The problem is that the same password is used for everything.
No it's not. The Apple ID is on thing, it's used for downloading.
Parental controls is a pin number.
And the passcode to access the device in the first place is a different one again.
If you're saying there should be a different password for free and non-free app downloads, that's straying into needlessly complicated territory. Not Apple's style.
We're talking about YOUR iOS device here and YOUR account. You should take an interest in what apps the kid is downloading, even if they are free.
If it's the kids own iOS device, he gets his own Apple ID, without unlimited credit card attached.
Either way, he doesn't get the parental controls PIN.
Few adults can resist? The vast majority of people who play these games (Farmville, Angry Birds etc.) never buy any content. The developers are playing the numbers game, it's OK if only a tiny percentage pay if you have more than a million of people playing.
Nowadays, every device has a built in app-store or similar functionality and a credit card is required to even make the device function (why does Apple require a credit card to download free apps or update apps that you've already paid for?!).
Plus, if you do have a credit card set up, then purchases require the password to be entered. You didn't give a password connected to your credit card to your kid did you?
On top of that, there are parental controls (under a different password) on the iOS devices, including one that turns off in-app purchase,
Further more, gift cards are available if you want to allocate a set amount for a child to spend.
So exactly how difficult is it for a responsible parent to stop their child spending? Actually it's the opposite way around... the parent has to take steps to enable the kid to make purchases.
For sure though there are a lot of parents that don't have the intelligence to not give a child a credit-card enabled phone. And low intelligence is not their fault. And I have no problem at all with governments clipping the wings of any companies peddling exploitative apps or premium phone lines.
Embedded car GPS systems are linked to the car speed data, and when entering a long tunnel, will continue to move the position correctly. For this limited scenario, it appears to the user as if the GPS was active all along.
Yes, but that's just software, blindly dead-reckoning from your GPS implied speed going into the tunnel, and it's map of where the tunnel goes. And generally they give up even after a minute or so, because the programmers accept it'll be wildly inaccurate by then.
This a a chip, with 3 gyros and 3 accelerometers. Which means it can tell when you change speed and direction. And will be reasonably accurate for much longer.
Nothing particularly new. Just military spec one in a tiny package. But more than you get with a consumer satnav.
Not so. Dumb mobile phones were obvious to everyone from the start. Everyone had experience of landlines and could imagine the same, but without a wire to tether it. Smartphones came quite a while after PDAs, so it was perfectly obvious that smartphones were a mix of PDAs and mobile phones. Applications were obvious.
Google glass is a different category. You'd do better to compare it with the Segway.
And it's not a HUD. HUDs display in your field of vision. This is a display out of the normal field of vision. So all the overlay ideas are dead on arrival.
It's faster. It displays larger icons for quicker visual identification when a partial name has brought up more than one app. And it doesn't have the clutter of files that aren't applications.
Basically it's a more specific tool for the job of launching apps than Spotlight is.
And not only does your OSX machine has a swap file it has other reserved partitions.
And it does a superb job of hiding that from me because it's not something I need to know about. The developers will never understand that that is a good thing.
Linux's FDISK is fantastic software.
Is it much different from the fdisk build in to OSX? Certainly not something for users. There are of course nice partition managers available for OSX with proper UIs, if you enjoy playing with that kind of thing.
The original post you started your random anti-Linux crusade on wasn't even talking about Linux
Of course it was. "I often wonder what will happen first: Microsoft/Apple realising the error of their ways and making a useful UI, or users collectively sighing and sucking up the crap they are given." "Fortunately, in the *nix world, we have a choice."
What version of *nix do you think he was talking about? He's just slagged off the only popular Unix, and he's not using BSD...
discuss the real reasons why Linux isn't popular on the desktop? You're always talking the UI
For a computer that is used by users, the UI is everything. It's entire worth is your input to it to control it, and it's output to you in response. Everything starts and ends with that. There is nothing more important.
But sure, other things are significant too.
Application availability? Sure, but apps are essentially mostly UI plugins. They too live or die by how good the UI they add is.
Businesses want Excel, Word, and Outlook. Creative developers want Photoshop
There's certainly a lot of file format lock in with the MS Office apps. But there's none with photoshop. Photographers and designers deliver in the standard image formats. They could use GIMP just as well as Photoshop. Except that GIMP sucks.
Software developers are whores who will program for anything. They're also the majority of desktop Linux users....Linux's problem isn't so much useability - it's that it has never had a killer app in the desktop realm to generate a user base around.
Which is odd isn't it? All those software engineers on Linux, working for 22 years. And no killer apps.
Why?
Because software engineers don't make great programs. Designers do. Software engineers are there to implement designers designs... but on Linux, the software developers either haven't realised that or are too arrogant to care.
