My problem with many mainstream media players is that they look more like a street corner in Times Square than they do a media player.
There are widgets everywhere! Drawers here, buttons there, little flashing things here, a list of stations or channels over there, throw in a few more widgets that don't seem to do anything, and finally some widgets that are supposed to be used to hide all of the other widget-ware.
News flash. If I want to watch a video clip, you know what? I probably want a window that contains the video clip and maybe a clean simple menu for basic functions. Thats it guys. If memory serves, QT (at least on the Mac) may be closer to this, but of course it keeps asking me if I want to go Pro. Argh. I bought the hardware and the OS from them and they still want MORE.
Also, many OS X apps like iTunes, iPhoto, etc. store their data in XML files and easy to navigate file systems, so you can get at them with your own software/scripts/etc.
I bought a Mac because OS X in general has the overall quality newcomers have found in apps like iTunes. It is a rare thing to be able to build a complete OS that is easy enough for newbies but powerful enough to satisfy software developers/hackers/power users/etc.
Would you please stop the BULL shitting and get frickin' clue (and perhaps some professional treatment if you can't get that clue by yourself), fucker?
Aww, now that isn't very nice:) But, I'm a big boy and I'll get over it.
the spoof didn't look anything like my toolbar and I think most phishermen (or whatever they're being called these days) will still be targeting IE while it's userbase is +90%
So Firefox used to be safe because it was "rock solid." Now, it is safe because nobody uses it anyway so it isn't a target, and anyways- people customize their toolbars so the spoof will look fake to them. Man, OSS has went to the shitter fast. But, I like the part about it being safe because nobody uses it. Classic.
Even if they did mean only MS Office, it is still an issue. Open Office becomes non-viable as soon as documents need to leave your office or new Office documents enter. The MS Word support in Open Office, for example, just isn't good enough for serious, professional use.
Imagine this- you need to prepare a 500 page proposal for a client, and there is a 10 million dollar contract on the line. You're getting ready to send them a draft that they can mark up... how good are you going to feel about "Save as Word 2003" (or whatever it might need to be saved as)?
Yeah, you saved a few bucks on going w/ Open Office. But when your client opened the document in Word, they assumed you had your 12 year old write the proposal because all the tables are screwed, formatting is messed up, etc. What does losing 10 million dollars do to the TCO figures?
I have a hard time quantifying why I still strongly prefer a printed book.
No need to quantify, friend. Real books just rock. They are an escape from the electro-computerized world we live in. When I read a book it is to avoid the Internet, my PC, my MP3 player, my TV, all of it. The last thing I want is for my last escape in the world to be a damned "eBook"!
I've taken guided tours across the world... everything from open top bus tours in NYC to a minicoach tour of the Isle of Skye in Scotland to a boat tour in Kauai to a hike thru a rain forest in Antigua to a mountain bike tour through the mountains of St. Lucia. In all of those tours, the transportation mechanism was fitting to the place being toured.
There is no other mechanism more appropriate for a tour of a beautiful place like Sarasota. A stuffy bus or coach would ruin the whole thing. Walking wouldn't let you cover enough distance. Biking wouldn't let you roam the sidewalks with pedestrians nor is it appropriate for a tour where you will stop frequently and listen and look around, etc.
Have you ever ridden a Segway? I'd highly recommend it. The way you can just "stop" and listen to your guide, and turn 360 in place to look at things is really advantageous for the purposes of a guided tour.
This was really a good example of a toy with no practical future.
True, but the world and economy is so big now that there is almost always a niche or two for the obscure product.
We recently took a guided tour in Sarasota, Florida on a Segway. The Segway did a wonderful job of facilitating the tour... we were able to visit the bayfront, travel on downtown sidewalks, and visit other places we would have never found. And, riding the Segway was a blast.
Feeney said the da Vinci Project has taken 8 years of dedication by more than 600 people.
Feeney said that roughly $337,000 dollars in cash has gone into the balloon/rocket project, along with some $10 million to $15 million dollars worth of time donated by people, as well as help from in-kind sponsors.
