>> the possible economical consequences are enormous.
Is that all about this article that stood out to you? The impact on the economy? It's thinking like yours that got us in this mess in the first place and is allowing it to get worse every day.
>> They can travel under it. That would have helped the Titanic quite a bit.
They did. I think its the 'coming up again' part that would have helped Titanic more.
>> why does Microsoft need this much CPU power to do it's (relatively simple) GFX in Vista?
Because they never sweep old code away, They just build layers of on layers on layers. Its quicker and easier (and dirtier) than actually doing proper refactoring. Microsoft engineers get recognition/rewards from Microsoft by coming up with a new schema, when all they've done is encapsulate an old macro-based API with another layer of macros so microsoft can then say they developed a new technology like.net, COM+, COM, OLE whatever.
Also, their most of their developers are all new grads (read: cheaper) so know their stuff academically but lack practical development experience, so don't automatically do things like think about performance while developing.
You know, someone who writes very intelligently in defence of a stupid argument is still closer to stupid than intelligent. It doesn't matter how many big words they use. There's already enough hard proof that its beyond doubt that cigarette smoke, both first and second-hand, is carcinogenic.
They tried that too. Trouble is, it was too obviously a lie because people notice other people dying. They can get away with lying about the environment, because generally people don't know what to look for.
Cool. Maybe they have secret lairs in volcanos that are protected by sharks with lasers on their heads. I wonder if Gates has a mini-Bill clone midget?
I suspect his is more like IE is dangerous when you surf with it at all.
But he's got a point... windows security is really arcane and has stupidly insecure defaults. Lets not even talk about the ongoing weaknesses that keep getting identified in Windows and also all the wide-open backdoors that Microsoft put there on purpose (ActiveX for example).
Also any OS that not only allows but expects apps to add or alter stuff in the operating system file structure itself is just fundamentally incapapable of real security right there.
Just because Microsoft say they are stopping support for 16 bit windows, is that enough to drive any remaining 95/98/ME users to change?
I mean I can't imagine how that now actually prevents their continued use of it.
Furthermore, although on paper Microsoft had been supporting it, have they actually released any important new fixes or functionality for it in the last few years? Just because they now say they're not supporting it any more, has anything really been lost here for existing users?
>> Bottom line: Linux is not a solution for any of the above problems.
Sure it is. You just need to run dosbox, qemu, xen or whatever works for those old apps from linux. Your parallel port works just fine under those with no finicky windows HAL in sight, and Linux works great on older PC hardware, unlike all versions of Windows. Even Windows 3.x was a hack that couldn't multitask properly and Vista still hasn't got it right.
My response to one of the other many Diebold security screwups reported on slashdot seems even more apporpriate. Cut and pasted for your viewing pleasure:
Bush must have shares in Diebold or something.
Diebold have been the butt-end of so many serious security failures its not funny any more. Its obvious they don't have a clue about security and aren't likely to get a clue anytime soon judging from their ongoing record.
Why are we still using this company's products? How many more times are the government going to allow Diebold to screw up?? Is there no-one else that makes a better system?
>>>So you've never seen a.html file before? What do you think those contain? What about a.php file?.css?.jpg? These are all files that contain data. The contents of all of these files could easily be placed in a database. So why don't we?
Because your performance goes to shit. Its the same problem Microsoft will hit when they introduce their DBFS or whatever its called.
>> To get to my real email: echo zqxv3nnrz0a9cbrxl39 | tr 0n3abvqxrzc9 @pogirdc.leam
great sig. It means you don't get emails from windows users. I like it;-)
OK here's something I never did understand about postgres:
If you modify a record in a postgres DB it keeps an invisible copy of the original for 'transactional reasons' and does not ever automatically delete it, even if there are no current transactional queries running. This means you can have a DB containing a single one field record and if you keep altering the field value you'll eventually run out of disk space. With any Postgres DB you therefore have to manually run a purge every now and again, and the purge slows the whole DB down to a crawl while its running (for us a purge had to be run every day otherwise the DB performance would be crazy slow, and the purge took over half an hour which during that time hardly any queries would run).
Basically, it just seems like Postgres has shot itself in the foot there.
