I don't have much time, time for bed. But I want to point out few things which aren't stright out in favor for Microsoft. Because of that I usually feel that I must to argue against the usual "But, but...Microsoft Office is all mighty, everyone uses it!" tribe I hear in comments after each such article in/.
No one argues that Microsoft Office has enormous monopoly in office app market. It is a fact. However, it doesn't have 100%. It doesn't even have 95%. I receive lot of emails with ODF documents everyday. It is because I have to work with mighty crowd of Macintosh users in my work and they all use NeoOffice, nicely in the row. And also lot of my friends and relatives uses ODF, after suggestions, introducing and training by me.
Why?
And there comes difference between "Everyone uses Microsoft Office" and "I don't care, because I. can't. use. it. period". Problem is that for many people, Microsoft Office glitches have became such personal demons, that in result they want to avoid this particular Microsoft product more than anything in the world. Yes, OpenOffice.org crashes sometimes, but it is so rare, at least in my scenarios. It also have few limitations, but then we find solution which suits both - user and OO.o.
In reality, yes, I had my share of doubts about giving users to check out NeoOffice. Some four months ago it still wasn't usable. However, they did a huge job for 2.2 and fixed lot of bugs, including very important ones for me. Of course, in the beginning Microsoft Office 2004 where installed on Macs, BUT...there comes the very same thing which plagues Office 2007 - interface is SO different from old one, that it confuses people stright away. In the same time, NeoOffice guys have done excellent job in integrating all those juicy OS X & Cocoa hooks in NeoOffice, in same time keeping same old interface style intact - which, in fact, I still value as very good compromise between simple functionality and ergonomics and one of few things Microsoft have done right in Office. Switch to Industrial icon theme and vola - you have really cool looking and functional office suite for OS X. For free. And yes, you can donate for NeoOffice guys if you want, because they deserve it.
In result, almost everyone accepted NeoOffice as really nice app, and few people even hated Microsoft Office (when app dies on you or does something wrong, when you have to deliver a huge list of people to your boss...figure it out what stress it took). I went forward with installing NeoOffice everywhere and now it is in my standard package when I install a brand new MacBook or MacPro. If Microsoft Office is there already, additional megs doesn't hurt and people will have possibility to open received ODF files.
Strangest fact is that in the beginning I liked MS Office Mac interface more. But after working serously with that I understood that it is just a very very bad wrapper around the same buggy functionality. Even more, MS Office for Mac is crash bomb. Even Photoshop under heavy load doesn't crash that bad. And let's not talk about those glitches.
But biggest bomb is a price. 1300$ for retail? Forget it. And I don't care that shops sells Academical for few bucks, it is illegal, because those people aren't students any more.
Of course, I can go on about my experiences on Windows platform, but you got a picture. And ohh, my main point is that I want to end.doc format hegemony in the world. If Microsoft can't deliver better format which everyone would accept (not only your drinking buddies), then they have to step aside.
Disclaimer: My English spelling and grammar is utterly bad and it is 1:30 PM here already, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes in my humble opinion.
I will never get it why Microsoft didn't bother to create simple yet effective single update mechanism until now. Program updates was already a nightmare in Windows 98/98SE. Yes, everyone wants to have seperate installer, bloat, ads for PR sake, but come on, such bloat and distraction only drives people away from apps.
In fact, it is overblown "fairness". I guess then why we don't compensate inventors of alphabet, decimal system, etc. Every inventor stands on the shoulders of it's ancestors and that's fine - that is HOW human race advances. Open source advancement in various areas shows that exchange of ideas trumps any private gain.
So it is fair? Maybe not, but who again can say what is fair and what is not? If you don't have money to implement your idea, then strike down deal with company who does, eventually in agreement protecting your rights. Ahhh, companies screw everyone and are evil bitches? You bet. So...but then problem isn't with patents existence or non-existence at all, but with deities who can fuck up and can walk away with it?
It is totally different matter. No, patents must go, because their reasoning was very vague at beginning and is almost gone now.
Wake me up when Sun has: * Has as much open drivers as Linux has; * When it has ALSA (I know, it sucks sorta, but it works at least); * When it has very vibrant and lively developer and user community; * And when you don't have to release such PR to say 'momentum is building behind OpenSolaris'. I know hyping is sometimes quite cool, but it is just sick.
People hype about ZFS. But do really there are mass defection to OpenSolaris because of that? I don't.
Article is about that finally another Ubuntu LTS is comming and everyone and his/her dog bitching how silly Ubuntu code names are. Not about bugs, not about how to help to solve them, but about FUCKIN FREAKIN code names!
If you choose software just by code names, you are completely lost. And if you thinking that word "Hard" is embarrassing, you definitely have too less sex, and never have thought what "Longhorn" actually can mean.
I think all bitching about Matrix Reloaded and Revolution is typical "I didn't order this for sequels" problem. Matrix set expectations, but not only for effects, music or clever editing.
People wanted story to be more direct as in first movie, but all they got were overall very thought provoking, but in same time some corny stuff. I think many people was VERY disappointed about all "you are nothing but program in our world" stuff about Neo. People didn't want that to happen, they didn't expect it. It was very confusing for me in the first time. Also some stuff like love making scene (rave party, well, in fact, it was very stylish, just...weird and little bit out place) and last dialog between Neo and Trinity was little over the top, as was last fight between Neo and Smith. However, I loved the rest of stuff and just because they transformed fairy/comic tale about the One Who Will Defeat Fuckin Machines into the One Who Will Sacrifice Everything To Stop This Nightmare And Get Us Peace. It was refreshing and I *love* scene with Architect because it strikes fairy tale down to black core of the Earth.