600 people working for 8 years, well, with $337,000 cash that means they were all volunteers (which he seems to indicate) because the equipment and operating expenses would be well over 337K. That is the price of an average house these days in a lot of neighborhoods. It doesn't buy a lot when you are talking aerospace engineering.
So, if everyone at Scaled gave up their paychecks maybe they could post a lower number too. But, the bottom line that will prove itself is that if you want to do exceptional things, you need exceptional people. Exceptional people usually don't come cheap- and building a space ship is a full time job. A few engineers couldn't have created SpaceShipOne a few hours a week after their day jobs that pay the bills.
We'll see- but I just hope they don't kill someone. This isn't the kind of shit you screw around with. I feel a lot better knowing Rutan's got several aircraft out there that he designed previously. Things that fly and don't kill people. From Homer's mom in October Sky... "Don't blow yourselves up."
Good thoughts. I agree, while a lot of these smaller boxes look really sweet it seems to come down to the issue of, "is it really practical/necessary?" I mean, I don't have a huge workspace at home but it is certainly sufficient for my primary box, A Dell Dimension 4600. (my other boxes are out of view anyway)
I think there is a market for small, SILENT boxes, but it is realistically smaller than you'd first think. My girlfriend needs a small, cheap box just to check email and what not. I considered building her out a fancy ITX based cube or something, but why bother? For a couple hundred bucks I can easily find a micro ATX based machine that is still small but so mass produced that it is actually very cheap.
Honestly, if your desk or work area is so incredibly small that you don't have room for a smaller mass produced desktop machine, you probably don't need to be spending money on a super-tiny PC. You probably need to consider buying a bigger desk or house (or both).
You do know that these provisions of the EULA are not legally enforceable?
Maybe, if Fairplay were an open standard. But it isn't- it is a proprietary standard that Apple reserves the right to license to others and I see no basis for the legal system to NOT uphold this right. If someone desires this interoperability, there is a correct way to appoach it- they can license the technology. Of course, Apple probably wouldn't want any association with Real, so luckily they also reserve the right not to do business with them.
RealNetworks executives said its engineers had to re-create their own version in their labs in order to make the device play them back.
Although the company said this action wasn't technically "reverse engineering," the software could trigger intense legal scrutiny.
The license accompanying Apple's iPod says purchasers cannot "copy, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble, (or) attempt to derive the source code of" the software.
RTFA. Real's engineers certainly had to obtain iTunes and an iPod to make this happen. When they did so, they agreed to the license accompanying the iPod. To spite what Real says, when they say "re-create their own version in their labs" that means reverse engineer! I've never heard such a lie. They'd have us believe they sat some engineers down in a room who had never looked at an iPod or iTunes (much less crack them) but yet were somehow able to "recreate their own version"? BULL shit. Off to jail, fuckers.
Lance has said many times he loves the Tour de France and he loves France, and he even learned to speak French. Most of the French respect him, but there are always a few guys who won't.
Well, you could present the question this way: assume the Newton was re-introduced and now the Newton 2000 lines the shelves beside the latest and greatest Palm and Pocket PC devices. Assuming a similar price point, how many Newtons would sell? If the Palm and Pocket PC devices outsell the Newtons, why? Which item ends up being a viable alternative to the other?
Re:The three worst annoyances in software developm
on
Are You Annoying?
·
· Score: 1
3. People who give up too easily. Something doesn't work exactly as it seems it should, so they try a few variations - maybe - and then they run for help. "This doesn't work like the book says it should!"
You know what is MORE annoying but similar? Developers who give up too easily. I've had co-workers try to do things the right way and as soon as the first try fails, they go off and put in some kind of totally bastard suck-ass hack instead. They'll claim that something is broken when they try doing it the "right way", even if it is something that you know can't be broken. i.e. "Java's StringTokenizer is broken! It won't parse my pipe delimited string! So I spent the afternoon writing my own." They you look at their code and they didn't instantiate their StringTokenizer correctly.
The worst part of all this is coming behind some dumbass like this and having to fix all their shit. I'd almost rather them just be annoying and ask for help first before they go off fixing a problem the wrong way.