1. Linux does have a share on the desktop. But not a market share. There's a difference, and if you think about it, you'll see why.
Free stuff still has a market share. Look at browsers. They have a market share by definition, otherwise Microsoft couldn't have been done under the Sherman act.
If you're telling us that you are incapable of even coping with that, you should hand in your "nerd card" and not come back.
It's not a matter of can't. I can spend an afternoon fixing a toilet if I need to, I just don't want to.
Bad design that exposes implementation that the user shouldn't have to care about offends me. As do Inconsistent and non-user friendly UIs.
Far be it from me to defend it, but it's clearly been good enough to attract people. Whereas desktop Linux hasn't.
and other problems that make it horribly unsuitable for the desktop.
I'm not suggesting using Android on the desktop! That's be silly. I'm just pointing out the difference between a commercial Linux UI that's actually been designed, and a hobbyist UI that hasn't.
the middle-button thingy is a historical artifact from earlier unices (but useful nonetheless once you have the hang of it). You don't have to use it if you don't like it.
Ah, but you used to. It was the only way with some apps, and not available on others. There was NO way to cut and paste between certain apps. Except to use a third app as a middle man.
So what's your point?
I made my point. This is why Linux has no market share on the desktop. I mean it SHOULD be popular. It's available free of charge for Christ's sake. If it was even close to the usability levels of the commercial OSs, it'd be popular. But it's not.
The whole point is that we don't have some bozo in a black roll-neck or grey suit telling us how we should use our machines.
And because of that lack of design talent and experience moulding the UI, it's got no market share.
It took a commercial organisation like Google to make a Linux based UI that people actually wanted to use - Android.
you can since at least 10 years ago I would say....
But anyway, you can stay in the years 1990...
10 years ago was 2003, not the 1990s. We're talking contemporaneous with Windows XP and OSX 10.2 Jaguar. They were amazingly good compared with Linux of the day.
But yes, it was late 1990s, through to the early 2000s, when I had a once a year ritual to give Linux a try to see if it was ready to use yet. Because each year people were assuring me that it was ready. This year was going to be the Year of Linux on the Desktop. And it never was. Each year I wasted a day of my time to find out that Linux was still horrible. Horrible UI and terrible hardware compatibility.
Can you blame me for giving up? And do you understand that I've heard your suggestion to give it a try because it's ready now before. I don't believe it's ready. I don't believe it ever will be. And I'm no longer going to waste a day a year confirming that.
I'm not even in the market any more because Apple did deliver on a user friendly Unix where Linux could not. And I'm more than happy with that.
With white space being insignifacant each reader of the code can format it however they want.
And that's a bad thing. I mean you don't have people choosing what they want to call the commands in a programming language. That would be chaos. Some people have tried... remember #define BEGIN { #define END }
With indenting as with commands, it's far better of the language defines a common standard, with deviations being a warning or an error. That way, when are working collaboratively their code is guaranteed to be in the same indentation style.
Unfortunately no language I know of does this. Python comes closest, but they stopped short of defining how big an indent is. So code from different sources can still be indented differently.
The PC will be like a truck, mobile like a car. There are people that need trucks, there are people that don't need trucks and want one anyway, but most people use a car.
A/V work is for trucks. But most people are in cars just running little errands or driving for fun.
I often wonder what will happen first: Microsoft/Apple realising the error of their ways and making a useful UI, or users collectively sighing and sucking up the crap they are given.
Ah, a Linux fan. It's been a while... tell me, can you actually copy and paste from anywhere to anywhere yet? It used to depend on what API a particular app had been coded with. Heck the UI for copy paste wasn't even the same between apps. For some it was the middle mouse button!?!
Does it still ask you where and how big to make a "swap file" when you install, and expect you to know about partitions?
Does it still use bizarre and unguessable names for apps, even the core ones like the one to set up basic system options?
There's a reason Linux never caught up on the desktop. And it's not because people are stupid. It's because no-one with any user design skills ever had enough control over Linux to make it half-decent to use.
Slashdot Mirror
Could you please supply the exact number of children's deaths over a 3 year period that you believe would justify banning the product. Thanks.
It still does.
Who's device is it? If it's the kids, then they have their own account, with whatever financial arrangements you choose.
If it's your device, then you wouldn't want the kid adding and updating apps without permission.
iOS Restrictions (parental controls) allows you to choose to have that 15 minutes, or require a password for every download.
The problem is that the same password is used for everything.
No it's not. The Apple ID is on thing, it's used for downloading.
Parental controls is a pin number.
And the passcode to access the device in the first place is a different one again.
If you're saying there should be a different password for free and non-free app downloads, that's straying into needlessly complicated territory. Not Apple's style.
We're talking about YOUR iOS device here and YOUR account. You should take an interest in what apps the kid is downloading, even if they are free.
