foreach (@list) {
next if $something;
last unless $whatever; ....
}
etc.
The language is just filled with such things that it immediately made me feel at ease programming it. For me (not a programmer by education), Perl is definitely as natural as it gets for a programming languages.
Obviously, it is related to the fact that Larry Wall originally wasn't a programmer but a linguist.
My favorite quote of him seems to apply to most other programming languages (at least the ones I have seen):
"In trying to make programming predictable, computer scientists have mostly succeeded in making it boring"
-- Larry Wall, interview in The Perl Journal, vol. 1 issue 1.
My daughter wants lights in her Barbie house (seriously!), and I thought it should probably be easy with these newer bright LEDs and a battery, but I really know nothing about this.
Wouldn't have thougt of asking/. about that, but since the topic came up...
Anyway, I'd rather find the solution than send my daughter asking that guy for advice...:-)
Can I directly connect these to a battery, or do I need some circuit in-between?
Which sort of LED is it that I want? I mean, how do I recognise and select the right type in a catalogue? Or what more specific keyword do I add to "LED" to find relevant information on Google?
HTML and CSS is mainly for screen viewing. Word processing is generally for print.
CSS has all or most of what is needed to use it for print, but that's not the point.
Word processing is generally for saying things with written words. Whether readers read a print out or read it on screen should only be a detail in the last "publishing" stage, and not something central to the word processing program. That concept of starting off media-agnostic is in HTML/CSS, waiting to be used.
What's so bad about being a geek?
Nothing. I love my geekiness. But that's not the point either.
For the non-geeks, I need a word processor which I could recommend them.
It would require half an hour or an hour training (10 minutes: - for titles and subtitles, press here; for bulleted lists, here. How you set the font to Arial? Don't loose your precious time with such details. If you really want to, it's buried in that hard to reach sub-menu, and will apply to all paragraphs with the same style. What is a style? 50 minutes explaining (Real) word processors. If they get it, they will love it. If they don't get it, they will stay away from the font sub-menu.)
Now, they can write a clever 50 page report with it, or type-away on a boring transcript or translation, and produce a word processor document, in which I don't have to correct all manual page breaks when I change the font before publishing, etc.
I could go on for hours, ranting about the need for a real and simple word processor, and the need to educate users about it not being a typewriter with a kitchen sink.
the computer "literacy" classes in those schools is training in Microsoft Office. [...] They're not teaching them the concepts behind a modern word processor, they're training them how to click buttons in Word.
The problem is that there is no modern word processor which could be used to teach the concepts that should be behind them. Never was any concept behind Word, other than "add the most features you can to this typewriter".
The modern ones aren't word processors. The word processors aren't modern. All we have is monstruous Word and would-be clones.
Still waiting for the simple and real word processor. I wish it would use plain HTML and CSS, but in an interface designed for people having something to say in a structured way, not for graphics designers turned web-designers, or for computer geeks.
Usually, the hard part is opening the laptop to get to the drive. There are many screws, but not all need to be unscrewed. Many parts are simply clipped together. I have opened several noteboks, and usually found out only too late that it would have been much easier if I had known how to open it.
First, try to search the web for a service manual which details how to get to the drive on your specific model. If you find clear instructions, that will be of great help.
For the drive thickness issue, as others have said, the recent thinner drives will work to replace older thicker drives, so you shouldn't have a problem.
If the notebook is old, the BIOS may not support the full capacity of your new drive. Not a big deal: you would just loose a few Gigabytes, but the drive will work perfectly with the lower capacity.
- searches for a "Delivered-To: some_mailbox" header.
- if not found: adds it and delivers the mail
- if found: drops the mail, probably also writing something in the logs.
Since any forwarding is done after delivery, it won't work.
Will have to find something else to test their bandwidth. If you come up with something that may really work, maybe you could send them a job application? They give Gmail invites to all applicants...
During the internet hype in the nineties, Sun and Microsoft got in a fight about which remote file
system API was going to make it. Sun was promoting NFS, Microsoft was promoting SMB.
