Sounds more like they are saying HTML5 needs more work, rather than that they are 'coming down on the side of flash'. Besides I disagree with some of the points:
"video owners require us to use secure streaming technology, such as the Flash Platform's RTMPE protocol, to ensure their videos are not redistributed."
RTMPE is not secure. AFAIK the spec just says (effectively) "please do not let users save the video".
"While WebKit has recently taken some steps forward on fullscreen support, it's not yet sufficient for video usage (particularly the ability to continue displaying content on top of the video)."
Pah, part of the reason flash is shit for video is because it has to convert it to RGB and then can't use dedicated video scaling hardware. I much prefer the 'direct' fullscreen video approach even if it means we lose subtitles (and ads!). It also means you can always fullscreen a video, even when the controls aren't provided (*cough* youtube).
They've got a point about robust streaming though.
Simple solution, enumerate all the equally likely possible configurations:
Child1 = Boy born on Tuesday and Child2 = any of: Boy_monday, Boy_tuesday, Boy_wednesday, Boy_thursday, Boy_friday, Boy_saturday, Boy_sunday, Girl_monday, Girl_tuesday, Girl_wednesday, Girl_thursday, Girl_friday, Girl_sarturday, Girl_sunday.
Also the following (note that we don't count Boy_tuesday, Boy_tuesday twice):
Child2 = Boy born on Tuesday and Child1 = any of: Boy_monday, Boy_wednesday, Boy_thursday, Boy_friday, Boy_saturday, Boy_sunday, Girl_monday, Girl_tuesday, Girl_wednesday, Girl_thursday, Girl_friday, Girl_sarturday, Girl_sunday.
Now count the number of boy-boy results (13) and the total (27) to give the answer:
Well, they'll get wholesale price which is going to be a bit less than $530, but probably not much less, and certainly way more than $199. I'd guess around $400-$450.
Buying the phone separately often works out cheaper in the UK, plus your phone is unlocked and you don't have a long-term contract.
No, it's what's known as the "actual price". The 'subsidy' for the phone is really just a monthly payment play rolled into your contract price. If you get a SIM-only contract it will be much cheaper than one that comes with a phone (except in America).
Did you really think the iPhone *actually* costs $199?
I get through the 2 year contract which pays for the phone. So how come my rates don't go down in the third year if I keep the same phone?
In everywhere except America, they do. I suspect the reasons your networks can get away with it are:
1. No real competition, partly due to the GSM / CDMA issue, and partly because it isn't as well regulated as in other countries. For example in the UK it used to be that you couldn't keep the same phone number when you change providers. Government changed the rules so that you can now.
2. The fact that the price of the phone is spread across your contract seems to be better obscured. There are lots of people in the UK who really think some phones are free, and the iPhone is £99, but it seems in American *everyone* thinks that.
They don't own the device. If I want to have *my* device tell the app there's no internet connection even when there is, why on Earth should the app developer be able to stop me?
They may have a right to have the code in their app execute as written, but they certainly shouldn't have any say over how the API should behave.
By the way, there is already an app to do this (at least for internet connectivity):
It wouldn't make sense to selectively disable some of these requested resources since the application wouldn't work this access.
Absolute rubbish. Suppose I don't trust your app not to silently track my position but I want to test it out. I could easily deny it internet access and allow GPS and bluetooth.
And your app *does* work without GPS/internet/bluetooth. It may not be able to do everything it wants to, but it won't just crash.
I agree, imagine if we had computer screens with this pixel density! We could finally have smoothly scalable *and* sharp fonts. It would also stop the need to add hinting to fonts, which is apparently really tedious and difficult.
It may be something, but it certainly isn't the best security system possible. There's no way to control which permissions you allow - it's all or nothing. There's also no option for granting permission on a case-by-case bases (i.e. "App X wishes to send the following text message:.... [Allow] [Deny] [Always Allow] [Always Deny]").
Those would be massive improvements, but I don't think Google have any interest in implementing them (or even accepting patches).
Rubbish. If there's a banking app that also logs your account details, do you think we should leave that on people's phones. (By the way, this has already sort of happened in Android.)
Granted it *should* at least tell them "This app has been found to be malicious and will be removed."
