had been going a little too heavy on the peace pipe. --
I changed '99' to '00' in various addresses, and I stumbled across the following article: Slafhdotte Newf for Forward-Thinking Perfonf. Itemf of importance.
5 Foot Railroad Gauge Gaining Acceptance An Article in Scientific American fayf that the 5 Foot railroad gauge is gaining Acceptance among fmaller Railroad Companief. Although Trainf designed for the exifting 4 Foot 8-1/2 Inch trackf in use by the Railroad Monopolief will Not Work on thefe trackf, the 5 Foot gauge haf many advantagef. It if cheaper to build, trainf can run fafter on it, and it only takef 4 minutef to infall a fection of track. Pluf, the trackf are being defigned efpecially fo that Train Crafhef will never occur.
Supporterf of the 'Open Track Movement' are building the trainf that will run on thefe trackf for free in their fpare time. It will not be long before the obfolete 4 Foot 8-1/2 Inch ftandard fallf into difufe.
Next Article: Jonathan Katz III propofef "Tell A Schoolteacher Not To Beat A Difobedient Child To-Day"
Commentf (We do not even know what Beta meanf!)
FIRST POST (Score:-1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Cowherd on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ High Noon
Ye Firft Poft!
Re: FIRST POST (Score: 1) by Farmer Bob on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ Sometime After High Noon
You are an extremely ignorant fellow. Quiet yourfelf before I muft resort to fifticufff.
5 INCH FOREVER! by Anonymous Cowherd on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ Sometime in the Evening
The railroad monopolief are going down! I certainly hope thifftandard if in general ufe before people begin to think that train crafhef are normal!
Slashdot Mirror
The problem with Xenocide is that the first half of the book made no sense without knowledge from the second half of the book. I liked the end of Xenocide, I also thought Children of the Mind was pretty good, but it wasn't really the same without Ender.
I guess this is comparable to Arthur C. Clarke's Rama series - good overall, but the books are so different that you're bound to hate at least one of them. (Now watch as I go off on a tangent.) I went and bought the computer game Rama because I liked the series - it's too bad that the game was mostly based on the one book I hated (Rama II). Oh, that and the fact that the non-playable demo was more fun than the game itself.
--
If I missed an obvious comparison, or if I'm just dead wrong about something, suggest what you would have put on this list.
--
No, what he said actually works. The "fringes of legality" divide legality from illegality. He claims never to come close to those fringes, so he must stay on one side (legality) or the other (illegality), which is a bit ambiguous, but from context you can figure out it's legality.
--
Well, this is very nice to hear, but I'm sure this news would have a much better impact if it was somewhere other than Slashdot.
I realize that many Slashdot users don't use Linux - I was one of them not too long ago - but I assume anyone who has read more than 2 articles on Slashdot realizes how successful Linux is becoming. Posting an article on Slashdot about this is preaching to the choir.
--
Listen to yourself. Jethro tried to help his friend, and you insult him. I think that Jethro should get credit for being concerned about Tracy. It may not seem likely, but there is a chance that Jethro did save Tracy's life. And the possibility of saving someone's life outweighs just about any risk of doing it.
I'm sure you probably know something better to do for someone with dangerously low blood pressure, but do you think you'd remember what to do in a stressful situation like that? I applaud Jethro for doing anything at all. The world needs more people like this. He doesn't deserve to be insulted, especially since you haven't said what you would have done instead.
--
Bill Gates did SOMETHING illegal when he was 15. I definitely remember reading that. It was probably stealing computer time.
If only he had been restricted from using a computer because of that... Think how much better the world would be...
--
Geekdom is even fond of completely wrong forms,
as we can probably see. I have a friend who actually took Latin in school but insists that the plural of "Unix" is "Unixii".
--
Uh, get a lot of timepieces and hope one of them doesn't fail?
Well, you could do some complicated constructions with an astrolabe, a compass, and a really big chart of magnetic declinations. It'd probably be easier to reinvent electricity, though.
--
And of course there would be no penguins in Hell, because Hell runs Windows.
--
And several months ago, he was lamenting about how unstable Windows was, but how we had no choice, and he added in parentheses: "(Well, there's Linux, but only the weird kid next door uses that.)"
But Al has finally seen the light - he now runs many columns about Linux. Contrary to the pessimists who say Microsoft has a monopoly over our minds, this is a victory. It was pretty much his job to give advice on Windows, but he's converted to Linux anyway.
--
First of all, let me clarify that I love KDE and it is what I use.
Re-arranging widgets is definitely nice. But I was trying to re-arrange the window widgets (program menu, sticky, maximize, minimize, close) and discovered that you can rearrange them a little, but not much from where they're expected to be.
Do you want to put minimize to the right of maximize? You're out of luck.
Do you want the program menu on the right side of the window? Sorry. You can click the button there but the menu still opens up on the LEFT side.
And then there's the completely arbitrary restriction that you can't have more than 3 widgets on each side of the window. I wanted to put EVERYTHING on the right side, because of the way I often lose the upper left corner of a window behind the top-left taskbar. Sorry, only 3 per side, and of course the program menu has to be on the left. But I dealt with it by getting rid of maximize, which I never use.
Anyway, I realize I'm complaining about TINY little things, but I hope that KDE 2.0 fixes these arbitrary restrictions.