And yes, I and my girlfriend loved V For Vendetta. Yes, it lacked fanfares of Matrix, but it was very balanced and very well acted, as very thought provoking about what is terrorism exactly, what is power and how it corrupts.
Don't feed the troll they say. Well, I can try only this time, because I feel you are not more trolling as just misunderstood me.
See, I have nothing to argue you against, because you have already answers - so, in fact, you don't want to even listen or even understand me. That's fine, everyone does it time after time. But I want to do simple explanation again.
I NEVER said that Israelis didn't blow people up, that they don't do wrong. BOTH sides have done very wrong in this conflict. And biggest wrong is to wanting to *continue* to do that, whatever reasons are.
HOWEVER - and listen carefully this time, because it could be very new concept for you - I UNDERSTAND Jews more easily than OTHER side. UNDERSTANDING in my book doesn't mean that I AGREE with them. Got it?
Yes, Jews has done terrible things with Palestinians. However, it is frequently very isolated layer and we can pinpoint actually which radical wing in Israel it is. Most of Israelis wants peace (shocking) as, I believe, most Palestinians. However, there are radical jerks with righteous attitude in both sides.
I can connect with logic of Jews radical side - to fight for protecting of existence of Israel state (because it is their only home country in the world). Palestinian radicals and Muslim radicals (which usually games support for former as platform for their violence) rarerly can give any *real* reason for their actions - usually it is just emotional answer to something unjust (they killed our children, ohh, let's kill their people too). You know, two wrongs doesn't make one of them right. It gives a feeling that Palestinians actually doesn't want country with borders, they want to destroy Israel and restore like it was before World War II.
iWorks has serious limitations and even Apple doesn't market it as full fledged office suite suited for Enterprise or SMB use. However, I agree in in it's own merits (aka small suite) it rocks and looks seriously cool, specially Keynote.
However, as many of people who use OO.o all the time in other OSes, I need ODF support. Apple is in bed with Microsoft in this one (even supporting Microsoft ego driven ISO screwing), so sorry Jobs, not this time. And all my supported Mac boxes (both PowerPC and Intel ones) has rockin solid NeoOffice 2.1 release, which finally fixed bunch of things which was blocking serious production use.
Let's correct it, carrying occupation only because of hostility of territories around it.
Personally I am at no one side, but I clearly understand Jews more than Palestinians and Arabs. And let's not talk about media vacuum or one side reporting here. I have read so many docs on these topic so I can clearly claim that I am fairly objective.
What causes my angriness and why I don't understand believers in Islam, is that that they are gaming this situation at every step they go. And usually their motives are confusing, radical and very violent ones (blowing up civilians in big numbers doesn't count as fight for something right in my book). It is like there are no almost situation where honest people (those who want to live in peace, not to kill or shout very radical slogans) are given chance.
Don't want to sound like troll, flamer or something, but I have to say - actions of Islam believers in this conflict frequently bears feel of obscurantism and illiteracy. And that worries me most. It is clear that they don't know what are good for them. They simply refuse to live in this life without conflict and seeks very antagonistic attitude.
Ohh Lord, please not again that stupid "but...but...but other pupils has problems too" type of comment.
Yes, ODF has problems. However, it's future are very clear that problems will be fixed and format will be naturally improved, with lot of input from MANY vendors which use it every day. And even those problems are quite nothing as OOXML ones which Microsoft simply refuses to fix.
Let's be honest, Microsoft still thinks that it has *it* - t.i. that it has charm and cunningness to fool everyone on any subject. Who the hell needs first version of standard to be back compatible with previous, prioritary and undocumented ones? Just Microsoft, no one else NEED that, period. Microsoft need it desperately for marketing and PR stuff. Why to fuck with ISO procedure in first place?
But in same time, it is very stubborning, childish, and I would say, very suicidal. Why the hell submit incomplete spec to ECMA and ISO? Even if they wanted to game system here, it looks arrogant, stupid and shortsighted.
Personally I already lost significant interest will be OOXML approved or not. Yes, ISO is very easy corruptible and Microsoft uses it in full. But it won't stop ODF addaption and Microsoft knows that. It is just damage control. Just like SCO.
As far as I have read and heard, pushing broken standard at all cost have made lot of people rethink their support and devotion to Microsoft as vendor.
Linus isn't slamming SVN and he responses very insightful why he things git is better. Please, stop this propaganda style summary writing, it is getting very old.
Nevermind that, interview was ok, not lot of new info, but much calmer and clever Linus than last months.
Then I must say you have chosen wrong distribution. Every application who is actively supported has deb or rpm packages. Up to date. For your distro. And nevermind that you can double click (Ubuntu for example) that and Grant installation, it will find even depencies for you.
And if you have bloating edge stuff to test, then use Ubuntu or Fedora betas, or even Gentoo. Sometimes blamed as geek distro, in fact it is very good for experimenting a new stuff, until you get past all building process, because it compiles everything and isn't binded by need to create special binary package.
And let's not talk about installing stuff on Windows or OS X. I am sysadmin and it is NIGHTMARE to install stuff on Windows sometimes. Installs simply don't launch, installs but nothing is copied, version checks doesn't work, hell of depencies which never can be resolved, etc. and OS X....oohhh, joys of copying everything in Applications. It doesn't matter that it seriously slows down whole system because of library duplication.
