Right on, right on. Unfortunately, its sequels didn't share its success, and I don't know of any later games that could claim a Myst as a major influence.
No menu on by default. No favorites on by default. The bookmark manager is bad.
I can see where those things would confuse a new user, but I thought it was quite clever to hide the menubar. I rarely use anything on the menubar, and the "Alt to show" functionality feels right. With IE6, I would smash all the toolbars into one, with only the File menu showing. Same for the Links bar--I like the placement of the star to access the bookmarks.
Overall I like the look and feel of IE7 better than FF2.0, but FF has the edge in functionality (certainly when you consider the Addons).
Case-sensitivity has got to be my biggest annoyance in Linux. The original motivation as I understand it was to save precious CPU cycles (since case-insensitive parsing takes twice or so the effort). The problem is, humans don't think case sensitive. Noone (as has been mentioned) would reasonably name any two things the same differing only in case, which is a pretty strong argument for getting rid of it all together. With case-insensitive filesystems, you still get the 'option' of naming things however you like, just not two things with the same spelling.
If the filesystem designer leaves it as an option on the filesystem, this option will inevitably get exercised and suddenly my software doesn't work.
This actually reminds me of my other big annoyance with Linux: too many Linux folk think people serve computers, when obviously (to anyone who ever gets out of the basement) the opposite is true.
One more problem we've had is that most of the employees think that documents in the wiki are owned by the creator of the document and not to be touched by them.
I had a similar experience when I created a wiki for a project (on a corporately maintained wiki site). Noone on the team had heard of a wiki, so I explained it as a sort of "designer's notebook", but with a corporate memory. I tried to emphasize that they shouldn't get hung up on the formal structure that traditional design docs require, and just dump what they know, linking as is useful. I updated it daily with whatever decisions were made for the component I was working on, with a side policy that if I ever had to look anything up (or anyone on the team asked me a question), it went in the wiki.
After almost a year, people were still asking me questions that I had referred to the wiki multiple times, with only one other person contributing anything to the site. To your point, I frequently got comments about spelling/grammar but nobody would update the page.
It was unfortunate that I was the only contributor (as wikis have a sort of ebay effect), but there was definitely a net gain on my inputs. I'm always looking up the same things it seems, and I often forget why I made some goofy decision.
The GIMP is a fabulous tool, but: I hate the floating tool windows--having to click around to find the tool window I need. This is not a complaint specific to the GIMP, Inkscape and XSANE have a similarly frustrating interface. I could live the floaty bits if they would just make all windows raise to top if you clicked on any part of the application.
I haven't spent a lot of time using it (since my project is just me a friend) but the Subversion + Trac looks pretty neat. Was pretty easy to setup and configure on Ubuntu.
Heh, Eclipse is actually a pretty mediocre product to be honest.
I realize you're a troll, but this comment I just don't understand. I've used Eclipse daily since 2.0, and I can say it gets usefully better with each milestone. I haven't used VS since college, so it might be the dog's bollocks, but VS's goodness has nothing to do with Eclipse (other than perhaps providing some competition).
Eclipse has vibrant development community, that it's open source makes plugin development easy and rewarding. I don't know what you're running on that makes it slow, but I've haven't experienced "flaky" since 2.0 (with the exception of external plugins).
If you'd like to try an great plugin (in alpha) that does make Eclipse flaky and slow, but can make you more productive (if you work on large products) check out Mylar.
I'll never understand the weirdo hating that goes on on this site....
I have never seen a casual user type anything (other than a save file name) in a file chooser. Even I, power user that I am, never use the address bar in Windows Explorer. Most of the functionality users such as yourself are missing, 95% of the population has no interest in.
As has been said earlier about "hidden" functionality, casual users won't use it, and experts can always find it.
I personally like the design philosophy behind Gnome (The Sensible Default) in general, and spatial browsing and the file dialog in particular, but I switched to Kubuntu over the weekend after Nautilus crashed for the zillionth time on me. I just couldn't take it anymore--the file browser is the fundamental component of the Desktop and having it freeze/crash every time something out of the ordinary happens with a remote share is just too much*. And it's slow. I like all the functionality it offers, with the previews and what not, but browsing a large media directory is an exercise in patience while the 2.4Ghz Celery processor wheezes and gasps to produce thumbnails.
