Split-screen multiplayer was a hack to enabled multiplayer gaming before consoles were networked, sure some people actually liked it but most people are glad it's gone.
The original PlayStation had a link cable that allowed two consoles to be connected, and software that used it, before the N64 was even released. Very few people used it and the number of games supporting it was always low, and Sony removed it from later units in order to bring down the price of the console.
Older PS2 models could link up over Firewire, but this was also removed in later units for the same reasons.
My point is that split screen multiplayer flourished because networked multiplayer on consoles was impractical, not because it didn't exist. Today it's more practical, but it still doesn't have the same pick-up-and-play quality as many split-screen games.
Old people now might be afraid of this kind of thing. It's the old people fifty years in the future who have been flying all their lives and don't see why they should stop who will be the problem.
There wouldn't have been a computer on every desk in the 1970s. I think it's more down to the fact that there's a lot less paper being shuffled in your average 2010 office than there was back then, which would take up a lot of desk space.
Personally, I would manage perfectly well with a desk half the size of what I have. I don't manage the extra space well; it just tends to accumulate clutter.
I'm torn. On the one hand, I remember when 512 kb/s down and 256 kb/s up was considered to be 'broadband', and seemed pretty damn fast. The idea that a connection can be broadband one day, and not broadband the next, because a bureaucrat somewhere changed a definition seems absurd to me.
On the other hand, coming up with a new name for each bump in speed also seems absurd to me. (I can't wait until super-duper-even-broader-band internet comes to my area!)
You're using the word 'would' a lot, as if people weren't already playing games on their smartphones. The largest single category in the iOS app store is the gaming section. I think we're past the point where we're asking, do people want to play games on their smartphones? Yes. Yes they do.
A keyboard and mouse will always be better than a controller for FPS games, and a steering wheel will always be better for racing games, yes, we know. And light gun games will always work better with a bloody light gun.
No console designer in their right mind would make any of these the default controller for their console, because they are all poor all-rounder controllers compared to the ones that come bundled with consoles right now.
Consoles have had USB ports since the PS2, and you can use a keyboard and mouse with them if you want. The Dreamcast had keyboard and mouse accessories that IIRC worked with the DC version of Quake 3. The original PlayStation even had a mouse for Command and Conquer. Nobody used or uses them, because using a keyboard and mouse in your living room is a pain in the arse.
I think the extent to which the syntax is a barrier to entry for new developers is exaggerated. Square brackets denote method calls - easy. It might take a wee while before typing out method declarations in the right order is second nature, but I think that's acceptable because you gain (forced) named parameters.
I like the fact that the syntax is different, because the chances of getting caught out are reduced. There are already too many languages with similar but subtly different syntaxes out there.
Syntax and implementation. I willingly go the extra mile to avoid using Obj-C anywhere except for UI code.
Isn't syntax just a personal preference? I actually quite like ObjC's syntax. What don't you like about it?
Not in my experience, eg: All the documentation presumes the developer is using IB when no serious developer I know will touch it.
As long as you understand what Interface Builder is doing under the bonnet/hood, then it's really not that hard. And is there any particular reason why a serious developer wouldn't touch IB? I find it to be quite a useful tool, much better than the equivalent in Qt Creator.
XCode is such utter shit that it's not funny.
Agreed. Xcode 4 is available as a developer preview and I'm hoping that it solves a lot of the issues I have with the current version, but I haven't had a chance to play with it properly yet.
I didn't mind it when developers strived for photorealism, while it was still nowhere near achievable. I think that the original Metal Gear Solid looks great, for example, but I'm not such a big fan of the later games, because they lost the stylistic element that the original had as a consequence of the PlayStation not being able to deliver all that much.
When did asking a question cease to be a valid method of finding things out?
I mean, it's great that you can find information like this from Google or Wikipedia, but it can be a risky strategy, and you might end up following a howto that results in a non-optimal implementation, or lacks crucial information, or doesn't adequately detail the pitfalls of a particular method. Or maybe you're like me, and sometimes you just can't think of the right search terms to use.
I would have thought that Slashdot would be a good place to come for someone looking to learn from others' knowledge and experience, and perhaps to find out the pros and cons of different ways of solving the problem. I've got this far down the page and I'm sad to say that this hasn't been the case.
