I've used linux heavily and I've used windows heavily, and I'll never put linux on my desktop again. Sure, it's geek-points or whatever to have it that way but Linux breaks in more wierd ways and makes baby jesus cry. I think Linux has a ton of usefulness server-side, but client-side it is still crap due to the vagueness of information required to ensure applications run. No business in their right mind is gonna deal with the amount of mental upkeep involved in supporting several thousand packages (everything in linux is a lib remember?) on every single machine! All you have to think about is normal user requirements in windows (package #1 = Windows, #2 = Office, #3 = A/V) vs the amount of crap you had to remember about Linux packages. Linux actually has so many you can't even possibly know them all or know all the ones you need. Does that make sense? Linux client-side is an administrative nightmare and that's the #1 reason for it to be #2 to anything Windows. Joe-user, and businesses don't care about inperceptable performance differences and right now that's the only difference between Vista and Linux on the same hardware. Linux has to get into the less than ten packages to keep track of category before it will ever look tasty to the management on the desktop.
- Mind
I don't think mandating it is a good idea, but I do think it is nice to have. There is nothing with wrong with giving people a tool to be responsible as a net citizen. Yes, you are still going to have the putz that still won't use it even if provided. I think you are doing people a tremendous favor by adding two whole tags to your page. I know adults that use parental controls on sites they visit because they don't want to hit porn or whatever. I know people that take life a little more seriously than I do, and have a hard time with such things. If the tag existed it would be wildly adopted immediately because right now objectionable content is effecting site hits. Imagine if you could go to your favorite joke site at work and not worry that something not safe would come up. Imagine how many ad hits these sites are gonna get if they put that ability in their page. 'Nuff said. Hits motivate everything for web sites.
I'd agree you basically have MS-Haters(tm) here. I'm the weird guy that doesn't care what OS is being used, but rather cares that it's not difficult to get it to work on your tasks. Now for me personally I have a few priorities:
1) Does it game better? (my home computers are for my amusement)
2) Does it play music/video better? (see #1)
3) Is it easier for my wife to find the music and videos she wants to see/hear? (no plugin installing + easy file browsing)
4) Does it's web browser work for my bank and mail?
Vista does all of these particular things as good as XP on comparable hardware (with the exception of particular games). Linux fails at them completely (I don't know if you've played around with linux media players but they're crap for the most part... though I think xmms is the best mp3 player around). The problem with Linux IMHO is you need a different screwdriver for every task and there are so many bits involved you cannot even relay that information to normal (non-geek) people. Something that difficult will never catch on with the masses, and is generally stupid for the geeks to use everyday as a matter of efficiency. You can spend your time listening to your music or playing your games or debugging library incompatibilities aka which screwdriver you forgot to download. Whatever get your rocks off.
If my priorities at home were coding software, or other such hackery maybe Linux would pull ahead. But, my work isn't a priority at home for me. For the small little script stuff I need at home.net can hack it and is already installed. (0h n03z! MS programming languages!... remember kids originally shell scripts in unix were learned because they were the easy way to program in a set of tasks on a proprietary system!)
A lot of long time NVIDIA users got burned by the drivers later. I was a Nvidia Fanboy (tm) from RIVA - GeForce 4400. I had a GeForce 4400 and the drivers never worked right for this card no matter what you were doing, by the time the card came along they were working on supporting the next versions of GeForce and stopped debugging it. Even if you run later models certain "revisions" of drivers work and others dont. Is it too much to ask to not have glitches in every damn game you play? This lack of continued support makes me have no interest in buying anything from them. I'm not dropping $300 and HOPING that you will keep fixing driver issues as I demand that of any product I buy.
Message received: We dont care if your card works until you need a new one as we are making you buy a new one because our drivers will break you.
I like the way ATI does it now despite the kinks they had early on (first radeon series). ATI is clearly paying attention to its customers and ensuring compatibility across the board. I got a Radeon X850 XT and I couldn't be happier with this card, or the stability no matter what I do and it runs extremely quiet. I'd recommend it to friends and anyone else who asked. It's not top of the line, but it does everything I want to do. WOW, counter-strike, whatever.
ATI sometimes has some glitches, but for the more common titles you can be assured they will be fixed and they're not killing your wallet as much as Nvidia is.
1) When I first started using Gentoo I was in love: Fast fixes, portage was godlike compared to rpm, and it was faster/lighter and all that jazz... There were only 20 something use flags at this time, so configuration was a breeze. You always had to tool with your xconf anyway, so this was nothing new. All the important packages were in the tree so no hunting. Portage itself was lean, mean, and completely adequate. Not only was the system easier to deal with using Gentoo but it had the added bonus. All the software I used on the system consumed a whole 2G.
2) Portage as it is now is a bloated and hacked whale that instead of fixing problems via a re-write is just being held together by more duct-tape. There are so many use flags I can't even remember them and frequently the core flags are altered so that something that used to be "included" requires a new flag. This makes it impossible to use your previous knowledge of configuring the system for anything. Its just like being a newbie every time you install it!