So, maybe installing stuff on Linux was well, hard some four years ago. Now such claim is bullshit, in my humble opinion.
People on Windows tries to install/configure weirdest things. So don't tell me that users are also stupid too.
It is just became obvious recently that open source publishes their breaks as they are, because they can't actually hide anything. I bet breaks in coorporation servers are so frequent that is common practise to be silent about them.
In mean time, there is a tradeoff between having one, LTS release which has rather old kernel with old drivers and new one, which has 18 month support but has everything up to date, including also unstable stuff of course. But in fact it doesn't even mather, because admin is who in charge.
So Linux is more secure than Windows? You bet. Then why such break-ins happens? Because of lazy or hobbist admins who have no time or maybe not enough knowledge to lock down server to protect it from attacks. To lock down such Windows server/workstation is much harder because of "black box" mentality such software has. But it is also possible.
So in resume - those are admins who are gulty persons here. Ubuntu Dapper and Feisty are secure enough releases to keep them locked down without causing trouble for services. And ohh, be careful to which persons you give access to and have good password management system.
I propably would be modded troll, but I would like to say that parents, who are specially looking for schools for their children without asking kids themselves, and looks for schools who produces "perfect people", are stupid. I mean, yes, teacher matters, but only a tiny bit. Nothing will stop pupil who got "math virus" or "chem virus", or have a crush on writing excelent, artistic essays.
Such attitude from parents indicates lack of time and insight of educational process itself.
This "tweaking" of performance is one of the reasons WHY I hate ratings of schools. I mean, wtf, we already have competitions between students themselves at country, world level. So let's stay it that way.
Ok, maybe it is fun to have such competition between schools once in ten or five years, but in long term it is hurtful. Education is NOT competition, when you learn, you just start to understand what to do with your power of knowledge and wisdom. Competition at such level crushes pupils which are emotionally weaker in time when they are not ready yet to stand on their own feet. It also popularizes more cynical point of view (versa friendlier, knowledge sharing like) to the world and can harm also motivation of smarter students.
When competition takes main role in the school, lot of students rushes trough material without trying really to understand it. Hapily, I spent my last secondary school's years in class which was full of "common man geniuses" (seven people tried to enter Med Academy, only two didn't succeded), I never felt to be in competition with them, because it was never forced. Yes, in the end, they dug material better, but I got my share of knowledge. And lot of very good friends.
In the end, it is not only knowledge that matters.
As artistic person, but same time working in IT I would say you are taking standardized "everyone is not the same, hell, let's not force it on poor, poor students" approach, which is a little bit off the course in this type of scenario.
Well, you compared it with arts. But in same time I yet have to meet successful artist who doesn't dig math and can't do very difficult calculations in high math level. It is not secret that at brain level arts and math are standing very close to each other. You can learn how to do it and yet choose different path for your life.
Why? Because math is one of those rare subjects who actually causes thinking *and* imagination. You are not forced to remember, you are not forced to take only one method for granted, but you are forced to think and imagine how to solve particular problem. And that is good for EVERYONE, even some boy who thinks that he is too lazy for this stuff, too stupid, yada yada yada (yep, that was me at some point in secondary school). You can't imagine how math comes into arts, into sports, into law, into economics (hi, John Nash), music recording (my hobby) etc. High level math.
And let's be honest, high level math is not that difficult (physics and chemistry requires more brain power and remembering lot of small, but important stuff). Problem, however, is that at time when it is feeded to students, they already have fed up with all of those difficult subjects (at least in my country), so they tend to ignore it, because, as you said, who will need it anyway. And that is sad, because math is one truly universal language of things.
Because our differences and possibility to discuss face to face (for example, every smart kid can go down on Linus or Miguel like ton of the bricks - if he/she has arguments, of course) is our STRENGTH. Not weakness. From competition between KDE and GNOME lot of interesting concepts are arised and in lot of battles best thing has won (see WebKit, DBUS). Between BSD and Linux battle Linux have became more secure and BSD - more user friendly.
It is our strength. Always have been. Even in case of Novell, community is split on action. And this is good. You know why? Partly Novell did wrong thing, and partly I want everyone to move on, because Novell didn't totally sold out to Microsoft, either. Patent claims? It didn't make anything worse or better. And yes, your opinion might differ...and that is a point.
Do not put all eggs in one basket. Free software and open source uses this strategy with blasting lights.
Woah, you want to tell me that there are scientists who actually do science for...err...sake of science, not money? What a surprise!
Without irony, I personally don't believe in profiting from BIG discoveries. If you get some applications going from that discovery, then it is understandable that you can and you will profit from them, but not from discovery itself.
I read posts and just wonder why people don't research subject, and stay to plainly dumb arguments. There are so misguided info about multimedia status on Ubuntu and how to install it, that it actually makes me a little bit angry (and getting emotional about computers is really something for me).
First I have to admit that it is community's fault, well, at least, part of it. Automatix is kinda one of those hacks for mass installations when you install distro on multiple boxes - no more, no less. It is a "hack" in a sense to provide urgent solution to a problem, but in long term more sane solution are required. I just wonder why those guys didn't submit those packages to universe/multiverse and dealed with it? (Ahhh, problem is w32codecs, but they are *illegal* anyway, in ANY country. Let me explain that later). What about commit yourself as community developer of Ubuntu project? Why working separately, instead of collaboration? Thanks for everything, Automatix finally let's use repository and community start to suggest Ubuntu "standard" way of doing things, via apt-get install gstreamer* or Add/Remove...