I'm typing this on a tram from a netbook tethered to my Android phone. How good is your tethering app?
It does the job. When my office's broadband connection went down a few weeks, tethered my iPhone and was back up and running in a few minutes. Fortunately there's a 3G Vodafone mast right outside the building.
Or Google for still not offering the service outside the US?
I thought the only reason that Google Voice was economical in the US was because the cost of a call there is billed to both caller and receiver, to cover the cost of the usage of their respective networks.
In the UK, for example, the caller pays 100% of the cost of the call, and there's a regulatory framework in place where the caller's network pays the receiver's network to receive the call.
My understanding of the way GV works is that it calls both participants and then connects them. In the US this is fine, because they both pay for receiving the calls. In the UK, Google would bear the entire cost of both calls, which means they wouldn't be able to offer it as a free service.
You act like people download directly to their phone and don't store their music anywhere else. I think you are far more "niche" if you do this than if you want quality audio like I do.
I store my music on an external hard drive, because there isn't space for it on my laptop's drive. I would much rather have it on my laptop's internal drive, and yeah, maybe I should upgrade.
Also, it's pretty easy to upgrade a laptop hard drive, and 1TB goes for about $120.
That depends on the laptop, doesn't it? Some are relatively accessible, some aren't. And that only covers the physical act of removing the old one and replacing it with a new one. There's also the requirement in most cases to copy the data across. That's something you or I could do, but not the average user.
And of course, if you're a SSD user, 1TB is going to be prohibitively expensive for a long time to come, but that's also a pretty small niche.
So, you really do only store music on your phone? No computer of any kind? But, based the on average track size in my library, it would take about 50GB to store those music files losslessly.
I like being able to store all my music on my phone, so that I don't have to think about what to take with me when I leave the house. I thought that was the whole point of the 'iPod revolution'. Maybe I'm alone in this though.
<sarcasm>there are now 3 or 4 programs that allow you transcode files from one audio format to another and store those files on a portable device (like a phone), with very little effort.</sarcasm>
Very little effort indeed (I believe iTunes even has this option), but at the expense of increased sync time, and this gets back to the crux of my argument. For the vast majority of people, there is little advantage to CD quality audio, because they're not going to notice the difference. They will notice the disadvantages, such as increased download time, increased hard disc usage and/or increased sync time.
That means there is little market pressure compelling music stores to switch their catalogues wholesale to CD quality, and so the people like yourself who do desire this are a niche.
I don't understand your numbers. A 4 minute song at 256 kb/s weighs in at less than 10 MB, so you should be able to comfortably transfer one of those in less than a second. If it takes 5 seconds to transcode that file, that's a five-fold increase in total transfer time.
No, but the average person doesn't have a 1 TB hard drive in their phone or laptop either.
My 32 GB phone has 2,234 tracks on it (most of them at 256 kb/s IIRC), which isn't a huge amount, but they have to coexist with everything else that's stored there. If they were CD quality, they wouldn't fit, simple as that.
My point is that the value proposition of offering CD quality audio is, for the majority of people, quite low. Aside from the greater storage and bandwidth requirements, a lot of people simply won't be able to tell the difference, whether due to hearing, equipment (cheap headphones, etc.) or background noise. So I don't think the added expense and complication of providing CD quality audio is justified for the size of the niche that it caters for, unless that niche is prepared to accept higher prices.
But, really, with terabyte drives selling for $50, why do we need lossy compression on our music?
That's fine for desktop PCs, where you can just whack in an extra 3.5" hard drive and dedicate it to your music collection. It's not so practical for laptops, because requiring an external drive to be hooked up to access your music collection sacrifices portability.
Neither is it practical for phones and portable MP3 players. You could automatically transcode when the device is synced, but that's going to drive up the time it takes to sync dramatically. Or you could offer two versions of the same file for download, but you're driving up your bandwidth requirements and the customer's storage requirements even further.
I actually think that most people are happy with the bitrates that are available now, and wouldn't welcome increased file size, download time and/or sync time. The fact that you disagree (and the fact that you're using finely-tuned command line options to LAME) puts you in the audiophile niche, and as with any niche market prices are going to be higher.