So I switched. I can say without reservation, that on my machine KDE is fast. Konqueror is waaaay faster than Mozilla/Firefox/Epiphany and it doesn't seem to peg the cpu on plugin-filled pages (or when it does it doesn't seem to affect the rest of the desktop). Kontact/KMail/KOffice look much more integrated than Evolution/OO.org (I also found Evolution to be very slow). KDE also seems to follow Windows paradigms more closely, so I have fewer "support issues" from my wife (it's her machine).
That said, I much prefer Gnome's aesthetic. Honestly, why would anybody want to wade through menus and menus of configuration? A right-click on any app has:
That's just annoying. I also prefer Gnome's approach to menus, and it's religious commitment to reducing clutter. KDE's shiny icons I don't care for either, but all these complaints are things that can probably be configured away (Hah!).
Torvald's complaints are wrong, but his conclusion is right. KDE is fantastic.
Todd
PS I still use Gnome on my machine, I am a glutton for punishment.
* After Miss Naughty crashed 3 times while trying to delete the Firefox lock file (why does Mozilla still have this idiotic profile dialog?), I tried to log a bug using the bug buddy tool, but it required sendmail be configured, or save to disk. I swear I couldn't get the chooser to save it and gave up, very disgusted. Probably user error, but I was still disgusted.
I've been listening to this for 2 days, and I can say it's a great DJ. I fed it plenty of music (and voted on their suggestions), and it is pumping out a great variety of music I'd never heard of. It would be hard to replace John in the Morning on KEXP, but you should definitely try it before slamming their method.
As a rapidly aging hipster, I can tell you that teen grudges are worth the Mead spiral bound they are written on. I was an angry teen once, but I would gladly drive all the cell phone using under-20s from whichever movie theatre I happen to be sitting in.
Where are all these people that have $500C for a game system with no games?
It may be that the two games that are available are intriguing enough to last until more titles make it into production. It took me a lot longer to get through Halo than what it said on the box, and I'm still playing it now.
Can't argue with your comment about the hype, though. A Time magazine cover? I didn't think you could buy that kind of recognition.
you'll have to give me a more credible reason than that it has greater power to customise the key bindings than Emacs does
I won't argue that Emacs is featureful piece of software. I've edited my share of files with it (albeit only as a functional version of pico), but Eclipse and other GUI-based editing tools (eg JEdit) make it trivial to change your keybindings. Go to the function you want in the key prefs, hit the chord. No learning curve. Emacs probably has a similarly simple process but I'd rather spend my time reading Slashdot than emacs docs (I do recall spending some time in apropos for something...).
In any case, I was attacking Emacs default bindings to show how revolutionary my own key combinations are. The inverted T is best way to move around an editor, I just wish they were the worldwide defaults instead of Emacs' ctrl+f, ctrl+b, etc.
I never thought much of Emacs keybindings, as they're not ergonomically assigned, sort of according to English mnemonics. Vi gets really close, but thanks to power of Eclipse, I made my own keybindings superior to either of those. Using control+i,j,k,l (and shift+ctrl for select, shift+alt+ctrl for by-word select) I never take my hands off the home row, while at the same time avoiding the pre-cursor key weirdness of Vi's dual modes.
Whaaa! Whaaa! Just customize your settings if you really think you're not getting the opinions you need. Or if you really want the unjustly overlooked opinions, go ahead and browse at -1 (at which point you'll be coming across my posts, and spending your whole day on one article).
Right on, brother. It's a standing joke around here that noone would use Rational Unified Process if Rational's products were built using RUP. ClearCase browser in particular feels like it was implemented by different interns over the couple of summers. But then the ClearQuest UI is so goofy... it's hard say which Rational product is worse, they just all suck so bad.
