Almost all Linux device drivers are written for free. The hardware support that exists is pretty damn impressive when you consider that. Users need to install a driver in Windows XP to get the card working. Ubuntu includes it and the card works automagically. Any WLAN driver that you put into Ubuntu is going to work like that.
No. If you read your own links you'll see that the original reason was that LAME was a patch for the original ISO reference code and thus wasn't able to encode anything on its own. Encoding isn't actually covered by the standard at all. The standard only specifies how to decode. It's up to each encoder to decide how the encoding happens. Of course, to get the same audio out as you put in, most encoders do pretty much the same thing. I'm sure it's possible to write around any encoder patents as well. Fraunhofer would have to prove that Microsoft's MP3 encoder uses algorithms that break their patent(s). That would mean reverse engineering. I'm not sure if you can use decompiled executables as proof in court, but I couldn't imagine the judge having a positive attitude towards the aquisition method. Microsoft might even countersue? In all events, I think it's highly unlikely that Fraunhofer will pursuit MS if they integrate an MP3 coder in X-box 360...
Personally I don't give a jack shit about winks or emoticons. I -do- care about audio/video conversations and file transfers. I'm just telling you how normal people like it. MSN is immensely popular because of its feature bloat. I think they could've found a more geek-friendly way of doing it, though.
The writer also seems to harp on the lack of nice appearance in the gaim and kopete interfaces... which AFAICT are totally skinnable leaving their appearance to the user, this article seems like nothing more than a PR statement from a MSN cheerleader...
My 30 year old sister doesn't even know what a skin *is*. She thinks winks are cute. She has a web site with her boyfriend on Freewebs. This is exactly the kind of people that use MSN. What he says about MSN Messenger in Europe is very true. People will look at you funny if you ask them about other IMs. If you can't send a file to someone or receive a wink or a handwritten message because you're using GAIM, you're basically a less fun person to IM for other people.
"All" the UN needs to do is to get every country to agree about using different root DNS servers. Anyone can form their own namespace. If the majority of the world forms their own namespace, USA will have to go along with it, or face isolation.
Does anyone know why access points even -have- fixed channels? If I can install Kismet on my Linksys WAP54G and scan for access points, can't the access point itself do the same, and put itself on the first free channel with the least noise on it? Wireless NICs scan the channels anyway, so I don't see why this isn't feasable.
Just some additional thoughts: At some point, when trying to define life, you will end up adding a criteria that is arbitrary and might actually exclude an existing life form. Any material will exhibit some response to its environment. The base of life is chemical. In this light, even the human brain can be perceived as only passively reacting to external stimuli. We also have to consider the definition of "external". To an organelle, such as a mitochondria, the inside of the cell is its environment and can be considered external. Life is more than the sum of its parts... or is it?
I guess you have a point, but in some senses, a mule is just a colony of cells. As we have established, the colony as a whole does not reproduce. Individual cells do. If we alter the sentence a bit...
"An organism is an entitiy in which reproduction takes place."
That would cover everything from a bacteria to a mule. This also leads me onto an interesting thought. Multi-celled organisms have two levels of reproduction. There is reproduction of tissue and there is the reproduction of the organism as a whole. Has anybody done research on how sexual reproduction evolved? Mating is an awfully complex way of creating an offspring, so this is making me curious.
In Norwegian, this planet's official name is Jorden (pron. YOOR-enn), from "jord" (earth, mold). The -en suffix is the determinator, making the word translate as "The Earth". It's interesting to note that "Earth" derives from Old English "eorthe" (pron. yorth), which is starting to sound an awful lot like "yoord", the literal pronounciation of "jord" if you don't mute the D. This is probably a lot of speculation on my part, but still.;)
My iRiver has what I'm guessing is a 1" display. I organize my music in folders. The display lists many of them at once and I navigate them. Arguing against a display is a sign of short thinking. Even if this player lacks folders, it's still quicker to glance at a song name and hit next than it is to wait for the song to start before you can browse on. As for nobody ever stopping to change the tune, that is a gross generalization. I -will- stop to change the song if I feel like listening to a special one. Also, you don't want to listen to all of your music at the same time. You keep a collection, and you browse for the song that fits your mood.
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Almost all Linux device drivers are written for free. The hardware support that exists is pretty damn impressive when you consider that. Users need to install a driver in Windows XP to get the card working. Ubuntu includes it and the card works automagically. Any WLAN driver that you put into Ubuntu is going to work like that.
I put my Cnet card (an RT2400 really) into my laptop with Ubuntu and clicked "Activate" and had wireless Internet access. Did anyone say "set up"?