3) Packages are being added much faster than they are being tested for compatibility, and sometimes they're not being added fast enough when there are critical improvements in the next release. Despite what the Gentoo Devs are thinking the people that use Gentoo typically want leaner and meaner but only so lean as not to be crippled in any way. Debian would be good, but they bork the process by being slow to the power of assinine. Debian could be BETTER than Gentoo if they'd ever get in the race. I've used the utilites in Knoppix and apt-get is defintely more useable than portage and faster but I would never install it because stable is too far behind the technology curve. Compiling Gnome, or KDE... STUPID... There are no "processor optimizations" in these apps, and any optimizations would give trivial gains. They're pre-compiling a lot of these packages now... but this is years later....
4) Breaks in Gentoo are TOO extreme. Like one day they decided to change my boot files, and my system didn't come up. I'm good enough to know how to fix it, but most people aren't. We don't have "random days" to just tech support our computer, and this was happening far too frequently. I was losing five days a month to random borks. Most people faced with this problem don't figure it out.. They just reinstall windows... Which is exactly what I did. I love linux, the tools... but if you think I can be down when I have work to do well guess again! I basically found myself installing Gentoo dealing with problems repeatedly and getting fed up repeatedly... I tried Gentoo 3x... that's more than most people would eh? Sorry kids, we gotta get past our open beta at some point.
Well that's all for now thanks for bearing with my aggrivation.
Complete crap, and completely untrue. Example of the day: You can easily play all half-life derived games on a computer that has 1 ghz. You may not be able to max the res, but you certainly play them acceptably. RAM and GPU are ALL that matter, and for games that use lots of textures fast disk can be handy too. Plunking on the processor is a complete waste of your money because it doesn't make the game any faster (most of the work being in the rendering/paging ram, dependent on DMA xfers, AGP fast writes, etc.) Case in point: I have a five year old PC and get 190 fps in counter-strike 1.6/condition zero. I could probably even play source since I have the ram to do so, again... All I've upgraded is RAM, and GPU. I specifically wait until the GPU drops out to the level of around $150, because before then you are paying the "early adopter" sin tax. Most counter-strike players will play the game at 800x600 even though their hardware could easily do 1600x1200+... We care more about the fps than the res, since fps=response time, extra pixels do not noticably effect accuracy other than to make your mouse travel more. You must realize that the NEW NEW NEW hardware is 2x too much for any current games. Buy your GPU and CPU two years behind and save a bundle, but still frag like a champ! The side effect is that you will also be buying the hardware when the games can finally make use of it.
Just remember that no matter what you read on the net your gaming experience doesn't get any better after about 100 fps, so paying money to have this feature is IHMO worthless and ultra-high resolution adversely effects the usefulness of mice (yes, even the super-cool 2000+dpi mice). You will not frag better for spending the money so skill up, and quit thinking your PC sucks.:)
"To say that Windows "just works" for the average user is not consistent with the very large base of call-in help desks and even radio shows dedicated to answering questions regarding Windows problems. It might work INITIALLY for the 'average' user, but that is not to say it is more maintenance free."
Yes, the difference is that normal people can go to normal sources to get the information to correct the problems. You have to realize that most people don't have much of an idea of what is under the hood, but they do need to use the car to get to work. They would have a difficult time understanding which parts of the information in Linux would aid in diagnosing the problem, whereas if it were a Windows problem the common experience base with the masses is actually a tool. I'm not saying Windows is the best damn software made, far from it... I see many problems with it from a conceptual and a practical level. I won't even say it is cheaper or more efficient in all cases to run Microsoft products, but I think if a normal user can reasonably communicate a problem I think that is definitely another means of efficiency.
"To me, long term maintainability is the selling point of Linux. I'll concede Linux is in general harder to set up, but only because the end-user is not typically setting up Windows; it is preinstalled (and configured). If you hide that initial set-up at the vendor, then the user would see Linux as a much easier to use machine LONG TERM. That is, I'd argue that once set up, Linux is far more reliable, more durable and much, much easier to extend into areas the user wants to take the computer after the initial set-up.
Ultimately, to each his own. I have a family member who will not, under any circumstances, even look at Linux. He does not care if it can do x, y or z better. Do I continue to try to "sell" Linux to him? No way. His box - his choice of OS."
Actually, the real problem I see with the Linux install process is that the maintainence of the system is not identical to the initial installation. Upgrading bits of the system is much harder than the loading of the product which is actually a blow to the long term maintainability since it is more confusing. For excample, most users in Windows user the windows installer and that interface is virtually the same when removing software as it is when adding it. The user needs to know nothing to perform that process other than the product name. In contrast, backing out of an upgrade in Linux can be difficult if not impossible (especially if you are talking about glibc, etc). This is actually a major minus to Linux because the normal user when faced with the fact that maintaining the software is difficult simply skips that step, and that is far for a solution isn't it? A Windows users would likely be able to back out even a service pack if something isn't working right after the update.
As far as selling Linux goes, just remember the simple truth: "A good product sells itself, and a buyer becomes an owner the minute he can see himself enjoying the fruits of the product." It's hard to draw someone to a product when the major feature is supposedly the fact that you get to spend less time as a computer janitor. That's a great advantage to a system administrator, but it'"s nothing to someone that doesn't maintain a system since they will not identify with this.