I spoke to the developers and was told in a rather snooty reply that they had no plans to allow the user to optionally disable transactional 'features'.
>> Vista 'will create more than 50,000 technology jobs in six large European countries
Yep I ran Vista RC1 and switched back to XP after about 20 minutes. Its obvious the extra jobs are going to be created In tech. support....Which means another 50,000 call centre workers in Mumbai India.
I'm not going hunting for the links, but all power consumption comparisons I've seen show intel in the lead over AMD now in terms of power consumption vs. performance.
I'm not sure about dollar for dollar any more, AMD stuff is going cheap now because they've lost the lead, especially if you don't mind relatively poor performance.
dB for db? since when did processors make noise? If you're talking about their respective heat output for equivalent performance, again it seems intel are now ahead. The core 2 runs cool enough that he cpu fan can be easily replaced with a fanless (silent) alternative anyway.
if they're not intending to use them, why did the get them in the first place? Its like someone pointing a gun at your head but saying "I won't pull the triger, honest".
This is a modern-day equivalent of book-burning, of which the chinese are one of the earliest examples.
Following the advice of Li Si, Qin Shi Huang ordered all philosophy books and history books from states other than Qin--except copies in the imperial library for official uses--to be burned 213 BC. This is accompanied by the live burial of a large number of intellectuals, who did not comply with the state dogma (To burn the classics and to bury the scholars). (Plagiarised from wikipedia).
All through history you can always immediately tell the most evil governing bodies as they are all afraid of truth and tried to limit free speech. All the most self-serving power groups with the worst human rights records through history have tried and ultimately failed to kill free speech. Interestingly, that group also includes the Nazis and the christian and islamic churches.
Slashdot Mirror
>> the possible economical consequences are enormous.
Is that all about this article that stood out to you? The impact on the economy? It's thinking like yours that got us in this mess in the first place and is allowing it to get worse every day.
>> They can travel under it. That would have helped the Titanic quite a bit. They did. I think its the 'coming up again' part that would have helped Titanic more.
95 sits over 16-bit DOS with EMM386 to get 32 bit.
>> why does Microsoft need this much CPU power to do it's (relatively simple) GFX in Vista?
.net, COM+, COM, OLE whatever.
Because they never sweep old code away, They just build layers of on layers on layers. Its quicker and easier (and dirtier) than actually doing proper refactoring. Microsoft engineers get recognition/rewards from Microsoft by coming up with a new schema, when all they've done is encapsulate an old macro-based API with another layer of macros so microsoft can then say they developed a new technology like
Also, their most of their developers are all new grads (read: cheaper) so know their stuff academically but lack practical development experience, so don't automatically do things like think about performance while developing.
...so you're proposing that Phillip Morris are trying to cover up the fact that Fig Newtons are the real cause of global warming then?
You know, someone who writes very intelligently in defence of a stupid argument is still closer to stupid than intelligent. It doesn't matter how many big words they use.
There's already enough hard proof that its beyond doubt that cigarette smoke, both first and second-hand, is carcinogenic.
They tried that too. Trouble is, it was too obviously a lie because people notice other people dying. They can get away with lying about the environment, because generally people don't know what to look for.
Cool. Maybe they have secret lairs in volcanos that are protected by sharks with lasers on their heads. I wonder if Gates has a mini-Bill clone midget?
I suspect his is more like IE is dangerous when you surf with it at all.
But he's got a point... windows security is really arcane and has stupidly insecure defaults. Lets not even talk about the ongoing weaknesses that keep getting identified in Windows and also all the wide-open backdoors that Microsoft put there on purpose (ActiveX for example).
Also any OS that not only allows but expects apps to add or alter stuff in the operating system file structure itself is just fundamentally incapapable of real security right there.
Just because Microsoft say they are stopping support for 16 bit windows, is that enough to drive any remaining 95/98/ME users to change?
I mean I can't imagine how that now actually prevents their continued use of it.
Furthermore, although on paper Microsoft had been supporting it, have they actually released any important new fixes or functionality for it in the last few years? Just because they now say they're not supporting it any more, has anything really been lost here for existing users?
>> Linux doesnt look enough like Microsoft ...Thank god.
