we have told bug reporters we don't care about their bug reports, that's not actually true. He is suggesting that this is what it might seem like.
As a longtime Firefox and Thunderbird bug submitter, let me assure you that this is in fact what it does seem like, and so it is effectively true. I've had some bugs open for 7 or 8 years; I recently saw a bug report complaining that it'd been open for 11. This doesn't cover those odd, irreproducible cases users will always submit - these were just plain bugs.
I would guess that only about 20% my of reported bugs ever got fixed.
"What is the deal with rental car reservations? They never have your car when you show up. It's like they know how to take your reservation, but they don't know how to hold your reservation." -- Hubble
For the great majority of users, computers have become just too complicated and confusing to operate
I think a part of that is people just don't accept that they have to learn how to use a computer
I think another part of that is that techies don't accept that people don't accept that they have to learn a computer. Techies know this, but all we do is complain about it. No?
Back then it was purely a Commodore BBS with full graphics
Q-Link didn't have full graphics, other than in the games; the service itself was text-based, and the menus weren't even graphic (they were split-screen, if you remember, and the divider would wiggle when the modem was in use, a side-effect of interrupt handling routines). A roomful of Q-Link users burst into applause when they saw this innovation in Super-Q: graphic emoticons in People Connection. Oooh!
Then when the web came-along in 1993 they offered access to it, but it cost extra
It didn't. Didn't happen. Dig up your old bills and check.
couldn't access playboy.com unless you first proved you're an adult
I'm pretty sure, though not positive, that this is also wrong. We had Parental Controls that would lock out the entire web from your childrens' screen names, but the master account was presumed to be an adult (we had your credit card), and I don't remember any domain whitelists or anything like that. I've asked around and I'll post back the answer.
On a similar note... as a consumer, what I usually want is to transcode video into some imaginary 90th-percentile compression rate, where 90% of the bits are identical to the uncompressed version. I have no idea what file size that corresponds to, nor what "quality level", nor how many FFT buckets that implies, etc... I just want to look at the size/quality tradeoff curve, point at a spot reasonably close to the right side, and say "match this quality". How can I do that? I envision some sort of multi-pass encoder that attempts a transcode and then iteratively compares its output to the original. That's all we're doing by hand anyway, isn't it?
AOL, Compuserve, Genie, and so on used to put the internet behind a wall and charge extra.
Wait, what? AOL never charged extra for Internet access; it was part and parcel of the AOL client. ("AOL is the Internet and so much more!") I don't believe the others charged extra either.
Then they opened the wall, but filtered which websites or newsgroups you could visit.
You have your history reversed. First AOL offered newsgroup access without any client changes, via a server gateway; once it was technically feasible, we built a browser and then a sockets library into the client so you could do whatever you wanted (short of connecting to port 25, which we redirected for spam filtering). I don't remember if we filtered out the porn newsgroups from our server gateway, though it wouldn't surprise me - we thought at the time that it was important for us to remain a "family service", though we were simultaneously developing automatic newsgroup-to-binary download capabilities, and of course you could use your own newsreader and a commercial news spool like giganews if you wanted full newsgroup access. We didn't filter any web access that I recall.
While a conventional laser emits a constant beam of light in one direction, the anti-laser simply does the opposite. It takes that same steady light stream
it have been so hard for the Mozilla developers to just add a config option to pick where the status bar display goes?
Yes, because then they'd have to support both styles with every future code change. Pretty soon you run into combinatorial complexity where there's just no chance that any useful configuration is going to be well-tested, and code maintenance sucks up time that could be used for new features.
I have mixed feelings about losing the status bar, but I think they did it the right way: Make a design decision, make the source code conform to it, and leave it to an extension developer to maintain some alternate UI if there's enough demand (and there is already an extension for this, as others have pointed out).
There once was a shampoo that somebody liked. And she told two friends, and they told two friends, and they told two friends, and so on, and so on, and so on.
how about the fact that you need to buy IP addresses
That's not by government regulation, is it? That's simply the architecture of IPv4 as implemented by the rest of the 'net. GP said that the oligarchy of these gatekeepers was caused by over-regulation. I think the free market led us right here, through entirely unregulated M&A and good old-fashioned competition.
just a few gatekeepers have somehow been able to get themselves to a position where they can in theory "control" the internet, and I contend it is because of too much regulation of the internet that this situation has happened.
