"From the time I took the iBook out of the box until this day, I have never been given the opportunity to set a root password. How can I forget something I never had the opportunity to set?"
Sorry. My bad. I had researched OS X enough to know about the three-tiered privilege system, but not about that little wrinkle. Still, it seemed that you got root and admin confused.
(BTW, I'm looking to buy a Mac eventually. Right now, I've been doing a lot of window shopping.)
"The menu bar. I hate, loathe, and despise the way OS X always puts the menu bar at the top of the screen."
The menu bar is at the top of the screen for a reason, Fitts's Law which says that the time to acquire a target is a function of the distance to and size of the target. Menu bar items are in essence inch-wide but mile-high targets, so you can zip your mouse to the top of the screen as fast as you like and you won't miss the target (the desired item on the menubar). In contrast, menubars attached to windows present far smaller targets. You are just very used to Windows-style menubars.
"I tried to do an su. Wrong password. (My account has admin privs anyway; I shouldn't need to do an su at all.)"
OS X has three privilege levels, not two: superuser (root), admin, and regular user. Admin privs are partway between user privs and full root privs; the idea is that you can run with some of the same privileges as root (i.e. privileges to install software for all users), without the problems of running as root full time. That's why you needed to do an su.
The Mozilla folder should have had you UID, not someone else's. That OS X's problem. Obviously you forgot your root password. That is *your* problem.
"Say what you like about Microsoft, they support a vast range of hardware, and that's one of the reasons they software is sometimes unreliable."
The biggest reasons why MS software, esp. the OS, has been unreliable are
* that until very recently, different versions of the same DLL couldn't coexist on the same system, leading application installers to overwrite system DLLs with older/newer versions, breaking other apps that depended on those DLLs, and
* that the Registry was designed such that it was a single point of failure, and since both the apps and the system continually wrote to the Registry database, the opportunity for Registry corruption was fairly high. The Registry is *still* a problem. MS has recently added things like automatic backups for the Registry, but that's a bandaid for the core problem.
Relative to those two problems, hardware issues are minor. By contrast, look at the stability of Linux. It too supports a lot of hardware, even on different architectures, yet it is far more stable than Linux.
"Isn't there a time limit this 100,000 has to be raised by?"
Nope--nothing offical, anyways.
As for the amount of money that's "pending," that's just money that hasn't gotten through PayPal, or checks that haven't yet been cleared. "Pending" is stuff that is almost guaranteed to come into the bank.
It's the "intent" money that could be tricky. That's money that people have pledged or promised to give. That is far more easy to default on.
Anyway, it's quite possible that Quark contacted the authors of the libraries and got special permission to use the code.
Re:Not convinced at all
on
Think Python
·
· Score: 2
"Python is a great language, but it is just plain ignorant to sell it as a C++ replacement."
The author of the book wasn't selling Python as a C++ replacement. He was pointing out the lower-level features of C++ that get in the way of using C++ as a first language for people learning to program.
Re:Not convinced at all
on
Think Python
·
· Score: 2
"I'm fairly confident saying they're are a lot more C and C++ libraries available to a C++ programmer than off the shelf Python packages."
The libraries available to C and C++ are irrelevant for teaching an introductory programming course. The idea behind using Python to teach programming is to start with a readable language that can be used to illustrate basic concepts without mucking with lower-level machine related details. Once the basic concepts have been conveyed, more lower-level details such as strong typing and pointers can be introduced, using languages like C or C++. In short, get the students to walk before they try to run.
Just because C++ is a good practical language doesn't mean it's a good teaching language.
What about Windows Update? What about the free Personal Learning Edition of Maya (an over 100 MB download), or Gmax (21.4 MB just for the installer, and 15.20 MB for the help files)?
"Id Software releases it's old and not-so-profitable-anymore source code, and I'm not seeing a single great thing being created with any of it, and as most would agree, Id's products are top notch. So I don't see how greatness can come from buying anyone else's old code."