Call it flamebait if you will, but for the average user Linux doesn't even exist. It doesn't matter if it is called Linux "Alterna-OS" or some other crap, they know what shipped on the computer and don't have the time or inclination to learn anything else. Sure, the geeks love it, but why would the average person like it? Does it do more than already-installed (windows/media player/office/etc) or does it just do the same thing? See, if all it does is the same thing then Linux has NO VALUE preposition whatsover to the average joe they will only switch when alternative software has more usefulness and is not merely a clone.
I ask you, why should you care about vi when you have notepad (which does the same job with less confusing commands)? Making Xine or Helix useable requires setup and configuration of codecs, whereas it just works under windows!
For Linux to gain ground it needs to add utility without adding futility. No one is going to accept that it more trouble to get the thing to work the same way, and they would barely consider it if the improvements are only marginal. As far as features, Windows is better to average joe. It reasonably works out of the box, and there is nothing to screw up in the configuration. When Linux works like that then it will compete with Windows, but if the software included with Linux surpassed it that would be the end for Redmond. There is no way a "normal" user is going to put up with the bullshit involved with setting a Linux box up, so these Linux people should shut up about their desktop until it works or even happens and stay on the servers.
All that being said, I love Linux as far as the performance... It turns "dated" machines into useable machines, and for those that are running on a budget it may still have a place. For servers, I don't think there is a better choice you can make. But again, the Linux people need to stop thinking they have a desktop offering -- they have a toolbox of many tools but they do not have a leatherman. Desktops need to be useable by the computer challenged to qualify as an offering, and anything too complex is just missing the mark. Do you think the normal person would know much about partitions, screen mode depth and resolution, or even the goofy device names for mice or screens? These things make the whole proposition unrealistic.
I sincerely wonder what this means about the health of the gaming industry, a business plagued with lack of innovation and consumer ADD! I think BioWare is seriously is attempting to break out of the mold, but by what "criteria" does a good idea an exist? A good idea is one part thought and ninety-nine parts execution! The problem you will have here is the same long-in-the-tooth people that no longer have originality (or a need for it, due to their fat salaries) are going to be the ones that choose which ideas are good. So basically, they're going to have a contest to hire some people that are just as worn out in the idea department as they are. You want to hire a good writer? Find an audience composed of the target market you need to hit and let them read the scripts. Let them rip them apart, applaud them, and determine which one is the best. I think gamers are more qualified than producers in figuring out what is fun and what isn't. You will be stuck in the loop of doing that which you think someone wants vs. knowing exactly what they want until you do that... The problem with all games of late is that they are based on what someone else thinks we want in a game (features), and not really understanding the components which we enjoy (benefits). I don't need to be told what I enjoy any more than you do, and that's why games have been really lame as of late. You could lump all of them in like 4-6 categories play one sample of them and never buy another game until next year. (Exception: Madden, you could just buy one of those for the next five years and it is the same game!) I haven't even had an urge to buy a game in a long time, and I love them -- there is just nothing out there that I don't already have as far as playability, style, action, or whatever!
-Mind
The lawsuits on this one are frightning!
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High-Tech RepoMan
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· Score: 1
Just image the lawsuits when someone who has one of these boxes is trying to get away from a criminal and flee to safety or some other similar emergency!
I guess this auto dealer likes writing the checks. Seriously though folks, I don't see why we can't just walk right down the street to "Joe's Auto" and buy the same car without the box and without the potential problems.
One project you might consider having a look at is Bitlbee it supports Jabber, MSN, ICQ, AIM, Yahoo (and since it is doing jabber, googletalk) but you can talk through your irc client. It also works like the jabber server. Just another option. There is no client more configurable than the various irc clients, so as far as flexiblity I think you can have it all with this solution.:)
- Mind
I believe that what is said here USED to be true. IRC was a great medium for exploring hobbies, and computing just happened to be one at some point in time. That is no longer true, and computing is not a hobby it is as necessary simply to function in the modern day world...
Now, if you go into any particular IRC room... even a "tech" room... the noise level dwarfs the signal... go to #perl and you overhear people speaking of their cute little cat, go to #linux and everyone is asking how to re-install winderz..
- Mind
The Next Article: Mac Mini Built into my A**!
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Mac mini Built Into Wall
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· Score: 0, Flamebait
I think this is especially true considering that there will be an OSX port to Intel available very soon. I cannot see why anyone would submit to the Microshaft torture test if they don't have to. People like doing their work and getting their games going. People do not like dorking with registrations, nags, "cannot reinstall", bloatware, and other such nonsense.
Maybe next time they'll decide to put this purchase a real copy feature into the operating system when they release it, instead of five years later! They could also try another feature that has been proven to work. Make your product reasonably priced so that people will buy it, and stop selling crippleware lesser versions! Many people are bootlegging it not because they having bought the OS, but rather they needed something that was in WinXP that they didn't know they needed when they bought the computer.
On a truthful note most people running bootleg winxp and the like are using corporate keys that do not activate, if you decided to disable them I'm sure you would be pissing some companies off big time. Sure, go ahead, pave the way for OSX. I'd switch in a heartbeat.
Actually, since they used the SATA connection instead of method that could talk directly to the cpu (or the PC memory) it will not any faster than a SATA hd. At least, not $500+ faster. Might be useful for some niche crap like broadcasting, but for a normal individual it's completely pointless. You might be a second or two faster on doing a couple of things and only because the memory board is more likely to fill the SATA bandwidth. The Raptor drive in the article is near to filling it as well so I would go and save yourself about $400 big ones with existing tech.