If you really care about audio quality, buy vinyl and contribute to its resurgence. There's no such thing as a lossless digital format.
Slashdot Mirror
Follow suit? O2's standard packages have come with 500 MB of data for some time now.
The original PlayStation had a link cable that allowed two consoles to be connected, and software that used it, before the N64 was even released. Very few people used it and the number of games supporting it was always low, and Sony removed it from later units in order to bring down the price of the console.
Older PS2 models could link up over Firewire, but this was also removed in later units for the same reasons.
My point is that split screen multiplayer flourished because networked multiplayer on consoles was impractical, not because it didn't exist. Today it's more practical, but it still doesn't have the same pick-up-and-play quality as many split-screen games.
Hadrian's Firewall?
Old people now might be afraid of this kind of thing. It's the old people fifty years in the future who have been flying all their lives and don't see why they should stop who will be the problem.
There wouldn't have been a computer on every desk in the 1970s. I think it's more down to the fact that there's a lot less paper being shuffled in your average 2010 office than there was back then, which would take up a lot of desk space.
Personally, I would manage perfectly well with a desk half the size of what I have. I don't manage the extra space well; it just tends to accumulate clutter.
Heh, right now I have yo mamma's ass band. I.e. cheap and readily available.
I'm torn. On the one hand, I remember when 512 kb/s down and 256 kb/s up was considered to be 'broadband', and seemed pretty damn fast. The idea that a connection can be broadband one day, and not broadband the next, because a bureaucrat somewhere changed a definition seems absurd to me.
On the other hand, coming up with a new name for each bump in speed also seems absurd to me. (I can't wait until super-duper-even-broader-band internet comes to my area!)
You're using the word 'would' a lot, as if people weren't already playing games on their smartphones. The largest single category in the iOS app store is the gaming section. I think we're past the point where we're asking, do people want to play games on their smartphones? Yes. Yes they do.
A keyboard and mouse will always be better than a controller for FPS games, and a steering wheel will always be better for racing games, yes, we know. And light gun games will always work better with a bloody light gun.
No console designer in their right mind would make any of these the default controller for their console, because they are all poor all-rounder controllers compared to the ones that come bundled with consoles right now.
Consoles have had USB ports since the PS2, and you can use a keyboard and mouse with them if you want. The Dreamcast had keyboard and mouse accessories that IIRC worked with the DC version of Quake 3. The original PlayStation even had a mouse for Command and Conquer. Nobody used or uses them, because using a keyboard and mouse in your living room is a pain in the arse.
Wii Sports Resort, which came bundled with more recent consoles and uses the MotionPlus accessory, is much better in this regard.
I think the extent to which the syntax is a barrier to entry for new developers is exaggerated. Square brackets denote method calls - easy. It might take a wee while before typing out method declarations in the right order is second nature, but I think that's acceptable because you gain (forced) named parameters.
I like the fact that the syntax is different, because the chances of getting caught out are reduced. There are already too many languages with similar but subtly different syntaxes out there.
Isn't syntax just a personal preference? I actually quite like ObjC's syntax. What don't you like about it?
As long as you understand what Interface Builder is doing under the bonnet/hood, then it's really not that hard. And is there any particular reason why a serious developer wouldn't touch IB? I find it to be quite a useful tool, much better than the equivalent in Qt Creator.
Agreed. Xcode 4 is available as a developer preview and I'm hoping that it solves a lot of the issues I have with the current version, but I haven't had a chance to play with it properly yet.
I didn't mind it when developers strived for photorealism, while it was still nowhere near achievable. I think that the original Metal Gear Solid looks great, for example, but I'm not such a big fan of the later games, because they lost the stylistic element that the original had as a consequence of the PlayStation not being able to deliver all that much.
As long as you don't swing too hard. You wouldn't look very threatening holding a cork.
When did asking a question cease to be a valid method of finding things out?
I mean, it's great that you can find information like this from Google or Wikipedia, but it can be a risky strategy, and you might end up following a howto that results in a non-optimal implementation, or lacks crucial information, or doesn't adequately detail the pitfalls of a particular method. Or maybe you're like me, and sometimes you just can't think of the right search terms to use.