Re:I'm getting really sick of...
on
Are You Annoying?
·
· Score: 2, Funny
...but, I was told that I could listen to the radio at a reasonable volume between the hours of nine and eleven...
However, if it's available only illegally, then a fan who wants to hear the album has no choice but to break the law.
Kinda like the first Star Wars Trilogy on DVD. Lots of folks just don't have VCR's any more and others who have one just can't stand fussing with the streaming magnetic tape- its around for the kids or wife and thats it.
But, if you want the original trilogy on DVD you'd have to get it off of E-Bay, usually some kind of bad dub from Laser Disc to DVD. For years there have been die hard fans who would love to do nothing more than pay money to their local store to get a prestine copy of the trilogy. But, without that option, you end up buying a bootleg. Lucas may have his "reasons"... but I'm still going to call him a dumb ass on this one.
Not exactly the same thing as this U2 album bit, but it is the same as your point... underestimating that large group of people who probably only do something illegal when there is no other outlet to obtain the media. Although IMHO in this case the real fans should just wait until the damn album is finished and get it legally.
I've never seen this kind of jack. It is a true analog, low power 1/8" mini plug (headphone style) and toslink style? (I understand, not at the same time of course)
I don't get how you can have an electrical analog signal AND a beam of light shooting out of the same plug. One of my original concerns was that the optical wasn't a true digital out signal, but some type of mysterious unknown conversion was happening from analog to optical/digital?
I hate software-related patents as much as the next guy, but the continual cry of "That's obvious" is getting tiring. If it was so obvious, why was there such a long period of time between the patent and when MS and Apple started using a similar system?
Maybe, but I wonder if it were really a proprietary idea, why didn't Microsoft or Apple try to patent it? I'm sure they could have had their lawyers play it up so it didn't look like a duplicate of the technology and the patent that was filed in the early 90's.
They've been ignored. It's not like people haven't been saying anything about it. It's that they get ignored.
Honestly, not to sound like a smart ass or anything but I just think that is a losers attitude. I've just never been fond of making excuses. The right marketing isn't easily ignored- TV, in print, etc.
One of the benefits of working for a big company is a QA/UAT department. You have an entire department of people lined up just to test your shit. And, usually this type of job makes a person very anal. They log defects for just about everything.
The person writing the code can unit test to his or her best ability, but it is really the job of someone else to put it through the wringer testing thousands of simulated real-world scenerios. Sure, a coder could do this testing. But a QA guy or gal is doing really well if he makes 3/4 the salary of the guy who wrote the code- so a divison of labor only makes sense.
Not to mention the person writing the code makes the worst tester in the world. You only test it the way you THOUGHT people would use it. So, while a coder is perhaps the one who created the original problem, the real fault is in whoever let this slip through to production. Assuming, of course, that it wasn't some kind of time-bomb easter egg that would have been impossible to test. Although, good QA testers should alter their system date/time when testing date sensitive routines.
Yup, and they didn't even write that. They bought it (insanely cheaply, IIRC) and marketed it. There's one thing they have figured out and are extremely good at, and that's marketing.
And that is one thing open source is horrible at. Where has the open source community been the whole time all these worms have infected the world and ruined people's days? Nothing in this world can be a success if you can't spread the word- and kudos to the people who are able to do it. People who build a great product and then stop with a "I built it, so come" attitude are stopping short and only punishing themselves, and for that I have no sympathy.
In my time away from the shop I'm an independent shareware author. I've found that often times when I'd like to keep adding features I really need to stop and give some time to marketing efforts. And I don't write entire products from scratch. I've licensed technology when it was intelligent to do so and used open source technology when appropriate (with aknowledgements, of course:)
As much as we'd like to say the role of a software company is to spend all efforts on writing great code, this really couldn't be further from the truth.
Slashdot Mirror
My problem with many mainstream media players is that they look more like a street corner in Times Square than they do a media player.
There are widgets everywhere! Drawers here, buttons there, little flashing things here, a list of stations or channels over there, throw in a few more widgets that don't seem to do anything, and finally some widgets that are supposed to be used to hide all of the other widget-ware.
