In the end, given enough time, both groups of programmers have equivalent education and experience and, given the right environment, will design similarly competent (or incompetent) code. (bold added by me)
I have one word for you: management. It's probably not the developers at Micosoft that caused Internet Explorer to suck and become outdated. It's the management who decides what recources to devote to further development of it that did that.
The advantage open source has here is that if one group stagnates, another group can take over. Forking of XFree86 into X.org is one example of this. Or someone can take an existing product and refine it (the fork of Mozilla Suite which became Firefox). There is not one "owner" of the software and that is one of the key advantages of OSS.
I know a guy who insists that degaussing his CDs (i.e., with a magnetic tape eraser) makes them sound better. I $#!^ you not!! I tried to be reasonable and explain how many ways that is wrong, but he insisted that I just have a tin ear. Well, I guess I better go turn in my Master's degree in electrical engineering, because it's no match to his Golden Ear.
As if that wasn't absurd enough, he later told me how he breaks in his AC power cords by running a current through them before using them on his stereo, because otherwise the sound is too, well, I don't even remember what adjective he used. Yellow? Impudent? Octagonal? Whatever. He said that a new electrical outlet takes even longer to break in. OMFGBBQ! I'm ashamed to say that at that point I completely lost the ability to debate rationally with him and try to educate him, and told him what an idiot he is. Well, at least he doesn't bother to ask me any electronics-related questions any more.
This guy is obviously fucking with you. No one can be that stupid... can they?
How many times are you going to say "You're totally missing my point"? I understand the advantages of owning a desktop and negatives of a laptop. But not everyone needs that advantage.
Yes, most developers (myself included) aren't going to rely solely on a laptop. Some might, especially if they are travelling a lot. 60 days is not the case for all service plans. Who the hell is taking 60 days to fix a laptop?
There are people on the go who need the power. I know one guy (a developer) who had the fastast x86 laptop he could get. It had 17" widescreen and two drives in fucking RAID configuration (I wish I could remember what kind of laptop). I'm sure he would've bought dual core if he could. It didn't last long on batteries, though (about 30 minutes), but he travelled and needed the power in a portable. It would be nice to have something that could be both powerful when plugged in, and scale down when running on batteries. He also travelled with another x86 laptop and a Powerbook, all 3 he used for work. He didn't use a desktop at all.
Personally, I've been hesitant to invest much in a laptop for a long time (bought a used IBM Thinkpad T23 and is doing me well, but is underpowered). But I'm at the point where I'd like to be more mobile and less tied to a desktop, but I don't want to sacrifice power because I want to do most of my work on the go. I'm willing to spend the extra bucks to achieve this. I really don't trust Dell/Compaq/HP/Toshiba/Sony in the laptop department. Apple and Lenevo (Thinkpads) are the only ones I am considering, they aren't cheap, but why would I want a cheap laptop that is going to break down in a few months? But Apple Intels I'll only consider after they have had enough iterations to get the bugs out.
Yeah, but Joel's an ass. [...] Dude needs to work on his street cred.
He worked at Microsoft as a program manger for the Excel development team (I believe had some other positions as well there). That's his street cred, and also one of the reasons he's popular among Microsofties. Why Slashdotters like him I'm not sure, maybe his article How Microsoft Lost the API War earned him some fans.
Although he's written a few good articles here and there (but not recently), I do agree that he's an ass.
That sound neat but totally misses one other critical point. That's the cost factor. I'm sure these ibooks will cost "a bit more" than the average wintel laptop. So again, why invest in something that is throw away?
It's not a throw away. When you have it plugged in, you get both cores at full strength. When you're mobile use one core, or underclock both cores (or use one underclocked core). If you are only mobile a small percentage of the time, it's worth it, and you don't have to buy and maintain a whole seperate machine if the notebook does everything you need. Though some of us geeks like to have more than one computer (myself included), some people want the simplicity of only having to worry about one computer but still want something powerful.
I'm sure these ibooks will cost "a bit more" than the average wintel laptop.