--
I remember those days... My friend had Win95 Beta on his computer, and I remember saying "Wow! You can play TWO .avi files at the SAME TIME? Without the computer crashing?! Amazing!"
I bet this time around (this friend is still a Windows nut) it'll be, "Wow, you can do (thing that crashed Win9x) without the computer crashing? *yawn* So can Linux."
--
Wow! You actually got to within 9.7 days of the Microsoft Epoch Error! It's too bad you kicked that power cable, you could have told us how spectacularly it crashed on day 49.7.
Has anyone ever had enough uptime to get to this error? If not: "To boldly crash where no computer has crashed before."
--
Windows 2000 won?t ship by the end of the year.
While you're eradicating stupidity, why not eradicate your SmartQuotes too?
Anyway, it's be nice if Windows 2000 actually shipped in 2000, not 1999 or 2001 - it'd mean that, unlike car manufacturers, software companies actually do know what year it is.
--
And the Microsoft employee was telling the truth in the same way that Bill Clinton was. (i.e. not).
The encryption really was cracked.
--
Oh, they could prevent an analog copy - simply introduce a sound format that's so secure, you can't play it! Attempting to play one of these files would make the analyzer bounce up and down, but the sound it would actually produce would be the Microsoft Sound over and over again. But optionally, for a small fee, you could click an 'ActiveListen' button which would cause Microsoft agents to barge into your house and point a secret device at your computer that would (a) make the music play, (b) delete any copies of Netscape on your computer, "for security reasons", and (c) check for anything recording the audio. If anything was detected, your personal information (and your Pentium III ID, if applicable) would be sent to Microsoft's servers, also "for security reasons".
Oh great, I probably just gave them ideas.
--
So what if IRC was first? If at first you don't succeed, try, try again...
I keep hearing the occasional IRC advocate saying how IRC is better than any messaging client - but from my experiences with IRC, it's not that great.
It takes forever to connect, if you can connect at all. Names aren't protected very well - even if someone registers their name, you can impersonate them for 60 seconds. Lag is sometimes measured in minutes. Sending spam messages to everyone online is common. Netsplits are abundant. And 99.9% of every server I've seen is pr0n/war3z.
The last time I used IRC was for the "Final Chat" with MST3K cast members. It was a mess. I now wholeheartedly avoid IRC.
--
Eep! I never heard of them wanting to make their own OS. That's scary.
Following the traditional naming schemes, it should probably be called "AOL Instant Bob".
--
Next time on Celebrity DeathMatch... Mars Sojourner vs. a Cuisinart.
--
I bet that on the anti-Earth, anti-Linus Torvalds has a monopoly over the anti-computer industry, except that a subculture of anti-geeks use a product called "Windows" that would be the anti-killer app if it would only gain acceptance by the anti-public.
--
"What do you MEAN you've never been to Alpha Centauri? For heaven's sake mankind, it's only four light-years away you know. I'm sorry, but if you can't even be bothered to take an interest in local affairs that's your own lookout. Energize the demolition beams."
- Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
So Alpha Centauri could be where the FAQ is.
We should build a spaceship to go there now - or would the aliens laugh at us and call us "rocket kiddies"?
--
Maybe the Indians saw some ships going by on some of the early explorations, when the Europeans didn't make much contact with the natives. An Indian who saw a European ship would claim that he saw a UFO (Unidentified Floating Object), and everyone else would just say that he had been going a little too heavy on the peace pipe.
--
The black hole should be running Windows. Then it would suck MORE.
--
So how is this art going to be displayed? Will art galleries have framed printouts of C code, or will they just give out Linux CDs?
--
I changed '99' to '00' in various addresses, and I stumbled across the following article:
Slafhdotte
Newf for Forward-Thinking Perfonf. Itemf of importance.
5 Foot Railroad Gauge Gaining Acceptance
An Article in Scientific American fayf that the 5 Foot railroad gauge is gaining Acceptance among fmaller Railroad Companief. Although Trainf designed for the exifting 4 Foot 8-1/2 Inch trackf in use by the Railroad Monopolief will Not Work on thefe trackf, the 5 Foot gauge haf many advantagef. It if cheaper to build, trainf can run fafter on it, and it only takef 4 minutef to infall a fection of track. Pluf, the trackf are being defigned efpecially fo that Train Crafhef will never occur.
Supporterf of the 'Open Track Movement' are building the trainf that will run on thefe trackf for free in their fpare time. It will not be long before the obfolete 4 Foot 8-1/2 Inch ftandard fallf into difufe.
Next Article: Jonathan Katz III propofef "Tell A Schoolteacher Not To Beat A Difobedient Child To-Day"
Commentf
(We do not even know what Beta meanf!)
FIRST POST (Score:-1, Offtopic)
by Anonymous Cowherd on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ High Noon
Ye Firft Poft!
Re: FIRST POST (Score: 1)
by Farmer Bob on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ Sometime After High Noon
You are an extremely ignorant fellow. Quiet yourfelf before I muft resort to fifticufff.
5 INCH FOREVER!
by Anonymous Cowherd on Monday Auguft 16, 1900, @ Sometime in the Evening
The railroad monopolief are going down! I certainly hope thif ftandard if in general ufe before people begin to think that train crafhef are normal!
--