News flash. If I want to watch a video clip, you know what? I probably want a window that contains the video clip and maybe a clean simple menu for basic functions. Thats it guys. If memory serves, QT (at least on the Mac) may be closer to this, but of course it keeps asking me if I want to go Pro. Argh. I bought the hardware and the OS from them and they still want MORE.
Also, many OS X apps like iTunes, iPhoto, etc. store their data in XML files and easy to navigate file systems, so you can get at them with your own software/scripts/etc. I bought a Mac because OS X in general has the overall quality newcomers have found in apps like iTunes. It is a rare thing to be able to build a complete OS that is easy enough for newbies but powerful enough to satisfy software developers/hackers/power users/etc.
Would you please stop the BULL shitting and get frickin' clue (and perhaps some professional treatment if you can't get that clue by yourself), fucker?
:) But, I'm a big boy and I'll get over it.
Aww, now that isn't very nice
The article says the Sony player saves juice by only playing "native" files... atrac in this case.
the spoof didn't look anything like my toolbar and I think most phishermen (or whatever they're being called these days) will still be targeting IE while it's userbase is +90%
So Firefox used to be safe because it was "rock solid." Now, it is safe because nobody uses it anyway so it isn't a target, and anyways- people customize their toolbars so the spoof will look fake to them. Man, OSS has went to the shitter fast. But, I like the part about it being safe because nobody uses it. Classic.
Parent should be modded all the way down. There are enough replies that show this post to be complete garbage.
This is basically a screenshot of a toolbar at the top of the browser
NOPE
its pretty trivial to make something with javascript that does exactly the same effect but does it better.
NOPE
the only way to get tricked by it would be to click something on a webpage
yeah, when browsing I never click on pages so no threat there.
5 Insightful? Christ.
Business Apps don't necessarily mean "MS Office."
Even if they did mean only MS Office, it is still an issue. Open Office becomes non-viable as soon as documents need to leave your office or new Office documents enter. The MS Word support in Open Office, for example, just isn't good enough for serious, professional use.
Imagine this- you need to prepare a 500 page proposal for a client, and there is a 10 million dollar contract on the line. You're getting ready to send them a draft that they can mark up... how good are you going to feel about "Save as Word 2003" (or whatever it might need to be saved as)?
Yeah, you saved a few bucks on going w/ Open Office. But when your client opened the document in Word, they assumed you had your 12 year old write the proposal because all the tables are screwed, formatting is messed up, etc. What does losing 10 million dollars do to the TCO figures?
I have a hard time quantifying why I still strongly prefer a printed book.
No need to quantify, friend. Real books just rock. They are an escape from the electro-computerized world we live in. When I read a book it is to avoid the Internet, my PC, my MP3 player, my TV, all of it. The last thing I want is for my last escape in the world to be a damned "eBook"!
Guided tours are nothing new
I've taken guided tours across the world... everything from open top bus tours in NYC to a minicoach tour of the Isle of Skye in Scotland to a boat tour in Kauai to a hike thru a rain forest in Antigua to a mountain bike tour through the mountains of St. Lucia. In all of those tours, the transportation mechanism was fitting to the place being toured.
There is no other mechanism more appropriate for a tour of a beautiful place like Sarasota. A stuffy bus or coach would ruin the whole thing. Walking wouldn't let you cover enough distance. Biking wouldn't let you roam the sidewalks with pedestrians nor is it appropriate for a tour where you will stop frequently and listen and look around, etc.
Have you ever ridden a Segway? I'd highly recommend it. The way you can just "stop" and listen to your guide, and turn 360 in place to look at things is really advantageous for the purposes of a guided tour.
This was really a good example of a toy with no practical future.
True, but the world and economy is so big now that there is almost always a niche or two for the obscure product.
We recently took a guided tour in Sarasota, Florida on a Segway. The Segway did a wonderful job of facilitating the tour... we were able to visit the bayfront, travel on downtown sidewalks, and visit other places we would have never found. And, riding the Segway was a blast.
Don't be fooled by the Da Vinci numbers.
Feeney said the da Vinci Project has taken 8 years of dedication by more than 600 people.