NaN's situation is not similar to Id Software's. Blender was originally released as binary-only freeware well before NaN existed. It was Neo-Geo's in-house software and was release as a matter of goodwill. Later on, the developers behind Blender formed NaN to sell Blender-related paraphenalia, like manuals, T-shirts, tutorials, keys to unlock special features of Blender, and some other things. The business didn't work out so well, so NaN went bankrupt, leaving Blender about to go onto the old bit-bucket of history.
What the fund raising campaign is trying to do is keep Blender going, not to buy of someone's old and unused assets.
"But, is Blender really on par with Maya? Probably not."
Maybe not, but it's pretty good, and certainly good enough for certain kinds of production work. Blender was originally Neo-Geo's in-house tool for game models and such. It was made into binary-only freeware sometime ago as a matter of goodwill on Neo-Geo's part, and only later did NaN come along to try--and fail--to make money with it.
Blender's not a half-baked piece of throwaway software. It's a pretty sweet piece of work. That's why so many have tried to make sure it didn't die when NaN went down.
There are a couple things that make Blender great.
1) It's small and fast.
2) It's fairly complete. It has "bones" for making articulated models. It has S-meshs for making round shapes without using a lot of vertices. It has animation, scripting, and all sorts of nifty and useful features. It is probably the most capable free 3D modeller out there.
Unfortunately, my finances are tight, so I could only give $10. Wah.
OTOH, if all the Slashdotters did the same (Hint! Big Hint! HINT!), the Blender sources could go GPL in a matter of days.
Yes, I am shamelessly trying to get you all to contribute, not only to compensate for my lack of funds, but to help keep a worthy, though ideosyncratic, piece of software from becoming part of the bit bucket of history.
Remember, if Blender isn't freed, it will be left stuck as binary-only software that will never be upgraded, subject to becoming unrunnable as our computers change and evolve.
How is *Sun* pushing CDE hard? CDE is just the default GUI for the boxes it sells, just as it is on nearly all proprietary Unix boxes. AFAIK, the only ones *selling* CDE to individuals at all are those providing it for Unices where it isn't the default, such as Linux and the *BSDs.
"A SINGLE MENUBAR AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN that changes according to the current context (window) instead of a menubar for every window."
You are partly right. The single menubar does take better advantage of Fitts' Law; menu entries on the bar are in effect "mile-high," making them a harder to miss target.
"Setting this as a User Default will improve Linux's ease-of-use."
Wrong! There is a crucial difference between Linux/X and a Mac. There is only one GUI toolkit on the Mac, so apps written for the Mac will consistently be able to use the menubar. On Linux, however, there are multiple toolkits, and not all of them can use that single menubar. The lack of consistency in switching between apps that can and can't use the single menubar washes out the speed gains from using the single menubar.
Remember, designers of X-based desktops are not starting from scratch. There are constraints that they have to work with that are not present in the Mac and Windows environments.
Wrong! CDE was designed by a bunch of Unix vendors working together to create a common interface for all proprietary Unices, hence the name "*Common* Desktop Environment"--common across the Unices. IIRC, CDE's dtwm, the window manager + panel, was based on donated code from HP's vuewm.
Your picture is taken so that human beings can recognize your face. The main difference I see here is that computer software is used to recognize your face rather than humans. There are still some potential problems, such as the Connecticut DMV thinking the software is more reliable that it is, but I don't think it's quite the coming of Big Brother yet.
Since nobody has any crystal balls, there no way to say for sure that MS has passed its apex. Consider this, though.
Current versions of Microsoft software compete with previous versions.
For example, most of the differences that distinguish Office 97, Office 2000, and Office XP are just small features, none of which are compelling reasons to spend several hundred dollars a copy to upgrade. Probably most upgrading is done out of fear of being incompatible with other Office users, and even this fear is questionable, since despite the moanings about MS playing file format games, Office maintains pretty good backwards compatibility and can save files in Office97 formats.
