I always find it odd that so many "Nerds" can't parse the slight grammatical errors that others may make. Perhaps these "Nerds" have been working too hard and haven't been keeping up-to-date with the latest events; when they see something strung together as is the case in this article, they don't realize what it means because they are a bit behind the times. I suspect that's why they take such aggressive stances towards the editors and those whose first language is evidently not english. A funny thing is that when I skimmed the article, I didn't even NOTICE the errors because I "knew" the history of what was being referenced -- but I could have easily clicked the links to find out more if I didn't.
What I can't stand is how inane comments that literally amount to "I am too stupid to figure out what these mistakes mean and it makes me so embarassed that I have to yell about it" end up as top posts. Do the clueful really need to be reminded in bold letters that there are some really clueless people reading slashdot? I'd rather see top posts have SOMETHING to do with the article submission but increasingly, that seems to be asking too much.
What people seem to be neglecting is the fact that the thrust of the cell processors is to speed up floating point -- but leaves integer performance alone. Thus, "normal" processing tasks won't be any faster at all but those that require floating point (digital media, scientific) will indeed improve. Mostly, I'd think this affects video and audio card makers since it makes much of what they do redundant. So the potential I see is bringing down overall system costs -- not exceeding mainstream performance; there is a cost as well since it will require changing the software tool chain. So I'd say to expect to see cell-based solutions in "niche" markets for the short and mid term. Desktops and servers will likely continue to rely on proven designs (including multi-core) for sometime to come.
The only acronyms I saw were "CA" and "MSFT". CA is used by Computer Associates in the same way that General Motors uses GM. There may be reasons to yell at the Slashdot editors but surely, this isn't one of them.
That innovation requires testing does not imply that testing is itself innovation. There is a significant difference between what is implied by your dictionary.com quote and the quote you made previously and which I replied to, namely, that "they test enormous numbers of drugs in the hope of finding one that works".
Still, I understand your argument, but I disagree. Certainly, it is a large undertaking to develop many new technologies (including non-drug related advances.) The fact that the (drug) companies are expending the money is not the issue here -- presumably, that is a cost of doing business and when a product becomes marketable, they will have their chance to recoup their expenditure (I expect they would have favourable licensing agreements with their "employees"). The company should consider themselves "lucky" when someone in their employ (or a contractor) comes up with something that they can successfully market. In fact, they should consider themselves lucky that someone is willing to try on their behalf. I think it is a tragic thing that corporations (or non-persons) are given very nearly the same considerations in society as a real person.
Testing is not innovation. Even if it were, the main premise that was put forward stands--why ought the (drug) companies hold the patent? At one point or another the patentable idea had to stem from a real brain. That real brain should accrue the benefit of the patent. Same for copyright. And neither patent nor copyright ought be transferable, IMO.
Damn, probably 90% of the posts in here need to be modded to -1. These rules relate to the transfer of a domain by the domain owner of that domain from one registrar to another. It is not about claiming (or hijacking) someone else's domain as the headline improperly entices you to think.
This is a good thing people! It helps to ensure that domain owners can transfer their registrations when they so wish. In fact, the domain owner has to first request the transfer before it even gets this far.
The problem is that while extremely negative traits are usually stripped away in this model, negative traits that do not (metaphorically) explicitly interfere with life up until reproduction often remain. Additionally, traits that would be extremely beneficial that are not explicitly necessary for survival fail to come to light. Our ability to think and reason was not the product of evolution, but was deliberately chosen for us. Perhaps this is a thought that should again be applied to the creation of software.
Don't forget that the model of evolution includes the environment--the model is the survival of the fittest and survival means outperforming in the tasks required for survival in the environment you exist. That means that "negative traits that do not...explicitly interfere with life" are not negative traits--they are neutral traits and thus inconsequential. The same applies to the other premise: "traits that would be extremely beneficial that are not explicitly necessary for survival fail to come to light"; here you are mislabeling another neutral (no effect) characteristic as one that actually has value. Evolution with competitive natural selection wins just because it optimizes for the proper balance of characteristics that exhibit best-fit properties for the environment. And when it comes to the completely unrelated matter of pre-ordained "creationism", the only question left open for it is the big bang itself and even that one may prove tractable in time.