Rational products aside, I can see the value of RUP to a client. On the projects on which I've used it, it successfully prevented any kind change from what was originally put down on paper. If I saw some small thing while using our application-in-development that could be improved, I would do nothing because of the overhead required to implement it. On the positive side, I wasn't writing in any new bugs. I agree with many of the other posters, however, who suggest a strict unit testing policy is worth 90% of RUP.
The crazy thing is, you can get a Tivo for $50 + $250 lifetime subscription. I like to tinker (why I use Linux), but it's nice to have TV where the only required interface is a remote.
Only thing missing is a useable UI for the Gimp. I hate the thing.
I can sympathize. Actually, I think I could live the Gimp if they just raise all of the child windows when you click on any part of the application. I know I'm using it incorrectly, but I'm always finding myself fishing around for the Layers dialog, or some such.
I suspect they _do_ know better than you how _I_ want my computer to function. Gnome's commitment to the "logical default" is it's greatest strength. Twiddling your desktop to nth degree may be fun, but it's hardly productive.
Further, there are tons of alternative desktops and window managers out there; use them. I've never understood the rabid hating that goes on here on Slashdot, and the promotion of same with "insightful" ratings.
Gnome has lots of room for improvement (mostly in making Nautilus faster and more stable), but it's a damn nice environment to get work done in.
Now get back to your E17 and twiddle the shade color of the blinking fade thing.
I was discussing autopackage with a friend, after being blown away by the slickest interface in Linux. Basically, it came down to:
- (in debian-based at least) apt-get covers the popular programs
- the gap is in the small compile-to-use tarball progs
What's needed is not autopackage, but a one-click installer into Synaptic, and make construction of the installer part of the GNU toolchain (or whatever it is that creates the make install).
Xbox 360s and PS3s should not try to be all things to all people. They should do games very well, and leave the rest of the "convergence" crap to the computers.
Because, simply, I spend enough time in front of the computer as it is. A mouse and keyboard might be the badassedest setup for playing your hardcore FPS, but it's also isolating (and as I said, I just spent 8 hours in front of my terminal). My favorite aspect of console gaming is that the whole "family" can be in the same room, bashing each others' brains out.
And as for the PC functions, I have XBMC running on my XBox v1, and can say playing media by way of the TV and stereo is a much more pleasurable experience than staring at a terminal (that I just spent 8 hours in front of).
Slashdot Mirror
Right on, right on. Let the distribution provide support, just make the hardware fully compatible.
Right on, right on. Unfortunately, its sequels didn't share its success, and I don't know of any later games that could claim a Myst as a major influence.
I can see where those things would confuse a new user, but I thought it was quite clever to hide the menubar. I rarely use anything on the menubar, and the "Alt to show" functionality feels right. With IE6, I would smash all the toolbars into one, with only the File menu showing. Same for the Links bar--I like the placement of the star to access the bookmarks.
Overall I like the look and feel of IE7 better than FF2.0, but FF has the edge in functionality (certainly when you consider the Addons).
If the filesystem designer leaves it as an option on the filesystem, this option will inevitably get exercised and suddenly my software doesn't work.
This actually reminds me of my other big annoyance with Linux: too many Linux folk think people serve computers, when obviously (to anyone who ever gets out of the basement) the opposite is true.
I had a similar experience when I created a wiki for a project (on a corporately maintained wiki site). Noone on the team had heard of a wiki, so I explained it as a sort of "designer's notebook", but with a corporate memory. I tried to emphasize that they shouldn't get hung up on the formal structure that traditional design docs require, and just dump what they know, linking as is useful. I updated it daily with whatever decisions were made for the component I was working on, with a side policy that if I ever had to look anything up (or anyone on the team asked me a question), it went in the wiki.
After almost a year, people were still asking me questions that I had referred to the wiki multiple times, with only one other person contributing anything to the site. To your point, I frequently got comments about spelling/grammar but nobody would update the page.
It was unfortunate that I was the only contributor (as wikis have a sort of ebay effect), but there was definitely a net gain on my inputs. I'm always looking up the same things it seems, and I often forget why I made some goofy decision.