And BTW, Unix has been around a lot longer than Microsoft.
>> Bottom line: Linux is not a solution for any of the above problems.
Sure it is. You just need to run dosbox, qemu, xen or whatever works for those old apps from linux.
Your parallel port works just fine under those with no finicky windows HAL in sight, and Linux works great on older PC hardware, unlike all versions of Windows.
Even Windows 3.x was a hack that couldn't multitask properly and Vista still hasn't got it right.
>> Researchers plan to announce on Monday that they have created a silicon-based chip that can produce laser beams.
Isn't this just what laser LED's are? They've been around for years now.
My response to one of the other many Diebold security screwups reported on slashdot seems even more apporpriate.
Cut and pasted for your viewing pleasure:
Bush must have shares in Diebold or something.
Diebold have been the butt-end of so many serious security failures its not funny any more. Its obvious they don't have a clue about security and aren't likely to get a clue anytime soon judging from their ongoing record.
Why are we still using this company's products? How many more times are the government going to allow Diebold to screw up?? Is there no-one else that makes a better system?
Thankyou, that question was exactly my original point except I probably didn't make it clear enough in the original post.
>>>So you've never seen a .html file before? What do you think those contain? What about a .php file? .css? .jpg? These are all files that contain data. The contents of all of these files could easily be placed in a database. So why don't we?
Because your performance goes to shit. Its the same problem Microsoft will hit when they introduce their DBFS or whatever its called.
It sounds like the perfect signal for PVR software to watch for in order to skip commercials automatically.
>> To get to my real email: echo zqxv3nnrz0a9cbrxl39 | tr 0n3abvqxrzc9 @pogirdc.leam great sig. It means you don't get emails from windows users. I like it ;-)
OK here's something I never did understand about postgres:
If you modify a record in a postgres DB it keeps an invisible copy of the original for 'transactional reasons' and does not ever automatically delete it, even if there are no current transactional queries running. This means you can have a DB containing a single one field record and if you keep altering the field value you'll eventually run out of disk space. With any Postgres DB you therefore have to manually run a purge every now and again, and the purge slows the whole DB down to a crawl while its running (for us a purge had to be run every day otherwise the DB performance would be crazy slow, and the purge took over half an hour which during that time hardly any queries would run).
Basically, it just seems like Postgres has shot itself in the foot there.
I spoke to the developers and was told in a rather snooty reply that they had no plans to allow the user to optionally disable transactional 'features'.
>> Vista 'will create more than 50,000 technology jobs in six large European countries
...Which means another 50,000 call centre workers in Mumbai India.
Yep I ran Vista RC1 and switched back to XP after about 20 minutes. Its obvious the extra jobs are going to be created In tech. support.
I totally agree. Mod parent up for insightfulness.
I'm not going hunting for the links, but all power consumption comparisons I've seen show intel in the lead over AMD now in terms of power consumption vs. performance.
I'm not sure about dollar for dollar any more, AMD stuff is going cheap now because they've lost the lead, especially if you don't mind relatively poor performance.
dB for db? since when did processors make noise? If you're talking about their respective heat output for equivalent performance, again it seems intel are now ahead. The core 2 runs cool enough that he cpu fan can be easily replaced with a fanless (silent) alternative anyway.
AMD's current range of CPUs can't get anywhere near intel core 2 and AMD are now dead in the water. Everyone knows that except the AMD fanboys.
if they're not intending to use them, why did the get them in the first place? Its like someone pointing a gun at your head but saying "I won't pull the triger, honest".
This is a modern-day equivalent of book-burning, of which the chinese are one of the earliest examples.
Following the advice of Li Si, Qin Shi Huang ordered all philosophy books and history books from states other than Qin--except copies in the imperial library for official uses--to be burned 213 BC. This is accompanied by the live burial of a large number of intellectuals, who did not comply with the state dogma (To burn the classics and to bury the scholars). (Plagiarised from wikipedia).
All through history you can always immediately tell the most evil governing bodies as they are all afraid of truth and tried to limit free speech. All the most self-serving power groups with the worst human rights records through history have tried and ultimately failed to kill free speech. Interestingly, that group also includes the Nazis and the christian and islamic churches.