On to software: asides from the advantadges of iterative development as mentioned by other posters, the fact is that most software projects are simply too complicated to design full out up-front and many large-scaled designs built on such ideas are breading grounds for non-competive over-engineering and mismatches between technical desires and actual needs.
Now as long as we are realistic and assume that our software must compete with other similar software and teams (which is always the case, even for custom contracts) then survival of the fittest ensures that code techniques will also advance as required. When you are competing for money (or usage) your fitness level is a relative measure so just delivering on all of the targets isn't good enough. You have to do it for less money than your competition, you have to do it with less resources, you have to be faster, you have to be easier and the list goes on.
I think the problem is that we software people too often think we are scientists looking for the grand scheme. Leonardo said of his statues that they existed already under the stones and he merely chipped away the extra bits. He didn't say he had a great plan and executed on it; he may have had an idea in mind but if you ever tried sculpting you will know that sometimes you have to go with what the materials give you and you must work your design to what actually happens. It could be that the results surprised him as much as anyone.
To sum up: we are here as thinking beings as a direct result of evolution; "designing software properly from the start" depends entirely on the meaning of "properly" and "properly" is never known at the start (and even if it was, we probably are incapable of conceiving an entire soltution all in one go for any large project anyhow); people will be people, no matter how they are categorized.
You are absolutely correct. He said (in an interview with Wolf Blitzer):
"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet."
Now lets not get too bogged down in semantics; I still believe that whatever credit Gore is deserving there is a long, long, long list of people who are more deserving of the credit that Gore would ascribe to himself.
Do you really want to try to get associated with that misinformation? Be wise and don't believe everything you are told. The laugh about Gore was that he claimed to have invented the internet. Nothing can be further from the truth. The fact of the matter is that DARPA was supporting the development of the internet long before Al Gore came on the scene and that public and private pipelines were available for years before Al said "peep". The internet also went global long before most people realize. No, Cerf was definately one of the inventors and Gore may have decided to jump on the bandwagon at one point and put whatever political support behind it that he could, but with or without him, the internet would exist pretty much exactly as it does today. One other thing that is very troubling about giving credit to Gore: it makes it sound like the internet is an American "utility". The initial technology was born in the USA, granted, but it took the world to build the thing out and develop it to its current state. To call it public is also a misnomer (and "publically available" is probably worse) since nearly everywhere the internet is carried over private lines by private enterprises.
The internet really is "about" politics and trying to make it so is kind of, well, disturbing.
There are several reasons all of the subatomic particles in your body might simultaneously jump one foot to the left--for example, *you* might actually endeaver to jump one foot to the left. Never-the-less, the statistical probability of that occuring without any impeding force is absolutely negligible. If Feynman did propose such a thought then I'd readily defer to Feynman and assume that he believed the statistical probablity to be somewhat closer to probable than negligable. Then again, Feynman could have been joking.
The Olympics are merely a drain on every societies finances when there are still more credible needs to be filled. The "games" are politics, not sports, so let us treat them (and the IOC) as such.
I think that the government is a mere reflection of its citizens because it's pretty sad when someone makes a movie about eating at McDonalds and getting fat and the people rave about it.
That's not sad--what's sad is that there is a NEED to make such a movie. Its sad that people can't connect the dots on their own. Its sad how stupid many people are willing to be--even WANT to be. It is also sad that some people truly believe that government is a reflection of its citizens. If that was ever true, it certainly isn't now. For one thing, it assumes that citizens are basically the same and that each wield the same power, which is ludicrous.
Uhh, a ring is simply a topological structure. That means it is mathematical in nature--a geometrical construction. It has nothing to do with matter or energy each of which may take on such a geometry. Indeed, there is quite a debate in the physical sciences as to what "matter" really is--because at a deep enough level, everything looks like energy events. Whatever "reality" is, it certainly isn't what you tell me it is.