It's a pocket-sized computer, so why don't we have pocket-sized operating systems instead of glorified firmware on them?
Two reasons:
1. Drivers. Many are still closed source. 2. The baseband image (i.e. the bit that talks to the mobile network). This is *always* closed source, and there's no way manufacturers are going to release the documentation for it...
Apparently Google are going to try to separate the UI from the base system better in future so upgrades will be easier. I'll believe it when I see it though.
I'm actually using Beta 3 (the final version doesn't seem to be in the market despite what the article says). It is much better than the first beta and generally isn't too bad.
You *can* zoom in using pinch-to-zoom but it doesn't really help. Even with the controls filling the screen you can't drag, and many controls are just too damn small.
You can also double-tap on the flash to make it fill the screen, which works pretty nicely, but even then you can't drag! (wtf?)
All in all, I don't think anyone could have done a much better job, but the fact is no current flash movies were designed for use on phones, and it shows badly.
Actually iOS multitasking works in exactly the same way as Android (i.e. when you switch away from an app its state is saved, and then it may be killed at any point).
The difference is that Android allows arbitrary 'Services' to run as well that aren't killed. Your app has to use these if you want 'true multitasking'. Apple seems to allow something like this, but with some kind of restrictions. I have no idea how they are enforced though.
So, I've tried it on my Nexus One. It seems to play videos ok, but that's about it. You can't really interact with the flash because no flash videos are designed for touch input.
On the BBC news video players you can't control playback because the clickable area on the time-line is far too narrow to hit. You also can't drag anything because this just scrolls the website.
Conclusion: Steve Jobs was right; flash doesn't belong on phones and I'm glad he is killing it, even if he is still an annoying control freak.
Significance at 10% is very significant for an election as closely monitored as first world elections are
No it isn't. If you test 10 elections you would expect one of those to fail this test *even if they are all 'good' elections*. There are more than 10 primaries aren't there? Nothing can be concluded from this result in isolation, however when taken with other *independent* evidence it can strengthen the whole case.
That's a good idea. There are recommendation sites for music (last.fm), films (filmaster.com) and so on. There should be an equivalent for search results. I.e. if you blacklist expertsexchange and scribd, then it finds other people who did the same and uses their preferences to modify your search results.
Google had a thing where you could delete search results for a while, but I don't know if it did anything like that and it seems to have disappeared.
Mice shouldn't *need* drivers! This is one of the things that annoys me most about OSX. It isn't so noticeable with the touchpad, but if you use an external mouse with the built-in HID drivers the acceleration is totally crazy, and there's no option to change it.
If you don't believe that it is crazy, consider the fact that there are several commercial three third party solutions to this problem, one of which is a completely new HID driver (which unfortunately breaks other USB devices).
Sailors can't go faster than the wind directly down-wind. From TFA which you didn't read:
Cavallaro explained the car is able to move faster than the wind because the propeller is not turned by the wind. The wind pushes the vehicle forward, and once moving the wheels turn the propeller. The propeller spins in the opposite direction to that expected, pushing the wind backwards, which in turn pushes the car forwards, turning the wheels, and thus turning the propeller faster still.
This isn't at all like sailing boats, or aerofoil-based boats.
There is already an 'anti-virus' app in the Android market. It has many 5 star reviews, but seeing as there *are* no android viruses yet I assume it just pretends to scan your system and then says 'no viruses found' or something.
a) How do they decide what is copyrighted? If *I* were to write a game/song/whatever and it got pirated I'm pretty sure they wouldn't even notice. b) How do they decide who is a film or music company? What's to stop anyone getting access to this list? Conversely why couldn't smaller film and music companies access it?
AV isn't about proportional representation! It's about removing the frustration of tactical voting.
It will probably still result in a more representative parliament though, and it is a complete lie to say it is 'less proportional the FPTP'. FPTP is about the worse voting system possible.
Slashdot Mirror
Sounds more like they are saying HTML5 needs more work, rather than that they are 'coming down on the side of flash'. Besides I disagree with some of the points:
"video owners require us to use secure streaming technology, such as the Flash Platform's RTMPE protocol, to ensure their videos are not redistributed."
RTMPE is not secure. AFAIK the spec just says (effectively) "please do not let users save the video".