Time and time again the biggest problem we these types of products is that no one stops to figure out what they would be useful for.
First off, this thing costs WAY too much in both terms of the card and terms of the memory to populate it. This board should cost about $50 not $150. I'm saying mainly $50 mostly for the fact that it comes with the lithium battery and charging feature.
Secondly, it is way too small. If it were 8GB I could use it for something like backing up dvds that play hell with hard drives and make you defrag them often. I could use this thing at that point, and so could you.
Third, for a memory based i/o board I can think of nothing more silly than to ladden it down with a disk i/o interface. It does make it more "compatible" or whatever, but it also makes this board antiquated in about two years. If they had just made the i/o controller talk directly to the cpu this board would be smoking, and probably twice the speed.
I was actually excited to read something about a product like this, but this one is not ready for prime time.
This is probably the lamest story I've seen on slashdot for awhile. Who friggin' cares about gloves? I want a 2001 space odyessey pimp space suit. I want a shipboard computer to talk smack to!
Nasa spacesuits currently look like they are made out of white cardboard boxes and aluminum foil so who cares about the gloves? Everyone knows half of science and innovation is an original idea, and the other half is looking like a pimp doing it!
I've had this happen to me before in the banking and financial industry as well. They fire you whether or not you actually were "at the helm". Basically, she was the easiest person for them to let go.
What will make you go "huh?" even more is that normally the person that is fired is someone that really doesn't have a part in the problem. I got fired from one job for non-completion of a project that I wasn't even in control of. But, if all the managers are nodding who's to say that I didn't have anything to do with it? They even told me that they would be giving me good references. Another sign that I really had nothing to do with what had happened. Why would you give good references to a person that you fired unless you are hiding something?
I wouldn't be surprised if they are completely lieing about who made the screwup (something else that this industry does) in the first place. This is just the norm in this industry and it really bugs me that we trust these individuals with our money.
RSS feeds, search within the browser, tabs? Why don't they just start bundling Firefox with Longhorn?:)
Honestly, why bother coming out with a new product when your product does nothing new? More importantly what reason would Firefox users have to switch back to IE? A lot of people I've worked with have ditched IE completely mostly because they cannot control what software is installed into the browser and they also cannot use software that requires the amount of maintenance that you would expect only in caring for a newborn baby.
Longhorn is really doing nothing that isn't available to users of W2K other than use more memory, and disk. When is the OS doing it's job well enough than most people are spending time improving other things? These are questions I ask when purchasing things and I am sure these are things others are thinking about as well.
People are much more savvy about computing than they were a few years and just telling them they need a new OS without there being a real need for one may send a clear message to Microsoft, one that they aren't going to like and one their stockholders REALLY won't care for either.
It all comes down to a simple point. Do I really need "Longhorn" or do you simply just think I need it? Currently, it doesn't do a damn thing that W2K, WinXP or even Linux couldn't do _right now_.
So why bother? Most people aren't doing high performance computing, they don't need to squeek an extra 32 bits out of their 64 bit cpu. Even then, Windows Bloatware running on at 64 native will probably still run like Win95 on a 386. There just isn't really a point now is there?
Lots of people would like the LAN party idea if they simply only knew what it was. Many of my buddies (long time computer guys) are just now learning what games like Evercrack or Counterstrike are and what a real multiplayer experience is. The best damn way to promote these things is do demos and to get flyers taped to games at the stores that sell the multiplayer games you are offering. Charge a small entry fee and split it down the middle with the store that got you the referral. This doesn't have to be much mind you, just enough to cover some network cabling/power bars and network cable/hubs. You don't care if you break even on this one, but the event will never happen if you don't buddy with someone to make it happen and let someone know about it. If you don't charge anything for it, people will think you are not worth the time because you don't even put a price on it. If rations and equipment are covered all you will be worried about is how many people you frag. As it should be!
In running a few little events myself the "ramp up time" does matter. You will get many more people with a years notice than you would with six months, and if you are talking 3 months or less lead time I wouldn't even bother. It simply takes time for people to tell their buddies about the event and for people to see your web links and ads. For these smaller events you need lots of time for them to really work. It's the difference between your event breaking even/profiting and you losing money. Even if you don't want to profit on it a serious gaming event costs money to put together, and the people coming know it costs you something so don't feel bad about sharing the costs with them.
We've been in a major economic downturn and to top it off the people that are technical (that would buy lots of the higher end stuff) are getting laid off. No one has the cash for Photoshop, 3D studio, or anything else that is on the top rung of the scales. These people crying about their losses are the same people the fired off 10,000 workers and replaced them with people from India, China, and Indonesia. f**k 'em... Use gimp, openoffice, and one of the many FREE operating systems. Send a clear message, and maybe they'll get these hits:
1) The software is too much money for a guy that now has to deliver pizzas. Pizza guys make $1/$2 an hour, and about $20/$30 in tips a day. Software = $40+, productivity apps range $150-$1000+
2) The software is no better than the stuff that can be downloaded for free, and occasionally it is worse. Gimp = 98% of photoshop (minus the bits no one uses), Openoffice = 120% of MS Office (the extra 20% is the time you do not have to worry about the application virusing you.) etc..