Its ironic though that Apple conveniently forgets that its founders used to sell Phreaking equipment.
Apple is as evil as the next corporation, plain and simple.
Re:Dictionary shows GPL is less free (as in freedo
on
PHP Not Moving To The GPL
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Good post.
I think some points were over simplified, though. None of the licenses being discussed force anyone to do something against their will. Use of the software is completely volountary in both cases. The main difference I can see between the GPL and BSD is the "share and share-alike" philosophy. This simply values the collective (and individual) right to have access to code modifications higher than the value of the individual to maintain exclusive rights over modified code (and only for software that is generally released). Compare this to commonly accepted laws which actually do restrict behaviour. For example, litter laws protects society at large at the "cost" of restricting an individual's right to dump garbage at will. Tellingly, most people wouldn't consider that an "individual right" in the first-place.
Both licences share a libertarian doctrine, though perhaps to different degrees. After all, the opposite of libertarianism is authoritarianism, not socialism (which belongs in an economic spectrum).
The GPL is not a socialist philosophy nor is individual liberty compromised. The GPL doesn't restrict your rights though it does place an obligation on you (which you accept only by your volountarily use of the software). Further, you are still free to commoditize your product (or what-have-you) so long as you share-back as well. In fact, it is more akin to a Pareto Optimal solution: it provides the maximum benefit to society and no one is made worse off.
Another great thing about freedom is that through it we can cooperate to try and limit the impact that the assholes have on us. Of course, everyone is a bit of an asshole, so both licenses are good.
Checkout coLinux. Similar to a VM, it allows you to run a linux kernel along-side your windows apps and its free-software. Works GREAT and you can even have multiple instances running as well as setting instances as Windows Services. Support for debian, gentoo, fedora, slackware and others.
It's kind of pathetic and twisted that Star Trek fans like you, who'll still be virgins at 40, keep complaining about the small amount of sex appeal that's been put in to appeal to us normal guys.
I'm married and have two kids. I don't think I'm the one with the problem. You might want to stop projecting on others. It tends to give away things you might not want them to know...
Most excellent reply!! Sure, eye candy is all fine and good I suppose, but when that's the whole damn thing, it gets boring right quick. Get your rocks off on the internet if you must and leave some room in those multi-million dollar shows for real intrigue, drama, suspense and blowing-things-up. Star Trek was way more interesting before it became Soft Trek and way, way more interesting before B&B inherited the whole vision of the thing.
I wonder if this new movie will get made though--didn't they lose something like $100M on the last dog they released?
It actually supposed to be a Representative Democracy. Rousseau had this to say about respresentation:
sovereignty cannot be represented...the peoples' deputies are not, and could not be, its representatives; they are merely its agents; and they cannot decide anything finally
Considering that is an 18th century thought, it is very telling in todays modern politics and it brings truth to your additional comment:
They don't care what the people think about what they do, they just do it.
Slashdot Mirror
What I can't stand is how inane comments that literally amount to "I am too stupid to figure out what these mistakes mean and it makes me so embarassed that I have to yell about it" end up as top posts. Do the clueful really need to be reminded in bold letters that there are some really clueless people reading slashdot? I'd rather see top posts have SOMETHING to do with the article submission but increasingly, that seems to be asking too much.
What people seem to be neglecting is the fact that the thrust of the cell processors is to speed up floating point -- but leaves integer performance alone. Thus, "normal" processing tasks won't be any faster at all but those that require floating point (digital media, scientific) will indeed improve. Mostly, I'd think this affects video and audio card makers since it makes much of what they do redundant. So the potential I see is bringing down overall system costs -- not exceeding mainstream performance; there is a cost as well since it will require changing the software tool chain. So I'd say to expect to see cell-based solutions in "niche" markets for the short and mid term. Desktops and servers will likely continue to rely on proven designs (including multi-core) for sometime to come.
The only acronyms I saw were "CA" and "MSFT". CA is used by Computer Associates in the same way that General Motors uses GM. There may be reasons to yell at the Slashdot editors but surely, this isn't one of them.