Maybe, but why would you want an "average wintel laptop." If I'm going to buy any laptop, I want it to be good quality. Compare prices of Thinkpads for example (with the same feature set), not piece-of-crap low-end Dell/HP/Compaq/Toshiba's. You get what you pay for, and lately Apple's notebook prices haven't been any more expensive than the competition.
and unless you have any reason to think otherwise you shouldn't be blogging in the first place. It'd be more beneficial for the vast majority of these 70 thousand daily people to read some books and improve themselves as opposed to rotting in self-decay / worthless mental masturbation.
Same goes for posting on Slashdot.
Personally I publish to get information out there for the search engines to index (mainly software development and other computer related info). I've found tons of useful information in other developer blogs, so I might as well do the same. It's also nice to be able to refer people to a blog entry or refer back to it for my own purposes.
Well, here's the problem. Mac OS X, and in fact the entire Apple experience, is intuitive for a certain kind of person. Artists, fashion mavens, leftists, and other creative personalities can sit down with a 12-inch PowerBook running the iLife suite on Tiger and comprehend its sensitive, tasteful aesthetic. It's a rare instinct, this appreciation for beauty and truth; accountants and other such pencil-pushers haven't a prayer.
In summary, unattractive squares should stick to Linux and Windows. Macs are for different thinkers.
I used to own a Mac, but I got too many girls pregnant and caught herpes, so I switched back to Linux.
Because no matter how hard you try to exemplify true open source ideals, you will not get any respect from the non-Microsoft community.
From the non-Microsoft community? What the fuck did you expect? Why would the non-Microsoft community give a shit about some Microsoft.Net app? Unless it runs on Mono, they can't even use your app, so why would it earn you respect?
register a few thousand gmail accounts and write the interface that will make writing of data to gmail inboxes invisible to the app.
Or you could use a system that posts to Slashdot. It will use signatures to ensure authenticity so Slashdot trolls can't mess up your data (or by Slashdot user, but I'd imagine they'd get banned pretty quick so you better use AC). To make changes to existing data it will write diffs (like CVS does). You will need a large number of IP addresses not in the same subnet (they can ban subnets). Getting past the lameness filter will be the only real challenge here, and that's not that hard.
Or you could go the easy way and use user journal postings to store the data.
I use slackware, myself, although I was thinking of giving Debian Sarge a try
Depends on what you're trying to achieve. If you are running a server, especially one that is exposed to the internet or a large number of users (e.g. web server), Debian stable is really great. Especially with the ability to setup automatic updates; you can set it up, and not have to really touch it for another 2-3 years.
If on the other hand you are using it for a desktop, development, or "tinkering" machine, Debian unstable or some other distro would probably be a better choice.
I wouldn't call it "tricked".. more like "guided". And I think its quite justified consider the habits of users.
What I tend to do is relabel the Firefox icon as "Internet." I used to use the IE icon and label it "Internet" and point it to Mozilla (pre-Firefox days), but I stopped doing that because I'd rather not teach people that they should be clicking on that. And of course remove all occurances of the IE icon from desktop, program menu, etc. Though I'm not an admin, and I only do this for family and sometimes friends. Eventually everyone learns to find the Firefox icon whether they are sitting in front of a Windows, OS X, or Linux box.
Me too. That's why I paid $300 up front for lifetime service. The break even point was 17 months. I've had the service for over 2 years now.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the lifetime service only apply to a single Tivo box? Meaning if you purchased another one you couldn't transfer the subscription over?
I'm sorry, I could see how having their BSD/Linux versions open and their windows versions closed could keep them in business; but now that they don't have any income generating platforms left, aren't they going to be out of business next week?
They will continue to make money the same way they always have, by selling commercial licenses. There are plenty of companies/people who want to use Qt that who can't or won't use a GPL licenses for their projects. This change simply means that we will see more Qt-based free (as in GPL) software for Windows.
Robotic machinery will handle routine skills like cooking fast food, housework, framing homes, etc., but somebody will have to build and design those machines
"The wars of the future will not be fought on the battlefield or at sea. They will be fought in space, or possibly on top of a very tall mountain. In either case, most of the actual fighting will be done by small robots. And as you go forth today remember always your duty is clear: To build and maintain those robots. Thank you."