3) People that cannot afford the package and truly need it will bootleg it and apply a crack if they cannot find a free alternative. (This has always been the case, since the dawn of computing.) If you think it is going away or ever will, you are simply insane and delusional. Price your wares fairly and you will sell more.
4) Nothing called software is worth over $100 unless it is used to control missile launches, perform nano-surgery. compute orbital tragectories to neptune. Ok, this is just my opinion... You may have another.:)
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I've used linux heavily and I've used windows heavily, and I'll never put linux on my desktop again. Sure, it's geek-points or whatever to have it that way but Linux breaks in more wierd ways and makes baby jesus cry. I think Linux has a ton of usefulness server-side, but client-side it is still crap due to the vagueness of information required to ensure applications run. No business in their right mind is gonna deal with the amount of mental upkeep involved in supporting several thousand packages (everything in linux is a lib remember?) on every single machine! All you have to think about is normal user requirements in windows (package #1 = Windows, #2 = Office, #3 = A/V) vs the amount of crap you had to remember about Linux packages. Linux actually has so many you can't even possibly know them all or know all the ones you need. Does that make sense? Linux client-side is an administrative nightmare and that's the #1 reason for it to be #2 to anything Windows. Joe-user, and businesses don't care about inperceptable performance differences and right now that's the only difference between Vista and Linux on the same hardware. Linux has to get into the less than ten packages to keep track of category before it will ever look tasty to the management on the desktop. - Mind
I don't think mandating it is a good idea, but I do think it is nice to have. There is nothing with wrong with giving people a tool to be responsible as a net citizen. Yes, you are still going to have the putz that still won't use it even if provided. I think you are doing people a tremendous favor by adding two whole tags to your page. I know adults that use parental controls on sites they visit because they don't want to hit porn or whatever. I know people that take life a little more seriously than I do, and have a hard time with such things. If the tag existed it would be wildly adopted immediately because right now objectionable content is effecting site hits. Imagine if you could go to your favorite joke site at work and not worry that something not safe would come up. Imagine how many ad hits these sites are gonna get if they put that ability in their page. 'Nuff said. Hits motivate everything for web sites.
I'd agree you basically have MS-Haters(tm) here. I'm the weird guy that doesn't care what OS is being used, but rather cares that it's not difficult to get it to work on your tasks. Now for me personally I have a few priorities:
.net can hack it and is already installed. (0h n03z! MS programming languages!... remember kids originally shell scripts in unix were learned because they were the easy way to program in a set of tasks on a proprietary system!)
1) Does it game better? (my home computers are for my amusement)
2) Does it play music/video better? (see #1)
3) Is it easier for my wife to find the music and videos she wants to see/hear? (no plugin installing + easy file browsing)
4) Does it's web browser work for my bank and mail?
Vista does all of these particular things as good as XP on comparable hardware (with the exception of particular games). Linux fails at them completely (I don't know if you've played around with linux media players but they're crap for the most part... though I think xmms is the best mp3 player around). The problem with Linux IMHO is you need a different screwdriver for every task and there are so many bits involved you cannot even relay that information to normal (non-geek) people. Something that difficult will never catch on with the masses, and is generally stupid for the geeks to use everyday as a matter of efficiency. You can spend your time listening to your music or playing your games or debugging library incompatibilities aka which screwdriver you forgot to download. Whatever get your rocks off.
If my priorities at home were coding software, or other such hackery maybe Linux would pull ahead. But, my work isn't a priority at home for me. For the small little script stuff I need at home
A lot of long time NVIDIA users got burned by the drivers later. I was a Nvidia Fanboy (tm) from RIVA - GeForce 4400. I had a GeForce 4400 and the drivers never worked right for this card no matter what you were doing, by the time the card came along they were working on supporting the next versions of GeForce and stopped debugging it. Even if you run later models certain "revisions" of drivers work and others dont. Is it too much to ask to not have glitches in every damn game you play? This lack of continued support makes me have no interest in buying anything from them. I'm not dropping $300 and HOPING that you will keep fixing driver issues as I demand that of any product I buy.
Message received: We dont care if your card works until you need a new one as we are making you buy a new one because our drivers will break you.
I like the way ATI does it now despite the kinks they had early on (first radeon series). ATI is clearly paying attention to its customers and ensuring compatibility across the board. I got a Radeon X850 XT and I couldn't be happier with this card, or the stability no matter what I do and it runs extremely quiet. I'd recommend it to friends and anyone else who asked. It's not top of the line, but it does everything I want to do. WOW, counter-strike, whatever.
ATI sometimes has some glitches, but for the more common titles you can be assured they will be fixed and they're not killing your wallet as much as Nvidia is.
- Mind
1) When I first started using Gentoo I was in love: Fast fixes, portage was godlike compared to rpm, and it was faster/lighter and all that jazz... There were only 20 something use flags at this time, so configuration was a breeze. You always had to tool with your xconf anyway, so this was nothing new. All the important packages were in the tree so no hunting. Portage itself was lean, mean, and completely adequate. Not only was the system easier to deal with using Gentoo but it had the added bonus. All the software I used on the system consumed a whole 2G.