In order to get SMB supported by other vendors, Microsoft did a couple of things:
They renamed SMB to CIFS. CIFS stands for "Common Internet File System". This name
change was just for marketing purposes, there is no real technical dierence between the two
Several proposed standards were published explaining the syntax of the protocol. They have
all expired by now.
Samba even got donations from Microsoft during this period, including funding for trips to conferences
and MSDN donations. Microsoft developers were encouraged to work with Samba developers
to get a working implementation of a SMB server and client on Unix.
Microsoft won the war. CIFS became the standard (for LANs, at least). After this, they lost
interest in having other vendors support CIFS. Rather, they tried to get everybody to use their
products.
Citing "ethics" in defense of hollywood record companies
I was not defending big hollywood record companies. Just noting that allofmp3.com is not the answer either. Artists are entitled to some revenue (if they get nothing, I don't consider it "ethical"), and any solution has to take this into account somehow.
That said, no one forced those artists to sign to those labels.
Many artists have no sense for business at all (and some others do, I know). I recently saw a documentary about Jimmy Hendrix, who apparently signed anything presented to him without reading it. Not very smart of him, sure. But he was a great musician.
Just dismissing the problem of getting some revenue to the artist with "It's simply not my problem that they are unable to obtain my money" is arrogant and stupid.
- I'd also like to see the artists being paid more than 10%...
Yes, a good share to the artists is important. And possible in a system where distribution costs may be low.
Note also that "artists" are not only the visible (or "audiblde") performing artists, but also people like producers (what would the early Michael Jackson music have been without Quincy Jones? Ever heard of Phil Spector? to name a few of the most well-known), sound technicians, etc.
As for the rest of the poll, here it goes:
- Should it have OGG and FLAC tracks, as well as MP3?
Yes, and with high bitrates available.
- Would you rather pay per-song or per-month?
Per song.
- Would you want the option to purchase hard-copy as well (like the actual album, or even band merchandise)?
Yes
- Should the song samples be 30 second downloads or full-song streams fed on-demand?
Full-length streams (can be very low quality)
- Is a radio station important for an online music store?
Not for me.
And last but not least, the question which was not asked:
- Should the songs have DRM?
NO. If I buy a song, I do whatever I want with it, and can copy it to all my MP3 players and home computers, whatever OS they are running, and don't have to worry about some arbitrary restrictions.
Seriously though, it's 2004 and you don't know a single person who uses any Instant Messenger client whatsoever?
Well, yes. Seriously. Maybe it's because it seems to have started on services like AOL or MSN, on which I never knew anybody (I used to have a CompuServe address, but that was more than 10 years ago). Maybe it's a generation thing (I'm 40). For synchronous communication, the phone seems more practical. For asynchronous, which I tend to prefer, there's email. I sort of never quite saw the point in IM, except maybe for some very special circumstances, of which I can't imagine an example right now.
Anyway, I managed to test Gaim, so if some day I feel it could be useful, it's there.
That's the problem with being a stupid technophile: I always prefer exploring some technology which I don't need, rather than doing something useful like earning money with the technology I already know...
That SafetyBot is funny. It reminded me of the pre-Windows days, and telnet or Dos menu interfaces. And reminded me of Compuserve (not surprisingly since they are the same company now) in the late eighties, and it's weird universe.
Slashdot Mirror
BUT the most important thisis tha becasue the code is sort
:-)
I can understand that you prefer the code to be short and that you find longer code you wrote difficult to read...
Things like "unless":or the freedom to put an if (or an unless) at the end of a statement:or the context-sensitive return types:or stuff like:etc.
The language is just filled with such things that it immediately made me feel at ease programming it. For me (not a programmer by education), Perl is definitely as natural as it gets for a programming languages.
Obviously, it is related to the fact that Larry Wall originally wasn't a programmer but a linguist.
My favorite quote of him seems to apply to most other programming languages (at least the ones I have seen):
My daughter wants lights in her Barbie house (seriously!), and I thought it should probably be easy with these newer bright LEDs and a battery, but I really know nothing about this.
/. about that, but since the topic came up...
:-)
Wouldn't have thougt of asking
Anyway, I'd rather find the solution than send my daughter asking that guy for advice...
Can I directly connect these to a battery, or do I need some circuit in-between?