Windows XP competes with Win95/98/ME. While WinXP is leaps and bounds more stable than the DOS-based Windows OSs, its hardware requirements are much higher as well, which discourages those with lower-end machines from upgrading. Most people are either just used to the instability of the DOS-based junk or don't stress the OS to the point that it's really a problem, so WinXP isn't so compelling.
Microsoft knows that its Office upgrades are offering less and less, so it's trying to switch to a subscription model, which many CEOs and CIOs are balking at.
Microsoft also is trying to diversify by getting into game consoles, but this path has been tough going, and most of MS's dirty tricks don't work so well in the console world.
Further, since MS pays its employees less than the industry average and compensate with employee stock options, MS has to keep its stock value rising at a high rate. Slow expansion or a mostly constant stock value won't do well. The Motley Fool had something on this.
Also, distrust of MS extends beyond just geeks. At the very least, hardly anyone takes the Microsoft name as a sign of quality.
There's no saying that MS won't overcome these problems, but it's not invulnerable, and the next few years, or even the next few months, depending on the outcome of Kotter-Kotelly's verdict, may determine whether MS continues to be the juggernaut that it is.
Slashdot Mirror
"From the time I took the iBook out of the box until this day, I have never been given the opportunity to set a root password. How can I forget something I never had the opportunity to set?"
Sorry. My bad. I had researched OS X enough to know about the three-tiered privilege system, but not about that little wrinkle. Still, it seemed that you got root and admin confused.
(BTW, I'm looking to buy a Mac eventually. Right now, I've been doing a lot of window shopping.)
"The menu bar. I hate, loathe, and despise the way OS X always puts the menu bar at the top of the screen."
The menu bar is at the top of the screen for a reason, Fitts's Law which says that the time to acquire a target is a function of the distance to and size of the target. Menu bar items are in essence inch-wide but mile-high targets, so you can zip your mouse to the top of the screen as fast as you like and you won't miss the target (the desired item on the menubar). In contrast, menubars attached to windows present far smaller targets. You are just very used to Windows-style menubars.
"I tried to do an su. Wrong password. (My account has admin privs anyway; I shouldn't need to do an su at all.)"
OS X has three privilege levels, not two: superuser (root), admin, and regular user. Admin privs are partway between user privs and full root privs; the idea is that you can run with some of the same privileges as root (i.e. privileges to install software for all users), without the problems of running as root full time. That's why you needed to do an su.
The Mozilla folder should have had you UID, not someone else's. That OS X's problem. Obviously you forgot your root password. That is *your* problem.
"Say what you like about Microsoft, they support a vast range of hardware, and that's one of the reasons they software is sometimes unreliable."
The biggest reasons why MS software, esp. the OS, has been unreliable are
* that until very recently, different versions of the same DLL couldn't coexist on the same system, leading application installers to overwrite system DLLs with older/newer versions, breaking other apps that depended on those DLLs, and
* that the Registry was designed such that it was a single point of failure, and since both the apps and the system continually wrote to the Registry database, the opportunity for Registry corruption was fairly high. The Registry is *still* a problem. MS has recently added things like automatic backups for the Registry, but that's a bandaid for the core problem.
Relative to those two problems, hardware issues are minor. By contrast, look at the stability of Linux. It too supports a lot of hardware, even on different architectures, yet it is far more stable than Linux.
"Anybody else not see the lack of logic here? MS has two crypto implementations? One for the OS, one for the API?"
Um, maybe one crypto service is for SSL, while the other is for, oh, maybe encrypting files?
There are so many good reasons to bash MS, why invent a bad one?
"Isn't there a time limit this 100,000 has to be raised by?"
Nope--nothing offical, anyways.
As for the amount of money that's "pending," that's just money that hasn't gotten through PayPal, or checks that haven't yet been cleared. "Pending" is stuff that is almost guaranteed to come into the bank.