2) Portage as it is now is a bloated and hacked whale that instead of fixing problems via a re-write is just being held together by more duct-tape. There are so many use flags I can't even remember them and frequently the core flags are altered so that something that used to be "included" requires a new flag. This makes it impossible to use your previous knowledge of configuring the system for anything. Its just like being a newbie every time you install it!
3) Packages are being added much faster than they are being tested for compatibility, and sometimes they're not being added fast enough when there are critical improvements in the next release. Despite what the Gentoo Devs are thinking the people that use Gentoo typically want leaner and meaner but only so lean as not to be crippled in any way. Debian would be good, but they bork the process by being slow to the power of assinine. Debian could be BETTER than Gentoo if they'd ever get in the race. I've used the utilites in Knoppix and apt-get is defintely more useable than portage and faster but I would never install it because stable is too far behind the technology curve. Compiling Gnome, or KDE... STUPID... There are no "processor optimizations" in these apps, and any optimizations would give trivial gains. They're pre-compiling a lot of these packages now... but this is years later....
4) Breaks in Gentoo are TOO extreme. Like one day they decided to change my boot files, and my system didn't come up. I'm good enough to know how to fix it, but most people aren't. We don't have "random days" to just tech support our computer, and this was happening far too frequently. I was losing five days a month to random borks. Most people faced with this problem don't figure it out.. They just reinstall windows... Which is exactly what I did. I love linux, the tools... but if you think I can be down when I have work to do well guess again! I basically found myself installing Gentoo dealing with problems repeatedly and getting fed up repeatedly... I tried Gentoo 3x... that's more than most people would eh? Sorry kids, we gotta get past our open beta at some point.
Well that's all for now thanks for bearing with my aggrivation.
- Mind
Complete crap, and completely untrue. Example of the day: You can easily play all half-life derived games on a computer that has 1 ghz. You may not be able to max the res, but you certainly play them acceptably. RAM and GPU are ALL that matter, and for games that use lots of textures fast disk can be handy too. Plunking on the processor is a complete waste of your money because it doesn't make the game any faster (most of the work being in the rendering/paging ram, dependent on DMA xfers, AGP fast writes, etc.) Case in point: I have a five year old PC and get 190 fps in counter-strike 1.6/condition zero. I could probably even play source since I have the ram to do so, again... All I've upgraded is RAM, and GPU. I specifically wait until the GPU drops out to the level of around $150, because before then you are paying the "early adopter" sin tax. Most counter-strike players will play the game at 800x600 even though their hardware could easily do 1600x1200+... We care more about the fps than the res, since fps=response time, extra pixels do not noticably effect accuracy other than to make your mouse travel more. You must realize that the NEW NEW NEW hardware is 2x too much for any current games. Buy your GPU and CPU two years behind and save a bundle, but still frag like a champ! The side effect is that you will also be buying the hardware when the games can finally make use of it.
:)
Just remember that no matter what you read on the net your gaming experience doesn't get any better after about 100 fps, so paying money to have this feature is IHMO worthless and ultra-high resolution adversely effects the usefulness of mice (yes, even the super-cool 2000+dpi mice). You will not frag better for spending the money so skill up, and quit thinking your PC sucks.
(just an observation)
- Mind
Yes, the difference is that normal people can go to normal sources to get the information to correct the problems. You have to realize that most people don't have much of an idea of what is under the hood, but they do need to use the car to get to work. They would have a difficult time understanding which parts of the information in Linux would aid in diagnosing the problem, whereas if it were a Windows problem the common experience base with the masses is actually a tool. I'm not saying Windows is the best damn software made, far from it... I see many problems with it from a conceptual and a practical level. I won't even say it is cheaper or more efficient in all cases to run Microsoft products, but I think if a normal user can reasonably communicate a problem I think that is definitely another means of efficiency.
"To me, long term maintainability is the selling point of Linux. I'll concede Linux is in general harder to set up, but only because the end-user is not typically setting up Windows; it is preinstalled (and configured). If you hide that initial set-up at the vendor, then the user would see Linux as a much easier to use machine LONG TERM. That is, I'd argue that once set up, Linux is far more reliable, more durable and much, much easier to extend into areas the user wants to take the computer after the initial set-up. Ultimately, to each his own. I have a family member who will not, under any circumstances, even look at Linux. He does not care if it can do x, y or z better. Do I continue to try to "sell" Linux to him? No way. His box - his choice of OS."Actually, the real problem I see with the Linux install process is that the maintainence of the system is not identical to the initial installation. Upgrading bits of the system is much harder than the loading of the product which is actually a blow to the long term maintainability since it is more confusing. For excample, most users in Windows user the windows installer and that interface is virtually the same when removing software as it is when adding it. The user needs to know nothing to perform that process other than the product name. In contrast, backing out of an upgrade in Linux can be difficult if not impossible (especially if you are talking about glibc, etc). This is actually a major minus to Linux because the normal user when faced with the fact that maintaining the software is difficult simply skips that step, and that is far for a solution isn't it? A Windows users would likely be able to back out even a service pack if something isn't working right after the update.