Second my ripe is that Automatix popularized solution, which works, but leads nowhere - therefore it is a hack without further direction (although, it is not Automatix devs nor users fault). In result, solutions which *might* be answer to problem, although not immediate, were left out from sight (because everyone uses ffmpeg + mplayer + xine combo, what a fun). We all remember Gstreamer and how it was in "cursed if you do, cursed if you don't" situation due of everyone blasting it and installing everything with Automatix instead. Yeah, it was very buggy, but they have won big fight with quality issues and moving faster now than before. They COULD escape such scenario, if there was enough community support. Instead of that, everyone hyped about Automatix and how it "deal with everything" - so in fact we lost at least several years to get us a proper media framework.
Thanks to Ubuntu devs, situation is much clearer now. You can install almost any set of codecs from Ubuntu repositories (Gstreamer plugins or Xine/ffmpeg combo, Gstreamer can use ffmpeg lib too) and they are working. But still lot of manuals and guides suggest just don't waste time and install Automatix. Strangely, but as a geek, I enjoy clearness of my system and install everything trough apt-get/synaptic, dpkg -i (or GUI eq.) and Add/Remove...
I am happy that more and more people use Ubuntu solutions for installation of multimedia codecs, not Automatix. It is also gives bigger test ground for Gstreamer/Xine/ffmpeg and bugs can be reported and collected to be submitted upstream.
In post scriptum, about w32codecs. I might be wrong, but w32codecs consists of hacked together dlls from various distributions of RealMedia, WMA, etc. etc. Licenses for those programs isn't even close to free distribution and doing that is violation of copyright. So they are not legally distributable in ANY form, period. In any country of the world which supports concept of copyright.
I found very good comment above about how Ad-based Works are just trial baloon for Microsoft Office next version, which, obvious, is aimed to be ad based and free - infinite income from Office, just imagine that, Microsoft wet dream - but heck, I already posted one comment, so I can't mod this disscussion.
Your claim is not partly true. From my observations (I have shared some work time in big/small distributors of Windows OEM with computers) that it can cost them some five ten dollars on their deal with Microsoft. However, if you are third or fourth middleman, they won't simply waste their time. You already will sell Windows OEM for much higher price than Dell or HP, which strikes deals with Microsoft directly. And if you are Dell or HP, you can piss off Microsoft without any big consequences, at least these days.
I think there are some bigger blocks for OEMing OpenOffice.org (or NeoOffice on OS X), like definitely support - users usually treat it like that: "you sold it, you support it". Problem with OpenOffice.org it is not that is difficult, but that it is *different*. So it need books, learning materials, etc. However, there are very few sources who could provide that, neither free or commercially (and no, RTFM doesn't count here). And another reason, of course, is those damn formats. This is a reason why I am very big supporter of OpenOffice.org. I know it doesn't work perfectly, I know, it is sometimes slow (but starting with 2.2 it is totally different beast in these terms), I know, it doesn't interpret old Office documents perfectly. But heck, it WORKS for the most of time I use it - or my girlfriend, and it is much more stable than Office 2000 or XP.
Err, because consumers don't know a shit about computers and software and don't have actually a choice? Isn't that obvious answer?
It is all about bundling. Take customers out of equation. They are ignored. All thanks to monopolies like Microsoft, Intel, Dell, etc. And ohh, thanks to politicians and government clerks who failed to stop them.
Linux kernel are usually referenced as _hybrid_ type kernel. For example, Ubuntu and Debian built EVERYTHING they can in modules, so their kernels are more microkernels than monoliths. But I really doubt that Linux will be pure microkernel sometimes, because...there is no need for it, _IMHO_.
Or you just wanted to start another flame war about how open source/open standards guys are zealots, etc. etc.
Guess what - even if you are neither, one of most advanced countries in the world using really open standards IS news, even for you.
Yes, maybe posting about every time when such things happens in local level - county, city, region - is a little bit silly (but even then I would like to know details), but this is different case.
p.s. Munich still goes "to the church", by the way (3thd year, and still going. Yes, they have mixed success, but they don't look back). So does lot of other organizations, cities, regions and countries.
...and then I thought today, doing some stuff outside - what a heck free software has to do with hardware?! Ok, I can't run software on specific hardware, it is crime now? What about lot of devices who will never see a line of open sourced code for their drivers? They should be bad too?
I think what FSF and RMS had problems to grasp - please notice that I agree mostly with them in GPL stuff - is that some companies - like Novell, Microsoft, Tivo - has found workarounds around GPL. RMS thought that GPL was importal, it was impossible to screw with. Turned out that you can go around in specific corners which _aren't_ _license_ _subjects_ _at_ _all_. Hardware is license subject? Give me a break! Patent coverage between companies users? It is _NOT_ license subject, period.
I think FSF had hard time to accept it. And I think this is what troubles Linus, because he as logical person see this as "road to hell" scenario. GPLv2 was legal license, and very balansed one. GPLv3, maybe it is too fast to say it, but is more "moral" and therefore very subjective, and less objective and legal license.
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I don't have much time, time for bed. But I want to point out few things which aren't stright out in favor for Microsoft. Because of that I usually feel that I must to argue against the usual "But, but...Microsoft Office is all mighty, everyone uses it!" tribe I hear in comments after each such article in /.
