They dont... I get all of my deliveries to my office. Fedex and UPS, come in and want a signature to confirm delivery. (A pain, but I actually like that.) Amazon Logistics... Drops and runs 90% of the time, they dont even bother to try and open the front door, they leave it outside on a busy street and mark it delivered. Thier delivery window is 8am to 8pm (and the 8am is flexible. I have had a package delivered at 7:30am and get the email from Amazon that it was going to be delivered today at 9am. I have had them mark the business as closed and no one there, when lights are on and my front door unlocked. I am NOT amused with them.
Heck even USPS is more consistent with delivery than Amazon logistics... Oh and forget calling amazon to find out where your package is... they will get back with you in 48 hours or so... at least UPS hasnt said my package was delivered when it wasnt.
Just because the government knows you cheated on your wife (because it came up in your background clearance check) does not mean that your wife knows. This is leverage.
I used work at such a place. If it came up during a background check that you were having an affair, they would call both you and your wife into the security office and tell the person with the clearance, "you tell them or we will".
They cared less about what you did and more for if you could be blackmailed for it.
My largest issues are as follows, LJ subscriber for 5+ years now... I don't own a tablet, and don't like reading on a desktop/laptop... I've been waiting for a good enough tablet that doesn't seem like gouging. I might do a rooted nook color though. For the most part I'm disappointed, but not surprised. I may not renew, will need to see an issue or two, see how they work (bu commentary) for various devices... if they're formatted well for on-screen, will see.
I can't agree more. I have been a subscriber since issue #6. I renewed my subscription for another 100 PRINT issues just 8 months ago. At the time, the digital only subscription was cheaper (This new pricing brings the digital subscription issue price to the same as the previous print subscription price as confirmed by the contents page of the latest print copy) I paid extra to ALSO get the digital copies for the occasional research of an article. I love the print copies and so I paid a premium for them over the digital version. This to me is nothing but a bait-and-switch.
We are talking OSX here, not Windoze... You should learn to read first then respond. The 10.3.5 drivers are hopelessly braindead. 10.3.6 fixes all the driver bugs with regards to NV_register_combiner2 and ARB_fragment_program extensions.
The most likely reason for the G5 requirement is the HUGE performance difference out of the compilers for G4 vs. G5. Given the PPC processors, there are a ton of performance optimizations that can be done on the G5 that hurt performance on the G4. And frankly given that most x86 programers seem to do float/int conversions with impunity and not worry about the performance hits (Since they are basicly free on the x86), Optimizing for the faster processor makes sense. (For those that dont know, on the PPC processor float/int conversions are THE most expensive operation to do in terms of performance that are possible (Ask IBM why) and game developers seem to rely on them ALOT.
TRUST ME on the 10.3.6. Both the NVidia and ATI video drivers (although ATI's driver was more sane) had enough issues that require the new revision. Doom3 + 10.3.5 most likely would = bright red world due to a driver issue. (There are issues with certain color formats and ARB_fragment_programs , all of which are fixed in the beta versions of the drivers.) I know... Same things with my game 10.3.5 has broken ARB_fragment_programs and broken NV_register_combiner2 OpenGL extensions. Both of which are fixed with 10.3.6.
NOTE: They were able to be worked around on the ATI cards. I had to blacklist those extensions on the NVIDIA card to prevent my use of them on 10.3.6.
Disclaimer: I dont work for Aspyr nor participated in any of the testing of the game. However, I do know the reasons for requiring 10.3.6 because I have encountered them. (It really is hard to explain to someone who has a NV 5200 why you have to render it like a GF2 to get it to work correctly)
Yes and no... While the majority of code will work, you dont want to use the X11 UI code on OSX, However in general the window management code was the easiest to convert if needed. The things to watch for in porting from Linux to OSX is byte ordering differences between x86 and PPC. Specificly, watch your resource loaders, network code, graphics display lists... (A lot of x86 programmers take the lazy way out and assume a specific byte order in RAM when passing data to Shader and Vertex programs.)
Be wary also of float/int conversions on the PPC... They == performance death. USE the OSX performance tools they are thousands of times better than anything that I have seen on the x86. Real-time performance counters ROCK. Shark Rocks.
Oh, I should mention... Yes, There are some games that are Windows/Linux/OSX. I did the port of the MMO "A Tale in the Desert" to both Linux and OSX.
What you are failing to realize is that the NPC that was the first part of the event, was a stranger to the land and insulted and cheated EVERYONE... It was just that quite a few woman decided to take it personally when a stranger from a forgein land refused to trade with them strictly because they were female.
In the enlightened environment of Egypt that would not be accepted and as was the case in the game, the NPC was driven from the land by an angry mob...