It's the "intent" money that could be tricky. That's money that people have pledged or promised to give. That is far more easy to default on.
"Quark XPress 5 has at least one GPL'd library"
You sure you don't mean an LGPL'd library?
Anyway, it's quite possible that Quark contacted the authors of the libraries and got special permission to use the code.
"Python is a great language, but it is just plain ignorant to sell it as a C++ replacement."
The author of the book wasn't selling Python as a C++ replacement. He was pointing out the lower-level features of C++ that get in the way of using C++ as a first language for people learning to program.
"I'm fairly confident saying they're are a lot more C and C++ libraries available to a C++ programmer than off the shelf Python packages."
The libraries available to C and C++ are irrelevant for teaching an introductory programming course. The idea behind using Python to teach programming is to start with a readable language that can be used to illustrate basic concepts without mucking with lower-level machine related details. Once the basic concepts have been conveyed, more lower-level details such as strong typing and pointers can be introduced, using languages like C or C++. In short, get the students to walk before they try to run.
Just because C++ is a good practical language doesn't mean it's a good teaching language.
"What's left to legally justify broadband?"
What about Windows Update? What about the free Personal Learning Edition of Maya (an over 100 MB download), or Gmax (21.4 MB just for the installer, and 15.20 MB for the help files)?
"Maybe he's out of job and uses the Internet to try to find a job. Maybe he lives with his parents."
Both are true, actually.
"You need to get something straight, It's not Neo-Geo as in the gameconsole, it's NeoGeo as in the 3d animation studio."
Ah, thank you. I didn't realize there were two NeoGeos floating around.
"Id Software releases it's old and not-so-profitable-anymore source code, and I'm not seeing a single great thing being created with any of it, and as most would agree, Id's products are top notch. So I don't see how greatness can come from buying anyone else's old code."
NaN's situation is not similar to Id Software's. Blender was originally released as binary-only freeware well before NaN existed. It was Neo-Geo's in-house software and was release as a matter of goodwill. Later on, the developers behind Blender formed NaN to sell Blender-related paraphenalia, like manuals, T-shirts, tutorials, keys to unlock special features of Blender, and some other things. The business didn't work out so well, so NaN went bankrupt, leaving Blender about to go onto the old bit-bucket of history.
What the fund raising campaign is trying to do is keep Blender going, not to buy of someone's old and unused assets.
"The way you mix '3D editor' and 'radiosity' makes me think that you are the one who is a bit confused about the meaning of terms you listed... "
He's not confused at all. Blender does both modelling and rendering.
"But, is Blender really on par with Maya? Probably not."
Maybe not, but it's pretty good, and certainly good enough for certain kinds of production work. Blender was originally Neo-Geo's in-house tool for game models and such. It was made into binary-only freeware sometime ago as a matter of goodwill on Neo-Geo's part, and only later did NaN come along to try--and fail--to make money with it.
Blender's not a half-baked piece of throwaway software. It's a pretty sweet piece of work. That's why so many have tried to make sure it didn't die when NaN went down.
> What makes Blender so great?
There are a couple things that make Blender great.
1) It's small and fast.
2) It's fairly complete. It has "bones" for making articulated models. It has S-meshs for making round shapes without using a lot of vertices. It has animation, scripting, and all sorts of nifty and useful features. It is probably the most capable free 3D modeller out there.
Unfortunately, my finances are tight, so I could only give $10. Wah.
OTOH, if all the Slashdotters did the same (Hint! Big Hint! HINT!), the Blender sources could go GPL in a matter of days.
Yes, I am shamelessly trying to get you all to contribute, not only to compensate for my lack of funds, but to help keep a worthy, though ideosyncratic, piece of software from becoming part of the bit bucket of history.
Remember, if Blender isn't freed, it will be left stuck as binary-only software that will never be upgraded, subject to becoming unrunnable as our computers change and evolve.