As far as selling Linux goes, just remember the simple truth: "A good product sells itself, and a buyer becomes an owner the minute he can see himself enjoying the fruits of the product." It's hard to draw someone to a product when the major feature is supposedly the fact that you get to spend less time as a computer janitor. That's a great advantage to a system administrator, but it'"s nothing to someone that doesn't maintain a system since they will not identify with this.
-Mind
Call it flamebait if you will, but for the average user Linux doesn't even exist. It doesn't matter if it is called Linux "Alterna-OS" or some other crap, they know what shipped on the computer and don't have the time or inclination to learn anything else. Sure, the geeks love it, but why would the average person like it? Does it do more than already-installed (windows/media player/office/etc) or does it just do the same thing? See, if all it does is the same thing then Linux has NO VALUE preposition whatsover to the average joe they will only switch when alternative software has more usefulness and is not merely a clone.
I ask you, why should you care about vi when you have notepad (which does the same job with less confusing commands)? Making Xine or Helix useable requires setup and configuration of codecs, whereas it just works under windows!
For Linux to gain ground it needs to add utility without adding futility. No one is going to accept that it more trouble to get the thing to work the same way, and they would barely consider it if the improvements are only marginal. As far as features, Windows is better to average joe. It reasonably works out of the box, and there is nothing to screw up in the configuration. When Linux works like that then it will compete with Windows, but if the software included with Linux surpassed it that would be the end for Redmond. There is no way a "normal" user is going to put up with the bullshit involved with setting a Linux box up, so these Linux people should shut up about their desktop until it works or even happens and stay on the servers.
All that being said, I love Linux as far as the performance... It turns "dated" machines into useable machines, and for those that are running on a budget it may still have a place. For servers, I don't think there is a better choice you can make. But again, the Linux people need to stop thinking they have a desktop offering -- they have a toolbox of many tools but they do not have a leatherman. Desktops need to be useable by the computer challenged to qualify as an offering, and anything too complex is just missing the mark. Do you think the normal person would know much about partitions, screen mode depth and resolution, or even the goofy device names for mice or screens? These things make the whole proposition unrealistic.
-Mind
I sincerely wonder what this means about the health of the gaming industry, a business plagued with lack of innovation and consumer ADD! I think BioWare is seriously is attempting to break out of the mold, but by what "criteria" does a good idea an exist? A good idea is one part thought and ninety-nine parts execution! The problem you will have here is the same long-in-the-tooth people that no longer have originality (or a need for it, due to their fat salaries) are going to be the ones that choose which ideas are good. So basically, they're going to have a contest to hire some people that are just as worn out in the idea department as they are. You want to hire a good writer? Find an audience composed of the target market you need to hit and let them read the scripts. Let them rip them apart, applaud them, and determine which one is the best. I think gamers are more qualified than producers in figuring out what is fun and what isn't. You will be stuck in the loop of doing that which you think someone wants vs. knowing exactly what they want until you do that... The problem with all games of late is that they are based on what someone else thinks we want in a game (features), and not really understanding the components which we enjoy (benefits). I don't need to be told what I enjoy any more than you do, and that's why games have been really lame as of late. You could lump all of them in like 4-6 categories play one sample of them and never buy another game until next year. (Exception: Madden, you could just buy one of those for the next five years and it is the same game!) I haven't even had an urge to buy a game in a long time, and I love them -- there is just nothing out there that I don't already have as far as playability, style, action, or whatever!
-Mind
Just image the lawsuits when someone who has one of these boxes is trying to get away from a criminal and flee to safety or some other similar emergency!
I guess this auto dealer likes writing the checks. Seriously though folks, I don't see why we can't just walk right down the street to "Joe's Auto" and buy the same car without the box and without the potential problems.
-Mind
One project you might consider having a look at is Bitlbee it supports Jabber, MSN, ICQ, AIM, Yahoo (and since it is doing jabber, googletalk) but you can talk through your irc client. It also works like the jabber server. Just another option. There is no client more configurable than the various irc clients, so as far as flexiblity I think you can have it all with this solution. :)
- Mind
I believe that what is said here USED to be true. IRC was a great medium for exploring hobbies, and computing just happened to be one at some point in time. That is no longer true, and computing is not a hobby it is as necessary simply to function in the modern day world...
Now, if you go into any particular IRC room... even a "tech" room... the noise level dwarfs the signal... go to #perl and you overhear people speaking of their cute little cat, go to #linux and everyone is asking how to re-install winderz..
- Mind
The title really says it all..
- Mind
-Mind
On a truthful note most people running bootleg winxp and the like are using corporate keys that do not activate, if you decided to disable them I'm sure you would be pissing some companies off big time. Sure, go ahead, pave the way for OSX. I'd switch in a heartbeat.
-Mind
-Mind
First off, this thing costs WAY too much in both terms of the card and terms of the memory to populate it. This board should cost about $50 not $150. I'm saying mainly $50 mostly for the fact that it comes with the lithium battery and charging feature.
Secondly, it is way too small. If it were 8GB I could use it for something like backing up dvds that play hell with hard drives and make you defrag them often. I could use this thing at that point, and so could you.
Third, for a memory based i/o board I can think of nothing more silly than to ladden it down with a disk i/o interface. It does make it more "compatible" or whatever, but it also makes this board antiquated in about two years. If they had just made the i/o controller talk directly to the cpu this board would be smoking, and probably twice the speed.