.doc format hegemony in the world. If Microsoft can't deliver better format which everyone would accept (not only your drinking buddies), then they have to step aside.
No one argues that Microsoft Office has enormous monopoly in office app market. It is a fact. However, it doesn't have 100%. It doesn't even have 95%. I receive lot of emails with ODF documents everyday. It is because I have to work with mighty crowd of Macintosh users in my work and they all use NeoOffice, nicely in the row. And also lot of my friends and relatives uses ODF, after suggestions, introducing and training by me.
Why?
And there comes difference between "Everyone uses Microsoft Office" and "I don't care, because I. can't. use. it. period". Problem is that for many people, Microsoft Office glitches have became such personal demons, that in result they want to avoid this particular Microsoft product more than anything in the world. Yes, OpenOffice.org crashes sometimes, but it is so rare, at least in my scenarios. It also have few limitations, but then we find solution which suits both - user and OO.o.
In reality, yes, I had my share of doubts about giving users to check out NeoOffice. Some four months ago it still wasn't usable. However, they did a huge job for 2.2 and fixed lot of bugs, including very important ones for me. Of course, in the beginning Microsoft Office 2004 where installed on Macs, BUT...there comes the very same thing which plagues Office 2007 - interface is SO different from old one, that it confuses people stright away. In the same time, NeoOffice guys have done excellent job in integrating all those juicy OS X & Cocoa hooks in NeoOffice, in same time keeping same old interface style intact - which, in fact, I still value as very good compromise between simple functionality and ergonomics and one of few things Microsoft have done right in Office. Switch to Industrial icon theme and vola - you have really cool looking and functional office suite for OS X. For free. And yes, you can donate for NeoOffice guys if you want, because they deserve it.
In result, almost everyone accepted NeoOffice as really nice app, and few people even hated Microsoft Office (when app dies on you or does something wrong, when you have to deliver a huge list of people to your boss...figure it out what stress it took). I went forward with installing NeoOffice everywhere and now it is in my standard package when I install a brand new MacBook or MacPro. If Microsoft Office is there already, additional megs doesn't hurt and people will have possibility to open received ODF files.
Strangest fact is that in the beginning I liked MS Office Mac interface more. But after working serously with that I understood that it is just a very very bad wrapper around the same buggy functionality. Even more, MS Office for Mac is crash bomb. Even Photoshop under heavy load doesn't crash that bad. And let's not talk about those glitches.
But biggest bomb is a price. 1300$ for retail? Forget it. And I don't care that shops sells Academical for few bucks, it is illegal, because those people aren't students any more.
Of course, I can go on about my experiences on Windows platform, but you got a picture. And ohh, my main point is that I want to end
Disclaimer: My English spelling and grammar is utterly bad and it is 1:30 PM here already, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes in my humble opinion.
Mod this people up!
I will never get it why Microsoft didn't bother to create simple yet effective single update mechanism until now. Program updates was already a nightmare in Windows 98/98SE. Yes, everyone wants to have seperate installer, bloat, ads for PR sake, but come on, such bloat and distraction only drives people away from apps.
In fact, it is overblown "fairness". I guess then why we don't compensate inventors of alphabet, decimal system, etc. Every inventor stands on the shoulders of it's ancestors and that's fine - that is HOW human race advances. Open source advancement in various areas shows that exchange of ideas trumps any private gain.
So it is fair? Maybe not, but who again can say what is fair and what is not? If you don't have money to implement your idea, then strike down deal with company who does, eventually in agreement protecting your rights. Ahhh, companies screw everyone and are evil bitches? You bet. So...but then problem isn't with patents existence or non-existence at all, but with deities who can fuck up and can walk away with it?
It is totally different matter. No, patents must go, because their reasoning was very vague at beginning and is almost gone now.
At least it is how I feel about them.
Wake me up when Sun has:
* Has as much open drivers as Linux has;
* When it has ALSA (I know, it sucks sorta, but it works at least);
* When it has very vibrant and lively developer and user community;
* And when you don't have to release such PR to say 'momentum is building behind OpenSolaris'. I know hyping is sometimes quite cool, but it is just sick.
People hype about ZFS. But do really there are mass defection to OpenSolaris because of that? I don't.
As far I understand voting rules, they have to avoid 'ABSTAIN' as much as 'NO', only 'YES' counts. Or I didn't get those rules right?
Article is about that finally another Ubuntu LTS is comming and everyone and his/her dog bitching how silly Ubuntu code names are. Not about bugs, not about how to help to solve them, but about FUCKIN FREAKIN code names!
If you choose software just by code names, you are completely lost. And if you thinking that word "Hard" is embarrassing, you definitely have too less sex, and never have thought what "Longhorn" actually can mean.
(ooh, there goes my karma)
In a mean time, click here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heron to see man with...ohhh, it is just bird. Nevermind.
I think all bitching about Matrix Reloaded and Revolution is typical "I didn't order this for sequels" problem. Matrix set expectations, but not only for effects, music or clever editing.
People wanted story to be more direct as in first movie, but all they got were overall very thought provoking, but in same time some corny stuff. I think many people was VERY disappointed about all "you are nothing but program in our world" stuff about Neo. People didn't want that to happen, they didn't expect it. It was very confusing for me in the first time. Also some stuff like love making scene (rave party, well, in fact, it was very stylish, just...weird and little bit out place) and last dialog between Neo and Trinity was little over the top, as was last fight between Neo and Smith. However, I loved the rest of stuff and just because they transformed fairy/comic tale about the One Who Will Defeat Fuckin Machines into the One Who Will Sacrifice Everything To Stop This Nightmare And Get Us Peace. It was refreshing and I *love* scene with Architect because it strikes fairy tale down to black core of the Earth.