Feeney said that roughly $337,000 dollars in cash has gone into the balloon/rocket project, along with some $10 million to $15 million dollars worth of time donated by people, as well as help from in-kind sponsors.
600 people working for 8 years, well, with $337,000 cash that means they were all volunteers (which he seems to indicate) because the equipment and operating expenses would be well over 337K. That is the price of an average house these days in a lot of neighborhoods. It doesn't buy a lot when you are talking aerospace engineering.
So, if everyone at Scaled gave up their paychecks maybe they could post a lower number too. But, the bottom line that will prove itself is that if you want to do exceptional things, you need exceptional people. Exceptional people usually don't come cheap- and building a space ship is a full time job. A few engineers couldn't have created SpaceShipOne a few hours a week after their day jobs that pay the bills.
We'll see- but I just hope they don't kill someone. This isn't the kind of shit you screw around with. I feel a lot better knowing Rutan's got several aircraft out there that he designed previously. Things that fly and don't kill people. From Homer's mom in October Sky... "Don't blow yourselves up."
Good thoughts. I agree, while a lot of these smaller boxes look really sweet it seems to come down to the issue of, "is it really practical/necessary?" I mean, I don't have a huge workspace at home but it is certainly sufficient for my primary box, A Dell Dimension 4600. (my other boxes are out of view anyway)
I think there is a market for small, SILENT boxes, but it is realistically smaller than you'd first think. My girlfriend needs a small, cheap box just to check email and what not. I considered building her out a fancy ITX based cube or something, but why bother? For a couple hundred bucks I can easily find a micro ATX based machine that is still small but so mass produced that it is actually very cheap.
Honestly, if your desk or work area is so incredibly small that you don't have room for a smaller mass produced desktop machine, you probably don't need to be spending money on a super-tiny PC. You probably need to consider buying a bigger desk or house (or both).
You do know that these provisions of the EULA are not legally enforceable?
Maybe, if Fairplay were an open standard. But it isn't- it is a proprietary standard that Apple reserves the right to license to others and I see no basis for the legal system to NOT uphold this right. If someone desires this interoperability, there is a correct way to appoach it- they can license the technology. Of course, Apple probably wouldn't want any association with Real, so luckily they also reserve the right not to do business with them.
RealNetworks executives said its engineers had to re-create their own version in their labs in order to make the device play them back.
Although the company said this action wasn't technically "reverse engineering," the software could trigger intense legal scrutiny.
The license accompanying Apple's iPod says purchasers cannot "copy, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble, (or) attempt to derive the source code of" the software.
RTFA. Real's engineers certainly had to obtain iTunes and an iPod to make this happen. When they did so, they agreed to the license accompanying the iPod. To spite what Real says, when they say "re-create their own version in their labs" that means reverse engineer! I've never heard such a lie. They'd have us believe they sat some engineers down in a room who had never looked at an iPod or iTunes (much less crack them) but yet were somehow able to "recreate their own version"? BULL shit. Off to jail, fuckers.
Lance has said many times he loves the Tour de France and he loves France, and he even learned to speak French. Most of the French respect him, but there are always a few guys who won't.
Which new hardware, exactly, will they switch to?
Well, you could present the question this way: assume the Newton was re-introduced and now the Newton 2000 lines the shelves beside the latest and greatest Palm and Pocket PC devices. Assuming a similar price point, how many Newtons would sell? If the Palm and Pocket PC devices outsell the Newtons, why? Which item ends up being a viable alternative to the other?
3. People who give up too easily. Something doesn't work exactly as it seems it should, so they try a few variations - maybe - and then they run for help. "This doesn't work like the book says it should!"
You know what is MORE annoying but similar? Developers who give up too easily. I've had co-workers try to do things the right way and as soon as the first try fails, they go off and put in some kind of totally bastard suck-ass hack instead. They'll claim that something is broken when they try doing it the "right way", even if it is something that you know can't be broken. i.e. "Java's StringTokenizer is broken! It won't parse my pipe delimited string! So I spent the afternoon writing my own." They you look at their code and they didn't instantiate their StringTokenizer correctly.