"While WebKit has recently taken some steps forward on fullscreen support, it's not yet sufficient for video usage (particularly the ability to continue displaying content on top of the video)."
Pah, part of the reason flash is shit for video is because it has to convert it to RGB and then can't use dedicated video scaling hardware. I much prefer the 'direct' fullscreen video approach even if it means we lose subtitles (and ads!). It also means you can always fullscreen a video, even when the controls aren't provided (*cough* youtube).
They've got a point about robust streaming though.
Simple solution, enumerate all the equally likely possible configurations:
Child1 = Boy born on Tuesday and Child2 = any of:
Boy_monday, Boy_tuesday, Boy_wednesday, Boy_thursday, Boy_friday, Boy_saturday, Boy_sunday,
Girl_monday, Girl_tuesday, Girl_wednesday, Girl_thursday, Girl_friday, Girl_sarturday, Girl_sunday.
Also the following (note that we don't count Boy_tuesday, Boy_tuesday twice):
Child2 = Boy born on Tuesday and Child1 = any of:
Boy_monday, Boy_wednesday, Boy_thursday, Boy_friday, Boy_saturday, Boy_sunday,
Girl_monday, Girl_tuesday, Girl_wednesday, Girl_thursday, Girl_friday, Girl_sarturday, Girl_sunday.
Now count the number of boy-boy results (13) and the total (27) to give the answer:
13/27.
Yes.
Well, they'll get wholesale price which is going to be a bit less than $530, but probably not much less, and certainly way more than $199. I'd guess around $400-$450.
Buying the phone separately often works out cheaper in the UK, plus your phone is unlocked and you don't have a long-term contract.
No, it's what's known as the "actual price". The 'subsidy' for the phone is really just a monthly payment play rolled into your contract price. If you get a SIM-only contract it will be much cheaper than one that comes with a phone (except in America).
Did you really think the iPhone *actually* costs $199?
I get through the 2 year contract which pays for the phone. So how come my rates don't go down in the third year if I keep the same phone?
In everywhere except America, they do. I suspect the reasons your networks can get away with it are:
1. No real competition, partly due to the GSM / CDMA issue, and partly because it isn't as well regulated as in other countries. For example in the UK it used to be that you couldn't keep the same phone number when you change providers. Government changed the rules so that you can now.
2. The fact that the price of the phone is spread across your contract seems to be better obscured. There are lots of people in the UK who really think some phones are free, and the iPhone is £99, but it seems in American *everyone* thinks that.
They don't own the device. If I want to have *my* device tell the app there's no internet connection even when there is, why on Earth should the app developer be able to stop me?
They may have a right to have the code in their app execute as written, but they certainly shouldn't have any say over how the API should behave.
By the way, there is already an app to do this (at least for internet connectivity):
http://code.google.com/p/droidwall/
Sure, but who says the app vendor is willing to make it available under those terms?
Why should they have any choice?
It wouldn't make sense to selectively disable some of these requested resources since the application wouldn't work this access.
Absolute rubbish. Suppose I don't trust your app not to silently track my position but I want to test it out. I could easily deny it internet access and allow GPS and bluetooth.
And your app *does* work without GPS/internet/bluetooth. It may not be able to do everything it wants to, but it won't just crash.
I agree, imagine if we had computer screens with this pixel density! We could finally have smoothly scalable *and* sharp fonts. It would also stop the need to add hinting to fonts, which is apparently really tedious and difficult.
It may be something, but it certainly isn't the best security system possible. There's no way to control which permissions you allow - it's all or nothing. There's also no option for granting permission on a case-by-case bases (i.e. "App X wishes to send the following text message: .... [Allow] [Deny] [Always Allow] [Always Deny]").
Those would be massive improvements, but I don't think Google have any interest in implementing them (or even accepting patches).
Rubbish. If there's a banking app that also logs your account details, do you think we should leave that on people's phones. (By the way, this has already sort of happened in Android.)
Granted it *should* at least tell them "This app has been found to be malicious and will be removed."
It's a pocket-sized computer, so why don't we have pocket-sized operating systems instead of glorified firmware on them?