And yes, I and my girlfriend loved V For Vendetta. Yes, it lacked fanfares of Matrix, but it was very balanced and very well acted, as very thought provoking about what is terrorism exactly, what is power and how it corrupts.
Don't feed the troll they say. Well, I can try only this time, because I feel you are not more trolling as just misunderstood me.
See, I have nothing to argue you against, because you have already answers - so, in fact, you don't want to even listen or even understand me. That's fine, everyone does it time after time. But I want to do simple explanation again.
I NEVER said that Israelis didn't blow people up, that they don't do wrong. BOTH sides have done very wrong in this conflict. And biggest wrong is to wanting to *continue* to do that, whatever reasons are.
HOWEVER - and listen carefully this time, because it could be very new concept for you - I UNDERSTAND Jews more easily than OTHER side. UNDERSTANDING in my book doesn't mean that I AGREE with them. Got it?
Yes, Jews has done terrible things with Palestinians. However, it is frequently very isolated layer and we can pinpoint actually which radical wing in Israel it is. Most of Israelis wants peace (shocking) as, I believe, most Palestinians. However, there are radical jerks with righteous attitude in both sides.
I can connect with logic of Jews radical side - to fight for protecting of existence of Israel state (because it is their only home country in the world). Palestinian radicals and Muslim radicals (which usually games support for former as platform for their violence) rarerly can give any *real* reason for their actions - usually it is just emotional answer to something unjust (they killed our children, ohh, let's kill their people too). You know, two wrongs doesn't make one of them right. It gives a feeling that Palestinians actually doesn't want country with borders, they want to destroy Israel and restore like it was before World War II.
iWorks has serious limitations and even Apple doesn't market it as full fledged office suite suited for Enterprise or SMB use. However, I agree in in it's own merits (aka small suite) it rocks and looks seriously cool, specially Keynote.
However, as many of people who use OO.o all the time in other OSes, I need ODF support. Apple is in bed with Microsoft in this one (even supporting Microsoft ego driven ISO screwing), so sorry Jobs, not this time. And all my supported Mac boxes (both PowerPC and Intel ones) has rockin solid NeoOffice 2.1 release, which finally fixed bunch of things which was blocking serious production use.
Let's correct it, carrying occupation only because of hostility of territories around it.
Personally I am at no one side, but I clearly understand Jews more than Palestinians and Arabs. And let's not talk about media vacuum or one side reporting here. I have read so many docs on these topic so I can clearly claim that I am fairly objective.
What causes my angriness and why I don't understand believers in Islam, is that that they are gaming this situation at every step they go. And usually their motives are confusing, radical and very violent ones (blowing up civilians in big numbers doesn't count as fight for something right in my book). It is like there are no almost situation where honest people (those who want to live in peace, not to kill or shout very radical slogans) are given chance.
Don't want to sound like troll, flamer or something, but I have to say - actions of Islam believers in this conflict frequently bears feel of obscurantism and illiteracy. And that worries me most. It is clear that they don't know what are good for them. They simply refuse to live in this life without conflict and seeks very antagonistic attitude.
Ohh Lord, please not again that stupid "but...but...but other pupils has problems too" type of comment.
Yes, ODF has problems. However, it's future are very clear that problems will be fixed and format will be naturally improved, with lot of input from MANY vendors which use it every day. And even those problems are quite nothing as OOXML ones which Microsoft simply refuses to fix.
Let's be honest, Microsoft still thinks that it has *it* - t.i. that it has charm and cunningness to fool everyone on any subject. Who the hell needs first version of standard to be back compatible with previous, prioritary and undocumented ones? Just Microsoft, no one else NEED that, period. Microsoft need it desperately for marketing and PR stuff. Why to fuck with ISO procedure in first place?
But in same time, it is very stubborning, childish, and I would say, very suicidal. Why the hell submit incomplete spec to ECMA and ISO? Even if they wanted to game system here, it looks arrogant, stupid and shortsighted.
Personally I already lost significant interest will be OOXML approved or not. Yes, ISO is very easy corruptible and Microsoft uses it in full. But it won't stop ODF addaption and Microsoft knows that. It is just damage control. Just like SCO.
As far as I have read and heard, pushing broken standard at all cost have made lot of people rethink their support and devotion to Microsoft as vendor.
Linus isn't slamming SVN and he responses very insightful why he things git is better. Please, stop this propaganda style summary writing, it is getting very old.
Nevermind that, interview was ok, not lot of new info, but much calmer and clever Linus than last months.
Then I must say you have chosen wrong distribution. Every application who is actively supported has deb or rpm packages. Up to date. For your distro. And nevermind that you can double click (Ubuntu for example) that and Grant installation, it will find even depencies for you.
And if you have bloating edge stuff to test, then use Ubuntu or Fedora betas, or even Gentoo. Sometimes blamed as geek distro, in fact it is very good for experimenting a new stuff, until you get past all building process, because it compiles everything and isn't binded by need to create special binary package.