I would have thought that Slashdot would be a good place to come for someone looking to learn from others' knowledge and experience, and perhaps to find out the pros and cons of different ways of solving the problem. I've got this far down the page and I'm sad to say that this hasn't been the case.
It does the job. When my office's broadband connection went down a few weeks, tethered my iPhone and was back up and running in a few minutes. Fortunately there's a 3G Vodafone mast right outside the building.
Mine too (a debit card in my case), although you'll probably find that it's a contactless smart card, not RFID.
I would get rid of it entirely, but it's my ATM card as well so I kinda need it.
I'm thinking about moving to another bank. Bank of Scotland have done nothing but piss me off recently.
I'd be surprised if this is being produced at any significant volume, so it will cost more because it can't take advantage of the economies of scale.
Can't it do both? I thought the entire point of the web app, and now the iPhone app, was to facilitate this.
I thought the only reason that Google Voice was economical in the US was because the cost of a call there is billed to both caller and receiver, to cover the cost of the usage of their respective networks.
In the UK, for example, the caller pays 100% of the cost of the call, and there's a regulatory framework in place where the caller's network pays the receiver's network to receive the call.
My understanding of the way GV works is that it calls both participants and then connects them. In the US this is fine, because they both pay for receiving the calls. In the UK, Google would bear the entire cost of both calls, which means they wouldn't be able to offer it as a free service.
I store my music on an external hard drive, because there isn't space for it on my laptop's drive. I would much rather have it on my laptop's internal drive, and yeah, maybe I should upgrade.
That depends on the laptop, doesn't it? Some are relatively accessible, some aren't. And that only covers the physical act of removing the old one and replacing it with a new one. There's also the requirement in most cases to copy the data across. That's something you or I could do, but not the average user.
And of course, if you're a SSD user, 1TB is going to be prohibitively expensive for a long time to come, but that's also a pretty small niche.
I like being able to store all my music on my phone, so that I don't have to think about what to take with me when I leave the house. I thought that was the whole point of the 'iPod revolution'. Maybe I'm alone in this though.
Very little effort indeed (I believe iTunes even has this option), but at the expense of increased sync time, and this gets back to the crux of my argument. For the vast majority of people, there is little advantage to CD quality audio, because they're not going to notice the difference. They will notice the disadvantages, such as increased download time, increased hard disc usage and/or increased sync time.
That means there is little market pressure compelling music stores to switch their catalogues wholesale to CD quality, and so the people like yourself who do desire this are a niche.
I don't understand your numbers. A 4 minute song at 256 kb/s weighs in at less than 10 MB, so you should be able to comfortably transfer one of those in less than a second. If it takes 5 seconds to transcode that file, that's a five-fold increase in total transfer time.
No, but the average person doesn't have a 1 TB hard drive in their phone or laptop either.
My 32 GB phone has 2,234 tracks on it (most of them at 256 kb/s IIRC), which isn't a huge amount, but they have to coexist with everything else that's stored there. If they were CD quality, they wouldn't fit, simple as that.
My point is that the value proposition of offering CD quality audio is, for the majority of people, quite low. Aside from the greater storage and bandwidth requirements, a lot of people simply won't be able to tell the difference, whether due to hearing, equipment (cheap headphones, etc.) or background noise. So I don't think the added expense and complication of providing CD quality audio is justified for the size of the niche that it caters for, unless that niche is prepared to accept higher prices.
That's fine for desktop PCs, where you can just whack in an extra 3.5" hard drive and dedicate it to your music collection. It's not so practical for laptops, because requiring an external drive to be hooked up to access your music collection sacrifices portability.
Neither is it practical for phones and portable MP3 players. You could automatically transcode when the device is synced, but that's going to drive up the time it takes to sync dramatically. Or you could offer two versions of the same file for download, but you're driving up your bandwidth requirements and the customer's storage requirements even further.
I actually think that most people are happy with the bitrates that are available now, and wouldn't welcome increased file size, download time and/or sync time. The fact that you disagree (and the fact that you're using finely-tuned command line options to LAME) puts you in the audiophile niche, and as with any niche market prices are going to be higher.
If you really care about audio quality, buy vinyl and contribute to its resurgence. There's no such thing as a lossless digital format.
It should just work in all regions, as far as I know.