Which sort of LED is it that I want? I mean, how do I recognise and select the right type in a catalogue? Or what more specific keyword do I add to "LED" to find relevant information on Google?
HTML and CSS is mainly for screen viewing. Word processing is generally for print.
CSS has all or most of what is needed to use it for print, but that's not the point.
Word processing is generally for saying things with written words. Whether readers read a print out or read it on screen should only be a detail in the last "publishing" stage, and not something central to the word processing program. That concept of starting off media-agnostic is in HTML/CSS, waiting to be used.
What's so bad about being a geek?
Nothing. I love my geekiness. But that's not the point either.
For the non-geeks, I need a word processor which I could recommend them.
It would require half an hour or an hour training (10 minutes: - for titles and subtitles, press here; for bulleted lists, here. How you set the font to Arial? Don't loose your precious time with such details. If you really want to, it's buried in that hard to reach sub-menu, and will apply to all paragraphs with the same style. What is a style? 50 minutes explaining (Real) word processors. If they get it, they will love it. If they don't get it, they will stay away from the font sub-menu.)
Now, they can write a clever 50 page report with it, or type-away on a boring transcript or translation, and produce a word processor document, in which I don't have to correct all manual page breaks when I change the font before publishing, etc.
I could go on for hours, ranting about the need for a real and simple word processor, and the need to educate users about it not being a typewriter with a kitchen sink.
the computer "literacy" classes in those schools is training in Microsoft Office. [...] They're not teaching them the concepts behind a modern word processor, they're training them how to click buttons in Word.
The problem is that there is no modern word processor which could be used to teach the concepts that should be behind them. Never was any concept behind Word, other than "add the most features you can to this typewriter".
The modern ones aren't word processors. The word processors aren't modern. All we have is monstruous Word and would-be clones.
Still waiting for the simple and real word processor. I wish it would use plain HTML and CSS, but in an interface designed for people having something to say in a structured way, not for graphics designers turned web-designers, or for computer geeks.
If you want a Luhn-valid number that is not in use, you could try 1000 0000 0000 0008 :-)
Yes:
$ perl -MBusiness::CreditCard -e 'print validate("1000 0000 0000 0008"), "\n"'
1
But:
$ perl -MBusiness::CreditCard -e 'print cardtype("1000 0000 0000 0008"), "\n"'
Unknown
I'm pretty sure 9111 1111 1111 1111 works as well
$ perl -MBusiness::CreditCard -e 'print cardtype("9111 1111 1111 1111"), "\n"'
Unknown
$ perl -MBusiness::CreditCard -e 'print validate("9111 1111 1111 1111"), "\n"'
0
rectennas?
You want me to get my energy from space, through an antenna in my rectum?
This is a new image, with new name etc.
New name? Did you get a new gender as well?
1) Generate fake credit card numbers that pass as "valid"
Easy: Business::CreditCard - Validate/generate credit card checksums/names.
Usually, the hard part is opening the laptop to get to the drive. There are many screws, but not all need to be unscrewed. Many parts are simply clipped together. I have opened several noteboks, and usually found out only too late that it would have been much easier if I had known how to open it.
First, try to search the web for a service manual which details how to get to the drive on your specific model. If you find clear instructions, that will be of great help.
For the drive thickness issue, as others have said, the recent thinner drives will work to replace older thicker drives, so you shouldn't have a problem.
If the notebook is old, the BIOS may not support the full capacity of your new drive. Not a big deal: you would just loose a few Gigabytes, but the drive will work perfectly with the lower capacity.
I does not work
It does, but you have to use "+", not just anything, between your login and the rest.
Wasn't there a previous Slashdot article about hotmail blocking Gmail invites?
Well, just received one at my hotmail address. If they were blocking them, they aren't anymore.
Still won't work, for the same reason.
The way "Delivered-To:" works:
Mailer is about to deliver mail to some_mailbox:
- searches for a "Delivered-To: some_mailbox" header.
- if not found: adds it and delivers the mail
- if found: drops the mail, probably also writing something in the logs.
Since any forwarding is done after delivery, it won't work.
Will have to find something else to test their bandwidth. If you come up with something that may really work, maybe you could send them a job application? They give Gmail invites to all applicants...