Two reasons:
1. Drivers. Many are still closed source.
2. The baseband image (i.e. the bit that talks to the mobile network). This is *always* closed source, and there's no way manufacturers are going to release the documentation for it...
Apparently Google are going to try to separate the UI from the base system better in future so upgrades will be easier. I'll believe it when I see it though.
I'm actually using Beta 3 (the final version doesn't seem to be in the market despite what the article says). It is much better than the first beta and generally isn't too bad.
You *can* zoom in using pinch-to-zoom but it doesn't really help. Even with the controls filling the screen you can't drag, and many controls are just too damn small.
You can also double-tap on the flash to make it fill the screen, which works pretty nicely, but even then you can't drag! (wtf?)
All in all, I don't think anyone could have done a much better job, but the fact is no current flash movies were designed for use on phones, and it shows badly.
Actually iOS multitasking works in exactly the same way as Android (i.e. when you switch away from an app its state is saved, and then it may be killed at any point).
The difference is that Android allows arbitrary 'Services' to run as well that aren't killed. Your app has to use these if you want 'true multitasking'. Apple seems to allow something like this, but with some kind of restrictions. I have no idea how they are enforced though.
So, I've tried it on my Nexus One. It seems to play videos ok, but that's about it. You can't really interact with the flash because no flash videos are designed for touch input.
On the BBC news video players you can't control playback because the clickable area on the time-line is far too narrow to hit. You also can't drag anything because this just scrolls the website.
Conclusion: Steve Jobs was right; flash doesn't belong on phones and I'm glad he is killing it, even if he is still an annoying control freak.
and was hard for voters to understand.
Is there any alternative voting system which isn't "hard for voters to understand"? Of all the weaselly excuses to keep FPTP that is the lamest.
Seriously. If you can't understand this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cumballot.gif
then maybe you shouldn't be voting.
Significance at 10% is very significant for an election as closely monitored as first world elections are
No it isn't. If you test 10 elections you would expect one of those to fail this test *even if they are all 'good' elections*. There are more than 10 primaries aren't there? Nothing can be concluded from this result in isolation, however when taken with other *independent* evidence it can strengthen the whole case.
Haha, the example they give for the 'glorious chaos of an article on the web' is an article spread over 8 pages! How glorious.
That's a good idea. There are recommendation sites for music (last.fm), films (filmaster.com) and so on. There should be an equivalent for search results. I.e. if you blacklist expertsexchange and scribd, then it finds other people who did the same and uses their preferences to modify your search results.
Google had a thing where you could delete search results for a while, but I don't know if it did anything like that and it seems to have disappeared.
Mice shouldn't *need* drivers! This is one of the things that annoys me most about OSX. It isn't so noticeable with the touchpad, but if you use an external mouse with the built-in HID drivers the acceleration is totally crazy, and there's no option to change it.
If you don't believe that it is crazy, consider the fact that there are several commercial three third party solutions to this problem, one of which is a completely new HID driver (which unfortunately breaks other USB devices).
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=osx+mouse+acceleration
Sailors can't go faster than the wind directly down-wind. From TFA which you didn't read:
Cavallaro explained the car is able to move faster than the wind because the propeller is not turned by the wind. The wind pushes the vehicle forward, and once moving the wheels turn the propeller. The propeller spins in the opposite direction to that expected, pushing the wind backwards, which in turn pushes the car forwards, turning the wheels, and thus turning the propeller faster still.
This isn't at all like sailing boats, or aerofoil-based boats.
he could visually estimate a vehicle's speed to within three to four miles per hour of the vehicle's actual speed, which he did
Where does it say that?
There is already an 'anti-virus' app in the Android market. It has many 5 star reviews, but seeing as there *are* no android viruses yet I assume it just pretends to scan your system and then says 'no viruses found' or something.
The biggest problems I see with this are:
a) How do they decide what is copyrighted? If *I* were to write a game/song/whatever and it got pirated I'm pretty sure they wouldn't even notice.
b) How do they decide who is a film or music company? What's to stop anyone getting access to this list? Conversely why couldn't smaller film and music companies access it?
AV isn't about proportional representation! It's about removing the frustration of tactical voting.
It will probably still result in a more representative parliament though, and it is a complete lie to say it is 'less proportional the FPTP'. FPTP is about the worse voting system possible.