Without applications, a computer and an OS is still "just a worthless hunk of metal and plastic".
I only need one application. A hex editor. The rest I can code after I have written my assembly compiler in machine language, my C compiler in assembly, etc...
On the Sarge error: A few days? Really, just uncomment that line and send it to the presses. Please don't make those of us who support the Debian project in this manner wait any longer. If this takes more than a week, I'll be seriously disappointed.
It's already been fixed (on Tuesday I believe). I'm not exactly sure why the Slashdot quote implies it hasn't. The updated files have a different name ("31r0a" in the filenames).
Total bullshit. Nevermind the fact that Linux doesn't have a single entity behind it and can't "want" to be anything. I use both Linux and OS X and find that they are oriented towards different areas. OS X still has long ways to go before being a server-oriented power-user UNIX system (although it tries), although it has the desktop thing down. Linux has ways to go before being a desktop-oriented non-techie-user system although it has the server thing down. And not everyone likes the choice of GUI that Apple rams down your throat. Personally I like a little choice in my user interface, and OS X is very deficient in that area.
If Apple screws up something in their UI (which we saw with Tiger), you are pretty much stuck with it unless they fix it. This is not so much a problem in Linux distros where everything is open source..
I absolutely agree! For example, some of my acquaintances have actually chosen to go out and look for individuals of the female persuasion. Unbelievable, I know! While I have chosen to simply wait, for a decade or two, for that good thing to walk through the door of my mothers house and straight into my basement apartment. Any minute now....
Hey, if you want to get a girlfriend faster, you have to contribute your own time rather than waiting around for someone to prepare one for you.
Slashdot Mirror
In the end, given enough time, both groups of programmers have equivalent education and experience and, given the right environment, will design similarly competent (or incompetent) code.
(bold added by me)
I have one word for you: management. It's probably not the developers at Micosoft that caused Internet Explorer to suck and become outdated. It's the management who decides what recources to devote to further development of it that did that.
The advantage open source has here is that if one group stagnates, another group can take over. Forking of XFree86 into X.org is one example of this. Or someone can take an existing product and refine it (the fork of Mozilla Suite which became Firefox). There is not one "owner" of the software and that is one of the key advantages of OSS.
I know a guy who insists that degaussing his CDs (i.e., with a magnetic tape eraser) makes them sound better. I $#!^ you not!! I tried to be reasonable and explain how many ways that is wrong, but he insisted that I just have a tin ear. Well, I guess I better go turn in my Master's degree in electrical engineering, because it's no match to his Golden Ear.
As if that wasn't absurd enough, he later told me how he breaks in his AC power cords by running a current through them before using them on his stereo, because otherwise the sound is too, well, I don't even remember what adjective he used. Yellow? Impudent? Octagonal? Whatever. He said that a new electrical outlet takes even longer to break in. OMFGBBQ! I'm ashamed to say that at that point I completely lost the ability to debate rationally with him and try to educate him, and told him what an idiot he is. Well, at least he doesn't bother to ask me any electronics-related questions any more.
This guy is obviously fucking with you. No one can be that stupid... can they?
... and not only no, but Hell NO.
My sentiments exactly. I already avoid Windows in its current form, why would I use something that was even worse?!??
You're totally missing my point.
How many times are you going to say "You're totally missing my point"? I understand the advantages of owning a desktop and negatives of a laptop. But not everyone needs that advantage.
Yes, most developers (myself included) aren't going to rely solely on a laptop. Some might, especially if they are travelling a lot. 60 days is not the case for all service plans. Who the hell is taking 60 days to fix a laptop?
There are people on the go who need the power. I know one guy (a developer) who had the fastast x86 laptop he could get. It had 17" widescreen and two drives in fucking RAID configuration (I wish I could remember what kind of laptop). I'm sure he would've bought dual core if he could. It didn't last long on batteries, though (about 30 minutes), but he travelled and needed the power in a portable. It would be nice to have something that could be both powerful when plugged in, and scale down when running on batteries. He also travelled with another x86 laptop and a Powerbook, all 3 he used for work. He didn't use a desktop at all.