Please contribute to the free Blender fund!
(HINT! HINT! HINT!)
"If there was photoshop Linux would we have the Gimp?"
We probably would, for the same reason that both Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro coexist. One app is for pros, the other for whom Photoshop is overkill.
"Sorry, the Gimp is nice and all... played with it extensively in fact... but it just doesn't cut it upside Photoshop."
Aside from the lack of CMYK support (a *long* known issue), where else does it not cut it?
How is *Sun* pushing CDE hard? CDE is just the default GUI for the boxes it sells, just as it is on nearly all proprietary Unix boxes. AFAIK, the only ones *selling* CDE to individuals at all are those providing it for Unices where it isn't the default, such as Linux and the *BSDs.
"A SINGLE MENUBAR AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN that changes according to the current context (window) instead of a menubar for every window."
You are partly right. The single menubar does take better advantage of Fitts' Law; menu entries on the bar are in effect "mile-high," making them a harder to miss target.
"Setting this as a User Default will improve Linux's ease-of-use."
Wrong! There is a crucial difference between Linux/X and a Mac. There is only one GUI toolkit on the Mac, so apps written for the Mac will consistently be able to use the menubar. On Linux, however, there are multiple toolkits, and not all of them can use that single menubar. The lack of consistency in switching between apps that can and can't use the single menubar washes out the speed gains from using the single menubar.
Remember, designers of X-based desktops are not starting from scratch. There are constraints that they have to work with that are not present in the Mac and Windows environments.
"Suns usability team created CDE"
Wrong! CDE was designed by a bunch of Unix vendors working together to create a common interface for all proprietary Unices, hence the name "*Common* Desktop Environment"--common across the Unices. IIRC, CDE's dtwm, the window manager + panel, was based on donated code from HP's vuewm.
"Jon Lasser has an excellent book which assumes you're a computer user, but new to Unix."
Great. What's the *name* of the book?
A big mess?
Your picture is taken so that human beings can recognize your face. The main difference I see here is that computer software is used to recognize your face rather than humans. There are still some potential problems, such as the Connecticut DMV thinking the software is more reliable that it is, but I don't think it's quite the coming of Big Brother yet.
Since nobody has any crystal balls, there no way to say for sure that MS has passed its apex. Consider this, though.
Current versions of Microsoft software compete with previous versions.
For example, most of the differences that distinguish Office 97, Office 2000, and Office XP are just small features, none of which are compelling reasons to spend several hundred dollars a copy to upgrade. Probably most upgrading is done out of fear of being incompatible with other Office users, and even this fear is questionable, since despite the moanings about MS playing file format games, Office maintains pretty good backwards compatibility and can save files in Office97 formats.
Windows XP competes with Win95/98/ME. While WinXP is leaps and bounds more stable than the DOS-based Windows OSs, its hardware requirements are much higher as well, which discourages those with lower-end machines from upgrading. Most people are either just used to the instability of the DOS-based junk or don't stress the OS to the point that it's really a problem, so WinXP isn't so compelling.
Microsoft knows that its Office upgrades are offering less and less, so it's trying to switch to a subscription model, which many CEOs and CIOs are balking at.
Microsoft also is trying to diversify by getting into game consoles, but this path has been tough going, and most of MS's dirty tricks don't work so well in the console world.
Further, since MS pays its employees less than the industry average and compensate with employee stock options, MS has to keep its stock value rising at a high rate. Slow expansion or a mostly constant stock value won't do well. The Motley Fool had something on this.
Also, distrust of MS extends beyond just geeks. At the very least, hardly anyone takes the Microsoft name as a sign of quality.
There's no saying that MS won't overcome these problems, but it's not invulnerable, and the next few years, or even the next few months, depending on the outcome of Kotter-Kotelly's verdict, may determine whether MS continues to be the juggernaut that it is.