Well, I certainly could use one. Thanks!
rduke15 at hotmail.com
Won't work. They use a "Delivered-To:" header, like Postfix (and most current mailers?).
I have the general notion that (A) Samba has been implemented without any documentation from MS
Wrong! See other comment in this story
SMB has actually been documented by MS.
From The future of CIFS by Jelmer Vernooij of the Samba team:
2.2 The NFS/CIFS marketing war
During the internet hype in the nineties, Sun and Microsoft got in a fight about which remote file system API was going to make it. Sun was promoting NFS, Microsoft was promoting SMB.
In order to get SMB supported by other vendors, Microsoft did a couple of things:
Samba even got donations from Microsoft during this period, including funding for trips to conferences and MSDN donations. Microsoft developers were encouraged to work with Samba developers to get a working implementation of a SMB server and client on Unix.
Microsoft won the war. CIFS became the standard (for LANs, at least). After this, they lost interest in having other vendors support CIFS. Rather, they tried to get everybody to use their products.
Why do the artists get nothing? allofmp3 do pay their licensing fees.
Look at how much you pay for allofmp3.com, and you will understand that artists cannot get anything from it.
Citing "ethics" in defense of hollywood record companies
I was not defending big hollywood record companies. Just noting that allofmp3.com is not the answer either. Artists are entitled to some revenue (if they get nothing, I don't consider it "ethical"), and any solution has to take this into account somehow.
That said, no one forced those artists to sign to those labels.
Many artists have no sense for business at all (and some others do, I know). I recently saw a documentary about Jimmy Hendrix, who apparently signed anything presented to him without reading it. Not very smart of him, sure. But he was a great musician.
Just dismissing the problem of getting some revenue to the artist with "It's simply not my problem that they are unable to obtain my money" is arrogant and stupid.
- I'd also like to see the artists being paid more than 10%...
Yes, a good share to the artists is important. And possible in a system where distribution costs may be low.
Note also that "artists" are not only the visible (or "audiblde") performing artists, but also people like producers (what would the early Michael Jackson music have been without Quincy Jones? Ever heard of Phil Spector? to name a few of the most well-known), sound technicians, etc.
As for the rest of the poll, here it goes:
- Should it have OGG and FLAC tracks, as well as MP3?
Yes, and with high bitrates available.
- Would you rather pay per-song or per-month?
Per song.
- Would you want the option to purchase hard-copy as well (like the actual album, or even band merchandise)?
Yes
- Should the song samples be 30 second downloads or full-song streams fed on-demand?
Full-length streams (can be very low quality)
- Is a radio station important for an online music store?
Not for me.
And last but not least, the question which was not asked:
- Should the songs have DRM?
NO. If I buy a song, I do whatever I want with it, and can copy it to all my MP3 players and home computers, whatever OS they are running, and don't have to worry about some arbitrary restrictions.
... is that the artists don't get anything!
While allofmp3.com may perhaps be technicaly "legal" (of which I'm not even sure, IANAL), it doesn't matter because it's still definitely not ethical.
Seriously though, it's 2004 and you don't know a single person who uses any Instant Messenger client whatsoever?
Well, yes. Seriously. Maybe it's because it seems to have started on services like AOL or MSN, on which I never knew anybody (I used to have a CompuServe address, but that was more than 10 years ago). Maybe it's a generation thing (I'm 40). For synchronous communication, the phone seems more practical. For asynchronous, which I tend to prefer, there's email. I sort of never quite saw the point in IM, except maybe for some very special circumstances, of which I can't imagine an example right now.
Anyway, I managed to test Gaim, so if some day I feel it could be useful, it's there.
That's the problem with being a stupid technophile: I always prefer exploring some technology which I don't need, rather than doing something useful like earning money with the technology I already know...
OK. It worked through AIM. Thanks.
That SafetyBot is funny. It reminded me of the pre-Windows days, and telnet or Dos menu interfaces. And reminded me of Compuserve (not surprisingly since they are the same company now) in the late eighties, and it's weird universe.
Thanks. Didn't work, though. Maybe because I'm on ICQ, and that is on AIM. Someone have another suggestion?