And let's not talk about installing stuff on Windows or OS X. I am sysadmin and it is NIGHTMARE to install stuff on Windows sometimes. Installs simply don't launch, installs but nothing is copied, version checks doesn't work, hell of depencies which never can be resolved, etc. and OS X....oohhh, joys of copying everything in Applications. It doesn't matter that it seriously slows down whole system because of library duplication.
So, maybe installing stuff on Linux was well, hard some four years ago. Now such claim is bullshit, in my humble opinion.
People on Windows tries to install/configure weirdest things. So don't tell me that users are also stupid too.
It is just became obvious recently that open source publishes their breaks as they are, because they can't actually hide anything. I bet breaks in coorporation servers are so frequent that is common practise to be silent about them.
In mean time, there is a tradeoff between having one, LTS release which has rather old kernel with old drivers and new one, which has 18 month support but has everything up to date, including also unstable stuff of course. But in fact it doesn't even mather, because admin is who in charge.
So Linux is more secure than Windows? You bet. Then why such break-ins happens? Because of lazy or hobbist admins who have no time or maybe not enough knowledge to lock down server to protect it from attacks. To lock down such Windows server/workstation is much harder because of "black box" mentality such software has. But it is also possible.
So in resume - those are admins who are gulty persons here. Ubuntu Dapper and Feisty are secure enough releases to keep them locked down without causing trouble for services. And ohh, be careful to which persons you give access to and have good password management system.
I propably would be modded troll, but I would like to say that parents, who are specially looking for schools for their children without asking kids themselves, and looks for schools who produces "perfect people", are stupid. I mean, yes, teacher matters, but only a tiny bit. Nothing will stop pupil who got "math virus" or "chem virus", or have a crush on writing excelent, artistic essays.
Such attitude from parents indicates lack of time and insight of educational process itself.
This "tweaking" of performance is one of the reasons WHY I hate ratings of schools. I mean, wtf, we already have competitions between students themselves at country, world level. So let's stay it that way.
Ok, maybe it is fun to have such competition between schools once in ten or five years, but in long term it is hurtful. Education is NOT competition, when you learn, you just start to understand what to do with your power of knowledge and wisdom. Competition at such level crushes pupils which are emotionally weaker in time when they are not ready yet to stand on their own feet. It also popularizes more cynical point of view (versa friendlier, knowledge sharing like) to the world and can harm also motivation of smarter students.
When competition takes main role in the school, lot of students rushes trough material without trying really to understand it. Hapily, I spent my last secondary school's years in class which was full of "common man geniuses" (seven people tried to enter Med Academy, only two didn't succeded), I never felt to be in competition with them, because it was never forced. Yes, in the end, they dug material better, but I got my share of knowledge. And lot of very good friends.
In the end, it is not only knowledge that matters.
As artistic person, but same time working in IT I would say you are taking standardized "everyone is not the same, hell, let's not force it on poor, poor students" approach, which is a little bit off the course in this type of scenario.
:)
Well, you compared it with arts. But in same time I yet have to meet successful artist who doesn't dig math and can't do very difficult calculations in high math level. It is not secret that at brain level arts and math are standing very close to each other. You can learn how to do it and yet choose different path for your life.
Why? Because math is one of those rare subjects who actually causes thinking *and* imagination. You are not forced to remember, you are not forced to take only one method for granted, but you are forced to think and imagine how to solve particular problem. And that is good for EVERYONE, even some boy who thinks that he is too lazy for this stuff, too stupid, yada yada yada (yep, that was me at some point in secondary school). You can't imagine how math comes into arts, into sports, into law, into economics (hi, John Nash), music recording (my hobby) etc. High level math.
And let's be honest, high level math is not that difficult (physics and chemistry requires more brain power and remembering lot of small, but important stuff). Problem, however, is that at time when it is feeded to students, they already have fed up with all of those difficult subjects (at least in my country), so they tend to ignore it, because, as you said, who will need it anyway. And that is sad, because math is one truly universal language of things.
Just my two euro cents
And you know, I am partly happy about that.
Because our differences and possibility to discuss face to face (for example, every smart kid can go down on Linus or Miguel like ton of the bricks - if he/she has arguments, of course) is our STRENGTH. Not weakness. From competition between KDE and GNOME lot of interesting concepts are arised and in lot of battles best thing has won (see WebKit, DBUS). Between BSD and Linux battle Linux have became more secure and BSD - more user friendly.
It is our strength. Always have been. Even in case of Novell, community is split on action. And this is good. You know why? Partly Novell did wrong thing, and partly I want everyone to move on, because Novell didn't totally sold out to Microsoft, either. Patent claims? It didn't make anything worse or better. And yes, your opinion might differ...and that is a point.
Do not put all eggs in one basket. Free software and open source uses this strategy with blasting lights.
And this is bad because...?
Woah, you want to tell me that there are scientists who actually do science for...err...sake of science, not money? What a surprise!
Without irony, I personally don't believe in profiting from BIG discoveries. If you get some applications going from that discovery, then it is understandable that you can and you will profit from them, but not from discovery itself.
I read posts and just wonder why people don't research subject, and stay to plainly dumb arguments. There are so misguided info about multimedia status on Ubuntu and how to install it, that it actually makes me a little bit angry (and getting emotional about computers is really something for me).