Personally, I've been hesitant to invest much in a laptop for a long time (bought a used IBM Thinkpad T23 and is doing me well, but is underpowered). But I'm at the point where I'd like to be more mobile and less tied to a desktop, but I don't want to sacrifice power because I want to do most of my work on the go. I'm willing to spend the extra bucks to achieve this. I really don't trust Dell/Compaq/HP/Toshiba/Sony in the laptop department. Apple and Lenevo (Thinkpads) are the only ones I am considering, they aren't cheap, but why would I want a cheap laptop that is going to break down in a few months? But Apple Intels I'll only consider after they have had enough iterations to get the bugs out.
K5 - the place where people write such long and boring entries you won't want to come back. Honestly, I almost forgot K5 still existed.
Yeah, but Joel's an ass.
[...]
Dude needs to work on his street cred.
He worked at Microsoft as a program manger for the Excel development team (I believe had some other positions as well there). That's his street cred, and also one of the reasons he's popular among Microsofties. Why Slashdotters like him I'm not sure, maybe his article How Microsoft Lost the API War earned him some fans.
Although he's written a few good articles here and there (but not recently), I do agree that he's an ass.
That sound neat but totally misses one other critical point. That's the cost factor. I'm sure these ibooks will cost "a bit more" than the average wintel laptop.
So again, why invest in something that is throw away?
It's not a throw away. When you have it plugged in, you get both cores at full strength. When you're mobile use one core, or underclock both cores (or use one underclocked core). If you are only mobile a small percentage of the time, it's worth it, and you don't have to buy and maintain a whole seperate machine if the notebook does everything you need. Though some of us geeks like to have more than one computer (myself included), some people want the simplicity of only having to worry about one computer but still want something powerful.
I'm sure these ibooks will cost "a bit more" than the average wintel laptop.
Maybe, but why would you want an "average wintel laptop." If I'm going to buy any laptop, I want it to be good quality. Compare prices of Thinkpads for example (with the same feature set), not piece-of-crap low-end Dell/HP/Compaq/Toshiba's. You get what you pay for, and lately Apple's notebook prices haven't been any more expensive than the competition.
and unless you have any reason to think otherwise you shouldn't be blogging in the first place. It'd be more beneficial for the vast majority of these 70 thousand daily people to read some books and improve themselves as opposed to rotting in self-decay / worthless mental masturbation.
Same goes for posting on Slashdot.
Personally I publish to get information out there for the search engines to index (mainly software development and other computer related info). I've found tons of useful information in other developer blogs, so I might as well do the same. It's also nice to be able to refer people to a blog entry or refer back to it for my own purposes.
Well, here's the problem. Mac OS X, and in fact the entire Apple experience, is intuitive for a certain kind of person. Artists, fashion mavens, leftists, and other creative personalities can sit down with a 12-inch PowerBook running the iLife suite on Tiger and comprehend its sensitive, tasteful aesthetic. It's a rare instinct, this appreciation for beauty and truth; accountants and other such pencil-pushers haven't a prayer.
In summary, unattractive squares should stick to Linux and Windows. Macs are for different thinkers.
I used to own a Mac, but I got too many girls pregnant and caught herpes, so I switched back to Linux.
Because no matter how hard you try to exemplify true open source ideals, you will not get any respect from the non-Microsoft community.
.Net app? Unless it runs on Mono, they can't even use your app, so why would it earn you respect?
From the non-Microsoft community? What the fuck did you expect? Why would the non-Microsoft community give a shit about some Microsoft
register a few thousand gmail accounts and write the interface that will make writing of data to gmail inboxes invisible to the app.
Or you could use a system that posts to Slashdot. It will use signatures to ensure authenticity so Slashdot trolls can't mess up your data (or by Slashdot user, but I'd imagine they'd get banned pretty quick so you better use AC). To make changes to existing data it will write diffs (like CVS does). You will need a large number of IP addresses not in the same subnet (they can ban subnets). Getting past the lameness filter will be the only real challenge here, and that's not that hard.
Or you could go the easy way and use user journal postings to store the data.
What ? You have HANDLES on your urinals ???
What planet do you live on ?
I work on a space station you insensitive clod.