Sorry, guys, I wanted it to be more closed beta of the client, so I linked it only off the downloads page until I worked out some more kinks. No big deal, just wanted the best impression possible BEFORE it hitting slashdot. Alas, you guys beat me too it... BTW, The faster downloads is via
http://game.atitd.com/download.html
Read the README for known issues with the mac client. It is still very much under development.
The 3.9 driver is much higher quality than the 3.11.1 drivers... I have had a ton of user complaints regarding black textures related to ARB_fragment_programs... Disabling the ARB_fragment_programs caused the driver to run the system out of RAM and die. Having the users revert to 3.9 solved all of those issues. It has caused that drivers advanced functions to get blacklisted in at least one commercial game.
Actually, the network code was already byte order clean, however lots of the internal buffering code, and actual graphics code made assumptions about the byteordering in memory which where incorrect. Those are just a matter of tracking them down...
As for using network byte-ordering for eveything in RAM that is just horribly nuts... (why should I byte swap every int and every pointer before it ever saved in RAM...) The game was written to be portable, but over its lifetime, it was never tested and audited to ensure that it work on anything except PC hardware)
If you read the link that I posted, it contains REAL data from an existing MMO. Based on all of the collected data (Which consisted of 100% of the population, so there is no margin of error in the data) Linux users DO pay more often, at leeast for that one game and stay subscribers for longer than windows users.
The point is that there IS a linux gaming community that is hungry for quality games and that contrary to popular opinion, they ARE willing to pay for them.
Some people dont like "A Tale in the Desert" and some people are rabid about it. Personally, I like it. While I look for free or low cost software to do what I need, I will gladly pay for quality software if it suits my needs.
Having worked on both, I prefer Linux, however, OSX is VERY nice. I have found its software quality to be consistantly higher than the normal tripe out of Redmond.
It worked for the most part, although when it broke, it broke REALLY well. (Something about idiots putting things OTHER than paper into the system) My favorite for things found in the system was the crackshaft of a car. (Now THAT messed up the system)
At a government agency that I used to work for, all documents were cross shredded then eventually dumped into a what amounted to a big blender (slurry tank) that mixed the little paper sheddings with water/bleaches/detergants to make a fine paper pulp, this was then pressed into bales sold to paper recyclers. (This agency was the largest recycler in the state:-) )
Slashdot Mirror
They dont... I get all of my deliveries to my office. Fedex and UPS, come in and want a signature to confirm delivery. (A pain, but I actually like that.) Amazon Logistics... Drops and runs 90% of the time, they dont even bother to try and open the front door, they leave it outside on a busy street and mark it delivered. Thier delivery window is 8am to 8pm (and the 8am is flexible. I have had a package delivered at 7:30am and get the email from Amazon that it was going to be delivered today at 9am. I have had them mark the business as closed and no one there, when lights are on and my front door unlocked. I am NOT amused with them. Heck even USPS is more consistent with delivery than Amazon logistics... Oh and forget calling amazon to find out where your package is... they will get back with you in 48 hours or so... at least UPS hasnt said my package was delivered when it wasnt.
Just because the government knows you cheated on your wife (because it came up in your background clearance check) does not mean that your wife knows. This is leverage.
I used work at such a place. If it came up during a background check that you were having an affair, they would call both you and your wife into the security office and tell the person with the clearance, "you tell them or we will". They cared less about what you did and more for if you could be blackmailed for it.
My largest issues are as follows, LJ subscriber for 5+ years now... I don't own a tablet, and don't like reading on a desktop/laptop... I've been waiting for a good enough tablet that doesn't seem like gouging. I might do a rooted nook color though. For the most part I'm disappointed, but not surprised. I may not renew, will need to see an issue or two, see how they work (bu commentary) for various devices... if they're formatted well for on-screen, will see.
I can't agree more. I have been a subscriber since issue #6. I renewed my subscription for another 100 PRINT issues just 8 months ago. At the time, the digital only subscription was cheaper (This new pricing brings the digital subscription issue price to the same as the previous print subscription price as confirmed by the contents page of the latest print copy) I paid extra to ALSO get the digital copies for the occasional research of an article. I love the print copies and so I paid a premium for them over the digital version. This to me is nothing but a bait-and-switch.
We are talking OSX here, not Windoze... You should learn to read first then respond. The 10.3.5 drivers are hopelessly braindead. 10.3.6 fixes all the driver bugs with regards to NV_register_combiner2 and ARB_fragment_program extensions.