The worst part of all this is coming behind some dumbass like this and having to fix all their shit. I'd almost rather them just be annoying and ask for help first before they go off fixing a problem the wrong way.
...but, I was told that I could listen to the radio at a reasonable volume between the hours of nine and eleven...
However, if it's available only illegally, then a fan who wants to hear the album has no choice but to break the law.
Kinda like the first Star Wars Trilogy on DVD. Lots of folks just don't have VCR's any more and others who have one just can't stand fussing with the streaming magnetic tape- its around for the kids or wife and thats it.
But, if you want the original trilogy on DVD you'd have to get it off of E-Bay, usually some kind of bad dub from Laser Disc to DVD. For years there have been die hard fans who would love to do nothing more than pay money to their local store to get a prestine copy of the trilogy. But, without that option, you end up buying a bootleg. Lucas may have his "reasons"... but I'm still going to call him a dumb ass on this one.
Not exactly the same thing as this U2 album bit, but it is the same as your point... underestimating that large group of people who probably only do something illegal when there is no other outlet to obtain the media. Although IMHO in this case the real fans should just wait until the damn album is finished and get it legally.
I've never seen this kind of jack. It is a true analog, low power 1/8" mini plug (headphone style) and toslink style? (I understand, not at the same time of course)
I don't get how you can have an electrical analog signal AND a beam of light shooting out of the same plug. One of my original concerns was that the optical wasn't a true digital out signal, but some type of mysterious unknown conversion was happening from analog to optical/digital?
I hate software-related patents as much as the next guy, but the continual cry of "That's obvious" is getting tiring. If it was so obvious, why was there such a long period of time between the patent and when MS and Apple started using a similar system?
Maybe, but I wonder if it were really a proprietary idea, why didn't Microsoft or Apple try to patent it? I'm sure they could have had their lawyers play it up so it didn't look like a duplicate of the technology and the patent that was filed in the early 90's.
I'm going to recompile Windows optimized for my hardware! It'll blow every other Windows away.
Uh, there is something you should know. Something that will become very obvious very shortly.
Yes, yes. Windows is actually written in a proprietary variant of Clipper.
They've been ignored. It's not like people haven't been saying anything about it. It's that they get ignored.
Honestly, not to sound like a smart ass or anything but I just think that is a losers attitude. I've just never been fond of making excuses. The right marketing isn't easily ignored- TV, in print, etc.
One of the benefits of working for a big company is a QA/UAT department. You have an entire department of people lined up just to test your shit. And, usually this type of job makes a person very anal. They log defects for just about everything.
The person writing the code can unit test to his or her best ability, but it is really the job of someone else to put it through the wringer testing thousands of simulated real-world scenerios. Sure, a coder could do this testing. But a QA guy or gal is doing really well if he makes 3/4 the salary of the guy who wrote the code- so a divison of labor only makes sense.
Not to mention the person writing the code makes the worst tester in the world. You only test it the way you THOUGHT people would use it. So, while a coder is perhaps the one who created the original problem, the real fault is in whoever let this slip through to production. Assuming, of course, that it wasn't some kind of time-bomb easter egg that would have been impossible to test. Although, good QA testers should alter their system date/time when testing date sensitive routines.
Yup, and they didn't even write that. They bought it (insanely cheaply, IIRC) and marketed it. There's one thing they have figured out and are extremely good at, and that's marketing.
:)
And that is one thing open source is horrible at. Where has the open source community been the whole time all these worms have infected the world and ruined people's days? Nothing in this world can be a success if you can't spread the word- and kudos to the people who are able to do it. People who build a great product and then stop with a "I built it, so come" attitude are stopping short and only punishing themselves, and for that I have no sympathy.
In my time away from the shop I'm an independent shareware author. I've found that often times when I'd like to keep adding features I really need to stop and give some time to marketing efforts. And I don't write entire products from scratch. I've licensed technology when it was intelligent to do so and used open source technology when appropriate (with aknowledgements, of course
As much as we'd like to say the role of a software company is to spend all efforts on writing great code, this really couldn't be further from the truth.