I use slackware, myself, although I was thinking of giving Debian Sarge a try
Depends on what you're trying to achieve. If you are running a server, especially one that is exposed to the internet or a large number of users (e.g. web server), Debian stable is really great. Especially with the ability to setup automatic updates; you can set it up, and not have to really touch it for another 2-3 years.
If on the other hand you are using it for a desktop, development, or "tinkering" machine, Debian unstable or some other distro would probably be a better choice.
I wouldn't call it "tricked".. more like "guided". And I think its quite justified consider the habits of users.
What I tend to do is relabel the Firefox icon as "Internet." I used to use the IE icon and label it "Internet" and point it to Mozilla (pre-Firefox days), but I stopped doing that because I'd rather not teach people that they should be clicking on that. And of course remove all occurances of the IE icon from desktop, program menu, etc. Though I'm not an admin, and I only do this for family and sometimes friends. Eventually everyone learns to find the Firefox icon whether they are sitting in front of a Windows, OS X, or Linux box.
Replacement for Microsoft Windows
Me too. That's why I paid $300 up front for lifetime service. The break even point was 17 months. I've had the service for over 2 years now.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the lifetime service only apply to a single Tivo box? Meaning if you purchased another one you couldn't transfer the subscription over?
I'm sorry, I could see how having their BSD/Linux versions open and their windows versions closed could keep them in business; but now that they don't have any income generating platforms left, aren't they going to be out of business next week?
They will continue to make money the same way they always have, by selling commercial licenses. There are plenty of companies/people who want to use Qt that who can't or won't use a GPL licenses for their projects. This change simply means that we will see more Qt-based free (as in GPL) software for Windows.
Robotic machinery will handle routine skills like cooking fast food, housework, framing homes, etc., but somebody will have to build and design those machines
"The wars of the future will not be fought on the battlefield or at sea. They will be fought in space, or possibly on top of a very tall mountain. In either case, most of the actual fighting will be done by small robots. And as you go forth today remember always your duty is clear: To build and maintain those robots. Thank you."
- Military school Commandant (Simpsons Episode #4F21)
The funny thing is he has never run Linux. Quoting this interview:
Theo de Raadt: I don't know. I have never run Linux.
We're gonna *TAKE DOWN* those vi fanboys!
I use *both* Emacs and vi you insensitive clod!
btw, wouldn't "Emacs Exterminators" mean that you are out to exterminate Emacs?
Without applications, a computer and an OS is still "just a worthless hunk of metal and plastic".
I only need one application. A hex editor. The rest I can code after I have written my assembly compiler in machine language, my C compiler in assembly, etc...
On the Sarge error: A few days? Really, just uncomment that line and send it to the presses. Please don't make those of us who support the Debian project in this manner wait any longer. If this takes more than a week, I'll be seriously disappointed.
It's already been fixed (on Tuesday I believe). I'm not exactly sure why the Slashdot quote implies it hasn't. The updated files have a different name ("31r0a" in the filenames).
OS X is what Linux dreams of one day being.
Total bullshit. Nevermind the fact that Linux doesn't have a single entity behind it and can't "want" to be anything. I use both Linux and OS X and find that they are oriented towards different areas. OS X still has long ways to go before being a server-oriented power-user UNIX system (although it tries), although it has the desktop thing down. Linux has ways to go before being a desktop-oriented non-techie-user system although it has the server thing down. And not everyone likes the choice of GUI that Apple rams down your throat. Personally I like a little choice in my user interface, and OS X is very deficient in that area.
If Apple screws up something in their UI (which we saw with Tiger), you are pretty much stuck with it unless they fix it. This is not so much a problem in Linux distros where everything is open source..
But wait... what is KHTML going to complain about now!
Would Apple have done this had they not complained?
I absolutely agree! For example, some of my acquaintances have actually chosen to go out and look for individuals of the female persuasion. Unbelievable, I know!
While I have chosen to simply wait, for a decade or two, for that good thing to walk through the door of my mothers house and straight into my basement apartment.
Any minute now....
Hey, if you want to get a girlfriend faster, you have to contribute your own time rather than waiting around for someone to prepare one for you.