That innovation requires testing does not imply that testing is itself innovation. There is a significant difference between what is implied by your dictionary.com quote and the quote you made previously and which I replied to, namely, that "they test enormous numbers of drugs in the hope of finding one that works".
Still, I understand your argument, but I disagree. Certainly, it is a large undertaking to develop many new technologies (including non-drug related advances.) The fact that the (drug) companies are expending the money is not the issue here -- presumably, that is a cost of doing business and when a product becomes marketable, they will have their chance to recoup their expenditure (I expect they would have favourable licensing agreements with their "employees"). The company should consider themselves "lucky" when someone in their employ (or a contractor) comes up with something that they can successfully market. In fact, they should consider themselves lucky that someone is willing to try on their behalf. I think it is a tragic thing that corporations (or non-persons) are given very nearly the same considerations in society as a real person.
Testing is not innovation. Even if it were, the main premise that was put forward stands--why ought the (drug) companies hold the patent? At one point or another the patentable idea had to stem from a real brain. That real brain should accrue the benefit of the patent. Same for copyright. And neither patent nor copyright ought be transferable, IMO.
Damn, probably 90% of the posts in here need to be modded to -1. These rules relate to the transfer of a domain by the domain owner of that domain from one registrar to another. It is not about claiming (or hijacking) someone else's domain as the headline improperly entices you to think.
This is a good thing people! It helps to ensure that domain owners can transfer their registrations when they so wish. In fact, the domain owner has to first request the transfer before it even gets this far.
Sheesh.
Don't forget that the model of evolution includes the environment--the model is the survival of the fittest and survival means outperforming in the tasks required for survival in the environment you exist. That means that "negative traits that do not...explicitly interfere with life" are not negative traits--they are neutral traits and thus inconsequential. The same applies to the other premise: "traits that would be extremely beneficial that are not explicitly necessary for survival fail to come to light"; here you are mislabeling another neutral (no effect) characteristic as one that actually has value. Evolution with competitive natural selection wins just because it optimizes for the proper balance of characteristics that exhibit best-fit properties for the environment. And when it comes to the completely unrelated matter of pre-ordained "creationism", the only question left open for it is the big bang itself and even that one may prove tractable in time.
On to software: asides from the advantadges of iterative development as mentioned by other posters, the fact is that most software projects are simply too complicated to design full out up-front and many large-scaled designs built on such ideas are breading grounds for non-competive over-engineering and mismatches between technical desires and actual needs. Now as long as we are realistic and assume that our software must compete with other similar software and teams (which is always the case, even for custom contracts) then survival of the fittest ensures that code techniques will also advance as required. When you are competing for money (or usage) your fitness level is a relative measure so just delivering on all of the targets isn't good enough. You have to do it for less money than your competition, you have to do it with less resources, you have to be faster, you have to be easier and the list goes on.
I think the problem is that we software people too often think we are scientists looking for the grand scheme. Leonardo said of his statues that they existed already under the stones and he merely chipped away the extra bits. He didn't say he had a great plan and executed on it; he may have had an idea in mind but if you ever tried sculpting you will know that sometimes you have to go with what the materials give you and you must work your design to what actually happens. It could be that the results surprised him as much as anyone.
To sum up: we are here as thinking beings as a direct result of evolution; "designing software properly from the start" depends entirely on the meaning of "properly" and "properly" is never known at the start (and even if it was, we probably are incapable of conceiving an entire soltution all in one go for any large project anyhow); people will be people, no matter how they are categorized.
Is it my imagination or are the AC's even stupider than usual these days?
Agreed! Particularly in a PHP thread! If I had mod points, you'd get 'em.
You are absolutely correct. He said (in an interview with Wolf Blitzer):
"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet."
Now lets not get too bogged down in semantics; I still believe that whatever credit Gore is deserving there is a long, long, long list of people who are more deserving of the credit that Gore would ascribe to himself.
The internet really is "about" politics and trying to make it so is kind of, well, disturbing.
It is relevant. What you can or can not do technically is not relevant, but what you have the right to do surely is.