No. If you read your own links you'll see that the original reason was that LAME was a patch for the original ISO reference code and thus wasn't able to encode anything on its own. Encoding isn't actually covered by the standard at all. The standard only specifies how to decode. It's up to each encoder to decide how the encoding happens. Of course, to get the same audio out as you put in, most encoders do pretty much the same thing. I'm sure it's possible to write around any encoder patents as well. Fraunhofer would have to prove that Microsoft's MP3 encoder uses algorithms that break their patent(s). That would mean reverse engineering. I'm not sure if you can use decompiled executables as proof in court, but I couldn't imagine the judge having a positive attitude towards the aquisition method. Microsoft might even countersue? In all events, I think it's highly unlikely that Fraunhofer will pursuit MS if they integrate an MP3 coder in X-box 360...
A license to Fraunhofer for what? I don't see the LAME project paying Fraunhofer royalties. Why would Microsoft need to?
Are you sure? The only thing he had to do in Europe was release an additional WMP-free version of XP.
If I had mod points, I'd mod you up.
Personally I don't give a jack shit about winks or emoticons. I -do- care about audio/video conversations and file transfers. I'm just telling you how normal people like it. MSN is immensely popular because of its feature bloat. I think they could've found a more geek-friendly way of doing it, though.
The writer also seems to harp on the lack of nice appearance in the gaim and kopete interfaces... which AFAICT are totally skinnable leaving their appearance to the user, this article seems like nothing more than a PR statement from a MSN cheerleader...
My 30 year old sister doesn't even know what a skin *is*. She thinks winks are cute. She has a web site with her boyfriend on Freewebs. This is exactly the kind of people that use MSN. What he says about MSN Messenger in Europe is very true. People will look at you funny if you ask them about other IMs. If you can't send a file to someone or receive a wink or a handwritten message because you're using GAIM, you're basically a less fun person to IM for other people.
That would mean that his phone doesn't handle POP3s "maildrop locked" response codes very well...
If Sun would only fix the memory problems in their JVM.
It's simple, really. "its" is like "his", except it applies to objects. "It's" = "It is". EOD!
"All" the UN needs to do is to get every country to agree about using different root DNS servers. Anyone can form their own namespace. If the majority of the world forms their own namespace, USA will have to go along with it, or face isolation.
I think the WAP54G firmware could be modified to do this. It's open source, after all.
AP manufacturers would save -sooo- much money on customer support if they automated features such as these.
Does anyone know why access points even -have- fixed channels? If I can install Kismet on my Linksys WAP54G and scan for access points, can't the access point itself do the same, and put itself on the first free channel with the least noise on it? Wireless NICs scan the channels anyway, so I don't see why this isn't feasable.
Why hasn't anybody removed this article?
Then what do you call the people who discovered the net just around the .com boom? They're even later.
Norwegian belongs to the Germanic language family, like English, so that would actually be true. ;-)
See the other answer to the parent post. I could add "actively respond" but what constitutes an active response in a cause-effect chain anyhow?
Just some additional thoughts: At some point, when trying to define life, you will end up adding a criteria that is arbitrary and might actually exclude an existing life form. Any material will exhibit some response to its environment. The base of life is chemical. In this light, even the human brain can be perceived as only passively reacting to external stimuli. We also have to consider the definition of "external". To an organelle, such as a mitochondria, the inside of the cell is its environment and can be considered external. Life is more than the sum of its parts... or is it?
That's an interesting proposition. There is something about fire. But we could just add another criteria and change the sencence:
"An organism is an entity, capable of responding to its environment, in which reproduction takes place."
Try to falsify it by example.
I guess you have a point, but in some senses, a mule is just a colony of cells. As we have established, the colony as a whole does not reproduce. Individual cells do. If we alter the sentence a bit...
"An organism is an entitiy in which reproduction takes place."
That would cover everything from a bacteria to a mule. This also leads me onto an interesting thought. Multi-celled organisms have two levels of reproduction. There is reproduction of tissue and there is the reproduction of the organism as a whole. Has anybody done research on how sexual reproduction evolved? Mating is an awfully complex way of creating an offspring, so this is making me curious.
Oh, but a mule -can- reproduce. In fact, it reproduces 24 hours a day. Its cells divide.
In Norwegian, this planet's official name is Jorden (pron. YOOR-enn), from "jord" (earth, mold). The -en suffix is the determinator, making the word translate as "The Earth". It's interesting to note that "Earth" derives from Old English "eorthe" (pron. yorth), which is starting to sound an awful lot like "yoord", the literal pronounciation of "jord" if you don't mute the D. This is probably a lot of speculation on my part, but still. ;)
My iRiver has what I'm guessing is a 1" display. I organize my music in folders. The display lists many of them at once and I navigate them. Arguing against a display is a sign of short thinking. Even if this player lacks folders, it's still quicker to glance at a song name and hit next than it is to wait for the song to start before you can browse on. As for nobody ever stopping to change the tune, that is a gross generalization. I -will- stop to change the song if I feel like listening to a special one. Also, you don't want to listen to all of your music at the same time. You keep a collection, and you browse for the song that fits your mood.