If it's the kids own iOS device, he gets his own Apple ID, without unlimited credit card attached.
Either way, he doesn't get the parental controls PIN.
Few adults can resist? The vast majority of people who play these games (Farmville, Angry Birds etc.) never buy any content. The developers are playing the numbers game, it's OK if only a tiny percentage pay if you have more than a million of people playing.
Nowadays, every device has a built in app-store or similar functionality and a credit card is required to even make the device function (why does Apple require a credit card to download free apps or update apps that you've already paid for?!).
That's simply not true.
http://s.iosfans.com/?u=http://cdn.macorg.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/free-apple-account-002.png
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2534
Plus, if you do have a credit card set up, then purchases require the password to be entered. You didn't give a password connected to your credit card to your kid did you?
On top of that, there are parental controls (under a different password) on the iOS devices, including one that turns off in-app purchase,
Further more, gift cards are available if you want to allocate a set amount for a child to spend.
So exactly how difficult is it for a responsible parent to stop their child spending? Actually it's the opposite way around... the parent has to take steps to enable the kid to make purchases.
For sure though there are a lot of parents that don't have the intelligence to not give a child a credit-card enabled phone. And low intelligence is not their fault. And I have no problem at all with governments clipping the wings of any companies peddling exploitative apps or premium phone lines.
Embedded car GPS systems are linked to the car speed data, and when entering a long tunnel, will continue to move the position correctly.
For this limited scenario, it appears to the user as if the GPS was active all along.
Yes, but that's just software, blindly dead-reckoning from your GPS implied speed going into the tunnel, and it's map of where the tunnel goes. And generally they give up even after a minute or so, because the programmers accept it'll be wildly inaccurate by then.
This a a chip, with 3 gyros and 3 accelerometers. Which means it can tell when you change speed and direction. And will be reasonably accurate for much longer.
Nothing particularly new. Just military spec one in a tiny package. But more than you get with a consumer satnav.
In state tuition can be paid for in full with no loan by waiting tables, at least im my state.
Shouldn't a student be studying rather than waiting tables.
But I've seen it happen. In the movies.
instantly identify assholes by the little light on their glasses
Glassholes.
Not so. Dumb mobile phones were obvious to everyone from the start. Everyone had experience of landlines and could imagine the same, but without a wire to tether it. Smartphones came quite a while after PDAs, so it was perfectly obvious that smartphones were a mix of PDAs and mobile phones. Applications were obvious.
Google glass is a different category. You'd do better to compare it with the Segway.
And it's not a HUD. HUDs display in your field of vision. This is a display out of the normal field of vision. So all the overlay ideas are dead on arrival.
That's not my recollection at all. People were impressed with mobile phones from day one. It just took a while till they were affordable.
Bluetooth headsets on the other hand... People do laugh and joke about and think people using them are assholes.
In fact there's already a derogatory term for Google Glass users.. Glassholes.
Maybe. Or maybe it's like when we scoffed at Microsoft's Kin, Zune and PlaysFerSure.
Personally I think it's going to be as popular as the Segway.
Crapload? Is there any indication there's much interest in developing for this?
It's faster. It displays larger icons for quicker visual identification when a partial name has brought up more than one app. And it doesn't have the clutter of files that aren't applications.
Basically it's a more specific tool for the job of launching apps than Spotlight is.
And not only does your OSX machine has a swap file it has other reserved partitions.
And it does a superb job of hiding that from me because it's not something I need to know about. The developers will never understand that that is a good thing.
Linux's FDISK is fantastic software.
Is it much different from the fdisk build in to OSX? Certainly not something for users. There are of course nice partition managers available for OSX with proper UIs, if you enjoy playing with that kind of thing.
The original post you started your random anti-Linux crusade on wasn't even talking about Linux
Of course it was.
"I often wonder what will happen first: Microsoft/Apple realising the error of their ways and making a useful UI, or users collectively sighing and sucking up the crap they are given."
"Fortunately, in the *nix world, we have a choice."
What version of *nix do you think he was talking about? He's just slagged off the only popular Unix, and he's not using BSD...
discuss the real reasons why Linux isn't popular on the desktop? You're always talking the UI
For a computer that is used by users, the UI is everything. It's entire worth is your input to it to control it, and it's output to you in response. Everything starts and ends with that. There is nothing more important.
But sure, other things are significant too.
Application availability? Sure, but apps are essentially mostly UI plugins. They too live or die by how good the UI they add is.
Businesses want Excel, Word, and Outlook. Creative developers want Photoshop
There's certainly a lot of file format lock in with the MS Office apps. But there's none with photoshop. Photographers and designers deliver in the standard image formats. They could use GIMP just as well as Photoshop. Except that GIMP sucks.