First I have to admit that it is community's fault, well, at least, part of it. Automatix is kinda one of those hacks for mass installations when you install distro on multiple boxes - no more, no less. It is a "hack" in a sense to provide urgent solution to a problem, but in long term more sane solution are required. I just wonder why those guys didn't submit those packages to universe/multiverse and dealed with it? (Ahhh, problem is w32codecs, but they are *illegal* anyway, in ANY country. Let me explain that later). What about commit yourself as community developer of Ubuntu project? Why working separately, instead of collaboration? Thanks for everything, Automatix finally let's use repository and community start to suggest Ubuntu "standard" way of doing things, via apt-get install gstreamer* or Add/Remove...
Second my ripe is that Automatix popularized solution, which works, but leads nowhere - therefore it is a hack without further direction (although, it is not Automatix devs nor users fault). In result, solutions which *might* be answer to problem, although not immediate, were left out from sight (because everyone uses ffmpeg + mplayer + xine combo, what a fun). We all remember Gstreamer and how it was in "cursed if you do, cursed if you don't" situation due of everyone blasting it and installing everything with Automatix instead. Yeah, it was very buggy, but they have won big fight with quality issues and moving faster now than before. They COULD escape such scenario, if there was enough community support. Instead of that, everyone hyped about Automatix and how it "deal with everything" - so in fact we lost at least several years to get us a proper media framework.
Thanks to Ubuntu devs, situation is much clearer now. You can install almost any set of codecs from Ubuntu repositories (Gstreamer plugins or Xine/ffmpeg combo, Gstreamer can use ffmpeg lib too) and they are working. But still lot of manuals and guides suggest just don't waste time and install Automatix. Strangely, but as a geek, I enjoy clearness of my system and install everything trough apt-get/synaptic, dpkg -i (or GUI eq.) and Add/Remove...
I am happy that more and more people use Ubuntu solutions for installation of multimedia codecs, not Automatix. It is also gives bigger test ground for Gstreamer/Xine/ffmpeg and bugs can be reported and collected to be submitted upstream.
In post scriptum, about w32codecs. I might be wrong, but w32codecs consists of hacked together dlls from various distributions of RealMedia, WMA, etc. etc. Licenses for those programs isn't even close to free distribution and doing that is violation of copyright. So they are not legally distributable in ANY form, period. In any country of the world which supports concept of copyright.
I found very good comment above about how Ad-based Works are just trial baloon for Microsoft Office next version, which, obvious, is aimed to be ad based and free - infinite income from Office, just imagine that, Microsoft wet dream - but heck, I already posted one comment, so I can't mod this disscussion.
Your claim is not partly true. From my observations (I have shared some work time in big/small distributors of Windows OEM with computers) that it can cost them some five ten dollars on their deal with Microsoft. However, if you are third or fourth middleman, they won't simply waste their time. You already will sell Windows OEM for much higher price than Dell or HP, which strikes deals with Microsoft directly. And if you are Dell or HP, you can piss off Microsoft without any big consequences, at least these days.
I think there are some bigger blocks for OEMing OpenOffice.org (or NeoOffice on OS X), like definitely support - users usually treat it like that: "you sold it, you support it". Problem with OpenOffice.org it is not that is difficult, but that it is *different*. So it need books, learning materials, etc. However, there are very few sources who could provide that, neither free or commercially (and no, RTFM doesn't count here). And another reason, of course, is those damn formats. This is a reason why I am very big supporter of OpenOffice.org. I know it doesn't work perfectly, I know, it is sometimes slow (but starting with 2.2 it is totally different beast in these terms), I know, it doesn't interpret old Office documents perfectly. But heck, it WORKS for the most of time I use it - or my girlfriend, and it is much more stable than Office 2000 or XP.
Err, because consumers don't know a shit about computers and software and don't have actually a choice? Isn't that obvious answer?
It is all about bundling. Take customers out of equation. They are ignored. All thanks to monopolies like Microsoft, Intel, Dell, etc. And ohh, thanks to politicians and government clerks who failed to stop them.
Linux kernel are usually referenced as _hybrid_ type kernel. For example, Ubuntu and Debian built EVERYTHING they can in modules, so their kernels are more microkernels than monoliths.
But I really doubt that Linux will be pure microkernel sometimes, because...there is no need for it, _IMHO_.
And this is relevant to this article because...?
Or you just wanted to start another flame war about how open source/open standards guys are zealots, etc. etc.
Guess what - even if you are neither, one of most advanced countries in the world using really open standards IS news, even for you.
Yes, maybe posting about every time when such things happens in local level - county, city, region - is a little bit silly (but even then I would like to know details), but this is different case.
p.s. Munich still goes "to the church", by the way (3thd year, and still going. Yes, they have mixed success, but they don't look back). So does lot of other organizations, cities, regions and countries.
...and then I thought today, doing some stuff outside - what a heck free software has to do with hardware?! Ok, I can't run software on specific hardware, it is crime now? What about lot of devices who will never see a line of open sourced code for their drivers? They should be bad too?
I think what FSF and RMS had problems to grasp - please notice that I agree mostly with them in GPL stuff - is that some companies - like Novell, Microsoft, Tivo - has found workarounds around GPL. RMS thought that GPL was importal, it was impossible to screw with. Turned out that you can go around in specific corners which _aren't_ _license_ _subjects_ _at_ _all_. Hardware is license subject? Give me a break! Patent coverage between companies users? It is _NOT_ license subject, period.
I think FSF had hard time to accept it. And I think this is what troubles Linus, because he as logical person see this as "road to hell" scenario. GPLv2 was legal license, and very balansed one. GPLv3, maybe it is too fast to say it, but is more "moral" and therefore very subjective, and less objective and legal license.