The GIMP is a fabulous tool, but: I hate the floating tool windows--having to click around to find the tool window I need. This is not a complaint specific to the GIMP, Inkscape and XSANE have a similarly frustrating interface. I could live the floaty bits if they would just make all windows raise to top if you clicked on any part of the application.
I haven't spent a lot of time using it (since my project is just me a friend) but the Subversion + Trac looks pretty neat. Was pretty easy to setup and configure on Ubuntu.
I realize you're a troll, but this comment I just don't understand. I've used Eclipse daily since 2.0, and I can say it gets usefully better with each milestone. I haven't used VS since college, so it might be the dog's bollocks, but VS's goodness has nothing to do with Eclipse (other than perhaps providing some competition).
Eclipse has vibrant development community, that it's open source makes plugin development easy and rewarding. I don't know what you're running on that makes it slow, but I've haven't experienced "flaky" since 2.0 (with the exception of external plugins).
If you'd like to try an great plugin (in alpha) that does make Eclipse flaky and slow, but can make you more productive (if you work on large products) check out Mylar.
I'll never understand the weirdo hating that goes on on this site....
I have never seen a casual user type anything (other than a save file name) in a file chooser. Even I, power user that I am, never use the address bar in Windows Explorer. Most of the functionality users such as yourself are missing, 95% of the population has no interest in.
As has been said earlier about "hidden" functionality, casual users won't use it, and experts can always find it.
I personally like the design philosophy behind Gnome (The Sensible Default) in general, and spatial browsing and the file dialog in particular, but I switched to Kubuntu over the weekend after Nautilus crashed for the zillionth time on me. I just couldn't take it anymore--the file browser is the fundamental component of the Desktop and having it freeze/crash every time something out of the ordinary happens with a remote share is just too much*. And it's slow. I like all the functionality it offers, with the previews and what not, but browsing a large media directory is an exercise in patience while the 2.4Ghz Celery processor wheezes and gasps to produce thumbnails.
So I switched. I can say without reservation, that on my machine KDE is fast. Konqueror is waaaay faster than Mozilla/Firefox/Epiphany and it doesn't seem to peg the cpu on plugin-filled pages (or when it does it doesn't seem to affect the rest of the desktop). Kontact/KMail/KOffice look much more integrated than Evolution/OO.org (I also found Evolution to be very slow). KDE also seems to follow Windows paradigms more closely, so I have fewer "support issues" from my wife (it's her machine).
That said, I much prefer Gnome's aesthetic. Honestly, why would anybody want to wade through menus and menus of configuration? A right-click on any app has:
Configure Part-of-app...
Configure App...
Configure Window-bits-of-app...
Configure Panel...
Configure KDE...
That's just annoying. I also prefer Gnome's approach to menus, and it's religious commitment to reducing clutter. KDE's shiny icons I don't care for either, but all these complaints are things that can probably be configured away (Hah!).
Torvald's complaints are wrong, but his conclusion is right. KDE is fantastic.
Todd
PS I still use Gnome on my machine, I am a glutton for punishment.
* After Miss Naughty crashed 3 times while trying to delete the Firefox lock file (why does Mozilla still have this idiotic profile dialog?), I tried to log a bug using the bug buddy tool, but it required sendmail be configured, or save to disk. I swear I couldn't get the chooser to save it and gave up, very disgusted. Probably user error, but I was still disgusted.
I've been listening to this for 2 days, and I can say it's a great DJ. I fed it plenty of music (and voted on their suggestions), and it is pumping out a great variety of music I'd never heard of. It would be hard to replace John in the Morning on KEXP, but you should definitely try it before slamming their method.
As a rapidly aging hipster, I can tell you that teen grudges are worth the Mead spiral bound they are written on. I was an angry teen once, but I would gladly drive all the cell phone using under-20s from whichever movie theatre I happen to be sitting in.
It may be that the two games that are available are intriguing enough to last until more titles make it into production. It took me a lot longer to get through Halo than what it said on the box, and I'm still playing it now.