Software developers are whores who will program for anything. They're also the majority of desktop Linux users....Linux's problem isn't so much useability - it's that it has never had a killer app in the desktop realm to generate a user base around.
Which is odd isn't it? All those software engineers on Linux, working for 22 years. And no killer apps.
Why?
Because software engineers don't make great programs. Designers do. Software engineers are there to implement designers designs... but on Linux, the software developers either haven't realised that or are too arrogant to care.
1. Linux does have a share on the desktop. But not a market share. There's a difference, and if you think about it, you'll see why.
Free stuff still has a market share. Look at browsers. They have a market share by definition, otherwise Microsoft couldn't have been done under the Sherman act.
If you're telling us that you are incapable of even coping with that, you should hand in your "nerd card" and not come back.
It's not a matter of can't. I can spend an afternoon fixing a toilet if I need to, I just don't want to.
Bad design that exposes implementation that the user shouldn't have to care about offends me. As do Inconsistent and non-user friendly UIs.
But android has a terrible UI
Far be it from me to defend it, but it's clearly been good enough to attract people. Whereas desktop Linux hasn't.
and other problems that make it horribly unsuitable for the desktop.
I'm not suggesting using Android on the desktop! That's be silly. I'm just pointing out the difference between a commercial Linux UI that's actually been designed, and a hobbyist UI that hasn't.
As for a dedicated swap filesystem, what do you think is happening inside the huge swap file on your windows machine.
How dare you! My OSX machine no doubt has swap files. But I don't need to know that.
What it certainly doesn't have is an installation wizard that talks about partitions and swap.
Last time I cared about partitions and swap was with a PC back in the late nineties. Trying out Linux and BeOS.
the middle-button thingy is a historical artifact from earlier unices (but useful nonetheless once you have the hang of it). You don't have to use it if you don't like it.
Ah, but you used to. It was the only way with some apps, and not available on others. There was NO way to cut and paste between certain apps. Except to use a third app as a middle man.
So what's your point?
I made my point. This is why Linux has no market share on the desktop. I mean it SHOULD be popular. It's available free of charge for Christ's sake. If it was even close to the usability levels of the commercial OSs, it'd be popular. But it's not.
The whole point is that we don't have some bozo in a black roll-neck or grey suit telling us how we should use our machines.
And because of that lack of design talent and experience moulding the UI, it's got no market share.
It took a commercial organisation like Google to make a Linux based UI that people actually wanted to use - Android.
you can since at least 10 years ago I would say....
But anyway, you can stay in the years 1990...
10 years ago was 2003, not the 1990s. We're talking contemporaneous with Windows XP and OSX 10.2 Jaguar. They were amazingly good compared with Linux of the day.
But yes, it was late 1990s, through to the early 2000s, when I had a once a year ritual to give Linux a try to see if it was ready to use yet. Because each year people were assuring me that it was ready. This year was going to be the Year of Linux on the Desktop. And it never was. Each year I wasted a day of my time to find out that Linux was still horrible. Horrible UI and terrible hardware compatibility.
Can you blame me for giving up? And do you understand that I've heard your suggestion to give it a try because it's ready now before. I don't believe it's ready. I don't believe it ever will be. And I'm no longer going to waste a day a year confirming that.
I'm not even in the market any more because Apple did deliver on a user friendly Unix where Linux could not. And I'm more than happy with that.
With white space being insignifacant each reader of the code can format it however they want.
And that's a bad thing. I mean you don't have people choosing what they want to call the commands in a programming language. That would be chaos. Some people have tried... remember
#define BEGIN {
#define END }
With indenting as with commands, it's far better of the language defines a common standard, with deviations being a warning or an error. That way, when are working collaboratively their code is guaranteed to be in the same indentation style.
Unfortunately no language I know of does this. Python comes closest, but they stopped short of defining how big an indent is. So code from different sources can still be indented differently.
Slashdot car analogy time.
The PC will be like a truck, mobile like a car. There are people that need trucks, there are people that don't need trucks and want one anyway, but most people use a car.
A/V work is for trucks. But most people are in cars just running little errands or driving for fun.
I often wonder what will happen first: Microsoft/Apple realising the error of their ways and making a useful UI, or users collectively sighing and sucking up the crap they are given.
Ah, a Linux fan. It's been a while... tell me, can you actually copy and paste from anywhere to anywhere yet? It used to depend on what API a particular app had been coded with. Heck the UI for copy paste wasn't even the same between apps. For some it was the middle mouse button!?!
Does it still ask you where and how big to make a "swap file" when you install, and expect you to know about partitions?
Does it still use bizarre and unguessable names for apps, even the core ones like the one to set up basic system options?
There's a reason Linux never caught up on the desktop. And it's not because people are stupid. It's because no-one with any user design skills ever had enough control over Linux to make it half-decent to use.