The most likely reason for the G5 requirement is the HUGE performance difference out of the compilers for G4 vs. G5. Given the PPC processors, there are a ton of performance optimizations that can be done on the G5 that hurt performance on the G4. And frankly given that most x86 programers seem to do float/int conversions with impunity and not worry about the performance hits (Since they are basicly free on the x86), Optimizing for the faster processor makes sense. (For those that dont know, on the PPC processor float/int conversions are THE most expensive operation to do in terms of performance that are possible (Ask IBM why) and game developers seem to rely on them ALOT.
TRUST ME on the 10.3.6. Both the NVidia and ATI video drivers (although ATI's driver was more sane) had enough issues that require the new revision. Doom3 + 10.3.5 most likely would = bright red world due to a driver issue. (There are issues with certain color formats and ARB_fragment_programs , all of which are fixed in the beta versions of the drivers.) I know... Same things with my game 10.3.5 has broken ARB_fragment_programs and broken NV_register_combiner2 OpenGL extensions. Both of which are fixed with 10.3.6.
NOTE: They were able to be worked around on the ATI cards. I had to blacklist those extensions on the NVIDIA card to prevent my use of them on 10.3.6.
Disclaimer: I dont work for Aspyr nor participated in any of the testing of the game. However, I do know the reasons for requiring 10.3.6 because I have encountered them. (It really is hard to explain to someone who has a NV 5200 why you have to render it like a GF2 to get it to work correctly)
Yes and no... While the majority of code will work, you dont want to use the X11 UI code on OSX, However in general the window management code was the easiest to convert if needed. The things to watch for in porting from Linux to OSX is byte ordering differences between x86 and PPC. Specificly, watch your resource loaders, network code, graphics display lists... (A lot of x86 programmers take the lazy way out and assume a specific byte order in RAM when passing data to Shader and Vertex programs.)
Be wary also of float/int conversions on the PPC... They == performance death. USE the OSX performance tools they are thousands of times better than anything that I have seen on the x86. Real-time performance counters ROCK. Shark Rocks.
Oh, I should mention... Yes, There are some games that are Windows/Linux/OSX. I did the port of the MMO "A Tale in the Desert" to both Linux and OSX.
What you are failing to realize is that the NPC that was the first part of the event, was a stranger to the land and insulted and cheated EVERYONE... It was just that quite a few woman decided to take it personally when a stranger from a forgein land refused to trade with them strictly because they were female. In the enlightened environment of Egypt that would not be accepted and as was the case in the game, the NPC was driven from the land by an angry mob...
Sorry, guys, I wanted it to be more closed beta of the client, so I linked it only off the downloads page until I worked out some more kinks. No big deal, just wanted the best impression possible BEFORE it hitting slashdot. Alas, you guys beat me too it ... BTW, The faster downloads is via
http://game.atitd.com/download.html
Read the README for known issues with the mac client. It is still very much under development.
The 3.9 driver is much higher quality than the 3.11.1 drivers... I have had a ton of user complaints regarding black textures related to ARB_fragment_programs... Disabling the ARB_fragment_programs caused the driver to run the system out of RAM and die. Having the users revert to 3.9 solved all of those issues. It has caused that drivers advanced functions to get blacklisted in at least one commercial game.
Actually, the network code was already byte order clean, however lots of the internal buffering code, and actual graphics code made assumptions about the byteordering in memory which where incorrect. Those are just a matter of tracking them down...
As for using network byte-ordering for eveything in RAM that is just horribly nuts... (why should I byte swap every int and every pointer before it ever saved in RAM...) The game was written to be portable, but over its lifetime, it was never tested and audited to ensure that it work on anything except PC hardware)
If you read the link that I posted, it contains REAL data from an existing MMO. Based on all of the collected data (Which consisted of 100% of the population, so there is no margin of error in the data) Linux users DO pay more often, at leeast for that one game and stay subscribers for longer than windows users. The point is that there IS a linux gaming community that is hungry for quality games and that contrary to popular opinion, they ARE willing to pay for them.
Linux Users More Likely to Pay for Games?
Some people dont like "A Tale in the Desert" and some people are rabid about it. Personally, I like it. While I look for free or low cost software to do what I need, I will gladly pay for quality software if it suits my needs.
Having worked on both, I prefer Linux, however, OSX is VERY nice. I have found its software quality to be consistantly higher than the normal tripe out of Redmond.
A Tale in the Desert http://www.atitd.com works well on it :-)
It worked for the most part, although when it broke, it broke REALLY well. (Something about idiots putting things OTHER than paper into the system) My favorite for things found in the system was the crackshaft of a car. (Now THAT messed up the system)
At a government agency that I used to work for, all documents were cross shredded then eventually dumped into a what amounted to a big blender (slurry tank) that mixed the little paper sheddings with water/bleaches/detergants to make a fine paper pulp, this was then pressed into bales sold to paper recyclers. (This agency was the largest recycler in the state :-) )