I was actually excited to read something about a product like this, but this one is not ready for prime time.
Anyone remember Boca boards? :)
- Mind
Frankly, I'm for the *space naked* movement myself. -Mind...
This is probably the lamest story I've seen on slashdot for awhile. Who friggin' cares about gloves? I want a 2001 space odyessey pimp space suit. I want a shipboard computer to talk smack to!
Nasa spacesuits currently look like they are made out of white cardboard boxes and aluminum foil so who cares about the gloves? Everyone knows half of science and innovation is an original idea, and the other half is looking like a pimp doing it!
Nah, but I think it could possibly make more sense to make a space shuttle that doesn't FALL APART. - Mind
I've had this happen to me before in the banking and financial industry as well. They fire you whether or not you actually were "at the helm". Basically, she was the easiest person for them to let go.
What will make you go "huh?" even more is that normally the person that is fired is someone that really doesn't have a part in the problem. I got fired from one job for non-completion of a project that I wasn't even in control of. But, if all the managers are nodding who's to say that I didn't have anything to do with it? They even told me that they would be giving me good references. Another sign that I really had nothing to do with what had happened. Why would you give good references to a person that you fired unless you are hiding something?
I wouldn't be surprised if they are completely lieing about who made the screwup (something else that this industry does) in the first place. This is just the norm in this industry and it really bugs me that we trust these individuals with our money.
- Mind
RSS feeds, search within the browser, tabs? Why don't they just start bundling Firefox with Longhorn? :)
Honestly, why bother coming out with a new product when your product does nothing new? More importantly what reason would Firefox users have to switch back to IE? A lot of people I've worked with have ditched IE completely mostly because they cannot control what software is installed into the browser and they also cannot use software that requires the amount of maintenance that you would expect only in caring for a newborn baby.
Longhorn is really doing nothing that isn't available to users of W2K other than use more memory, and disk. When is the OS doing it's job well enough than most people are spending time improving other things? These are questions I ask when purchasing things and I am sure these are things others are thinking about as well.
People are much more savvy about computing than they were a few years and just telling them they need a new OS without there being a real need for one may send a clear message to Microsoft, one that they aren't going to like and one their stockholders REALLY won't care for either.
It all comes down to a simple point. Do I really need "Longhorn" or do you simply just think I need it? Currently, it doesn't do a damn thing that W2K, WinXP or even Linux couldn't do _right now_.
So why bother? Most people aren't doing high performance computing, they don't need to squeek an extra 32 bits out of their 64 bit cpu. Even then, Windows Bloatware running on at 64 native will probably still run like Win95 on a 386. There just isn't really a point now is there?
- Mindmaster
Lots of people would like the LAN party idea if they simply only knew what it was. Many of my buddies (long time computer guys) are just now learning what games like Evercrack or Counterstrike are and what a real multiplayer experience is. The best damn way to promote these things is do demos and to get flyers taped to games at the stores that sell the multiplayer games you are offering. Charge a small entry fee and split it down the middle with the store that got you the referral. This doesn't have to be much mind you, just enough to cover some network cabling/power bars and network cable/hubs. You don't care if you break even on this one, but the event will never happen if you don't buddy with someone to make it happen and let someone know about it. If you don't charge anything for it, people will think you are not worth the time because you don't even put a price on it. If rations and equipment are covered all you will be worried about is how many people you frag. As it should be!
In running a few little events myself the "ramp up time" does matter. You will get many more people with a years notice than you would with six months, and if you are talking 3 months or less lead time I wouldn't even bother. It simply takes time for people to tell their buddies about the event and for people to see your web links and ads. For these smaller events you need lots of time for them to really work. It's the difference between your event breaking even/profiting and you losing money. Even if you don't want to profit on it a serious gaming event costs money to put together, and the people coming know it costs you something so don't feel bad about sharing the costs with them.
-Mind
People aren't buying the damn software!
:)
We've been in a major economic downturn and to top it off the people that are technical (that would buy lots of the higher end stuff) are getting laid off. No one has the cash for Photoshop, 3D studio, or anything else that is on the top rung of the scales. These people crying about their losses are the same people the fired off 10,000 workers and replaced them with people from India, China, and Indonesia. f**k 'em... Use gimp, openoffice, and one of the many FREE operating systems. Send a clear message, and maybe they'll get these hits:
1) The software is too much money for a guy that now has to deliver pizzas. Pizza guys make $1/$2 an hour, and about $20/$30 in tips a day. Software = $40+, productivity apps range $150-$1000+
2) The software is no better than the stuff that can be downloaded for free, and occasionally it is worse. Gimp = 98% of photoshop (minus the bits no one uses), Openoffice = 120% of MS Office (the extra 20% is the time you do not have to worry about the application virusing you.) etc..
3) People that cannot afford the package and truly need it will bootleg it and apply a crack if they cannot find a free alternative. (This has always been the case, since the dawn of computing.) If you think it is going away or ever will, you are simply insane and delusional. Price your wares fairly and you will sell more.
4) Nothing called software is worth over $100 unless it is used to control missile launches, perform nano-surgery. compute orbital tragectories to neptune. Ok, this is just my opinion... You may have another.
-Mind