Can't argue with your comment about the hype, though. A Time magazine cover? I didn't think you could buy that kind of recognition.
I think (functional programmers correct me) OO code is not "mathematically provable" because of state (private) variables.
I won't argue that Emacs is featureful piece of software. I've edited my share of files with it (albeit only as a functional version of pico), but Eclipse and other GUI-based editing tools (eg JEdit) make it trivial to change your keybindings. Go to the function you want in the key prefs, hit the chord. No learning curve. Emacs probably has a similarly simple process but I'd rather spend my time reading Slashdot than emacs docs (I do recall spending some time in apropos for something...).
In any case, I was attacking Emacs default bindings to show how revolutionary my own key combinations are. The inverted T is best way to move around an editor, I just wish they were the worldwide defaults instead of Emacs' ctrl+f, ctrl+b, etc.
I never thought much of Emacs keybindings, as they're not ergonomically assigned, sort of according to English mnemonics. Vi gets really close, but thanks to power of Eclipse, I made my own keybindings superior to either of those. Using control+i,j,k,l (and shift+ctrl for select, shift+alt+ctrl for by-word select) I never take my hands off the home row, while at the same time avoiding the pre-cursor key weirdness of Vi's dual modes.
Try it once, you'll love it forever.
I'd also add that the pool of Java developers is pretty substantial, making it easier to staff a project than say PHP or Ruby.
Whaaa! Whaaa! Just customize your settings if you really think you're not getting the opinions you need. Or if you really want the unjustly overlooked opinions, go ahead and browse at -1 (at which point you'll be coming across my posts, and spending your whole day on one article).
No need to thank me for the information.
You can buy the Tivo for $50 + $250 for a lifetime subscription. Seems like a reasonable price for an entertainment computer.
Right on, brother. It's a standing joke around here that noone would use Rational Unified Process if Rational's products were built using RUP. ClearCase browser in particular feels like it was implemented by different interns over the couple of summers. But then the ClearQuest UI is so goofy... it's hard say which Rational product is worse, they just all suck so bad. Rational products aside, I can see the value of RUP to a client. On the projects on which I've used it, it successfully prevented any kind change from what was originally put down on paper. If I saw some small thing while using our application-in-development that could be improved, I would do nothing because of the overhead required to implement it. On the positive side, I wasn't writing in any new bugs. I agree with many of the other posters, however, who suggest a strict unit testing policy is worth 90% of RUP.
The crazy thing is, you can get a Tivo for $50 + $250 lifetime subscription. I like to tinker (why I use Linux), but it's nice to have TV where the only required interface is a remote.
I can sympathize. Actually, I think I could live the Gimp if they just raise all of the child windows when you click on any part of the application. I know I'm using it incorrectly, but I'm always finding myself fishing around for the Layers dialog, or some such.
I suspect they _do_ know better than you how _I_ want my computer to function. Gnome's commitment to the "logical default" is it's greatest strength. Twiddling your desktop to nth degree may be fun, but it's hardly productive.
Further, there are tons of alternative desktops and window managers out there; use them. I've never understood the rabid hating that goes on here on Slashdot, and the promotion of same with "insightful" ratings.
Gnome has lots of room for improvement (mostly in making Nautilus faster and more stable), but it's a damn nice environment to get work done in.
Now get back to your E17 and twiddle the shade color of the blinking fade thing.
- (in debian-based at least) apt-get covers the popular programs
- the gap is in the small compile-to-use tarball progs
What's needed is not autopackage, but a one-click installer into Synaptic, and make construction of the installer part of the GNU toolchain (or whatever it is that creates the make install).
Because, simply, I spend enough time in front of the computer as it is. A mouse and keyboard might be the badassedest setup for playing your hardcore FPS, but it's also isolating (and as I said, I just spent 8 hours in front of my terminal). My favorite aspect of console gaming is that the whole "family" can be in the same room, bashing each others' brains out.
And as for the PC functions, I have XBMC running on my XBox v1, and can say playing media by way of the TV and stereo is a much more pleasurable experience than staring at a terminal (that I just spent 8 hours in front of).