There are several reasons all of the subatomic particles in your body might simultaneously jump one foot to the left--for example, *you* might actually endeaver to jump one foot to the left. Never-the-less, the statistical probability of that occuring without any impeding force is absolutely negligible. If Feynman did propose such a thought then I'd readily defer to Feynman and assume that he believed the statistical probablity to be somewhat closer to probable than negligable. Then again, Feynman could have been joking.
The Olympics are merely a drain on every societies finances when there are still more credible needs to be filled. The "games" are politics, not sports, so let us treat them (and the IOC) as such.
First of all, he looks like a rip-off of everyone else's favourite corporate cartoon character: Poochy. So "Snitchy" feels right.
That's not sad--what's sad is that there is a NEED to make such a movie. Its sad that people can't connect the dots on their own. Its sad how stupid many people are willing to be--even WANT to be. It is also sad that some people truly believe that government is a reflection of its citizens. If that was ever true, it certainly isn't now. For one thing, it assumes that citizens are basically the same and that each wield the same power, which is ludicrous.
Is just me or do those press photos look like they are CG? Circa Doom II.
So that's why two wrongs don't make a right!
Uhh, a ring is simply a topological structure. That means it is mathematical in nature--a geometrical construction. It has nothing to do with matter or energy each of which may take on such a geometry. Indeed, there is quite a debate in the physical sciences as to what "matter" really is--because at a deep enough level, everything looks like energy events. Whatever "reality" is, it certainly isn't what you tell me it is.
Apple is as evil as the next corporation, plain and simple.
Good post.
I think some points were over simplified, though. None of the licenses being discussed force anyone to do something against their will. Use of the software is completely volountary in both cases. The main difference I can see between the GPL and BSD is the "share and share-alike" philosophy. This simply values the collective (and individual) right to have access to code modifications higher than the value of the individual to maintain exclusive rights over modified code (and only for software that is generally released). Compare this to commonly accepted laws which actually do restrict behaviour. For example, litter laws protects society at large at the "cost" of restricting an individual's right to dump garbage at will. Tellingly, most people wouldn't consider that an "individual right" in the first-place.
Both licences share a libertarian doctrine, though perhaps to different degrees. After all, the opposite of libertarianism is authoritarianism, not socialism (which belongs in an economic spectrum).
The GPL is not a socialist philosophy nor is individual liberty compromised. The GPL doesn't restrict your rights though it does place an obligation on you (which you accept only by your volountarily use of the software). Further, you are still free to commoditize your product (or what-have-you) so long as you share-back as well. In fact, it is more akin to a Pareto Optimal solution: it provides the maximum benefit to society and no one is made worse off.
Another great thing about freedom is that through it we can cooperate to try and limit the impact that the assholes have on us. Of course, everyone is a bit of an asshole, so both licenses are good.
It depends on the meanings of "sport" and "is"
Checkout coLinux. Similar to a VM, it allows you to run a linux kernel along-side your windows apps and its free-software. Works GREAT and you can even have multiple instances running as well as setting instances as Windows Services. Support for debian, gentoo, fedora, slackware and others.
I'm married and have two kids. I don't think I'm the one with the problem. You might want to stop projecting on others. It tends to give away things you might not want them to know...
Most excellent reply!! Sure, eye candy is all fine and good I suppose, but when that's the whole damn thing, it gets boring right quick. Get your rocks off on the internet if you must and leave some room in those multi-million dollar shows for real intrigue, drama, suspense and blowing-things-up. Star Trek was way more interesting before it became Soft Trek and way, way more interesting before B&B inherited the whole vision of the thing.
I wonder if this new movie will get made though--didn't they lose something like $100M on the last dog they released?
It actually supposed to be a Representative Democracy. Rousseau had this to say about respresentation:
sovereignty cannot be represented...the peoples' deputies are not, and could not be, its representatives; they are merely its agents; and they cannot decide anything finally
Considering that is an 18th century thought, it is very telling in todays modern politics and it brings truth to your additional comment:
They don't care what the people think about what they do, they just do it.
Too bad you posted AC, though.