What Internet regulations do you think have led to this? I'm not aware of any.
If private individuals were allowed to connect to whomever and however they wanted for a network connection
Slashdot Mirror
Southern folks shut down when there is 2 INCHES of snow
True story: In the 1990s, Montgomery County, MD schools once closed because it might snow the next day.
we have told bug reporters we don't care about their bug reports, that's not actually true. He is suggesting that this is what it might seem like.
As a longtime Firefox and Thunderbird bug submitter, let me assure you that this is in fact what it does seem like, and so it is effectively true. I've had some bugs open for 7 or 8 years; I recently saw a bug report complaining that it'd been open for 11. This doesn't cover those odd, irreproducible cases users will always submit - these were just plain bugs.
I would guess that only about 20% my of reported bugs ever got fixed.
I try to be self-deprecating, but I suck at it.
We don't even know if the Martians use big-endian encodings yet.
Ok, so let's use median instead of mode. What's the median number of legs, and what percentage of the population has a below-median number of legs?
This was the impetus for the Office ribbon; the top 10 requested features for Office were already in Office, but buried in the menu bar.
I can't say I've ever done that, but I have clicked on blue links in a color printout.
No, half the population is NOT necessarily below average; that's only true when there's a normal distribution.
Hint: Most people have an above-average number of legs.
If requiring real names killed Friendster, why would it not have also killed Facebook?
Optimal satisfaction with your zero-radius mower, and the fact that you bought it, requires that the number of U-turns be maximized.
I want to know if SSDs are more reliable than HDDs in an environment full of cat hair. I've never had a SCSI HDD outlast its warranty.
"What is the deal with rental car reservations? They never have your car when you show up. It's like they know how to take your reservation, but they don't know how to hold your reservation." -- Hubble
I think another part of that is that techies don't accept that people don't accept that they have to learn a computer. Techies know this, but all we do is complain about it. No?
You forgot solemnly looking at you. They're good at solemnly looking at you.
Q-Link didn't have full graphics, other than in the games; the service itself was text-based, and the menus weren't even graphic (they were split-screen, if you remember, and the divider would wiggle when the modem was in use, a side-effect of interrupt handling routines). A roomful of Q-Link users burst into applause when they saw this innovation in Super-Q: graphic emoticons in People Connection. Oooh!
It didn't. Didn't happen. Dig up your old bills and check.
I'm pretty sure, though not positive, that this is also wrong. We had Parental Controls that would lock out the entire web from your childrens' screen names, but the master account was presumed to be an adult (we had your credit card), and I don't remember any domain whitelists or anything like that. I've asked around and I'll post back the answer.
On a similar note... as a consumer, what I usually want is to transcode video into some imaginary 90th-percentile compression rate, where 90% of the bits are identical to the uncompressed version. I have no idea what file size that corresponds to, nor what "quality level", nor how many FFT buckets that implies, etc... I just want to look at the size/quality tradeoff curve, point at a spot reasonably close to the right side, and say "match this quality". How can I do that? I envision some sort of multi-pass encoder that attempts a transcode and then iteratively compares its output to the original. That's all we're doing by hand anyway, isn't it?
Wait, what? AOL never charged extra for Internet access; it was part and parcel of the AOL client. ("AOL is the Internet and so much more!") I don't believe the others charged extra either.
You have your history reversed. First AOL offered newsgroup access without any client changes, via a server gateway; once it was technically feasible, we built a browser and then a sockets library into the client so you could do whatever you wanted (short of connecting to port 25, which we redirected for spam filtering). I don't remember if we filtered out the porn newsgroups from our server gateway, though it wouldn't surprise me - we thought at the time that it was important for us to remain a "family service", though we were simultaneously developing automatic newsgroup-to-binary download capabilities, and of course you could use your own newsreader and a commercial news spool like giganews if you wanted full newsgroup access. We didn't filter any web access that I recall.
Jay Levitt, AOLer, 1989-2001
and emits it in the other direction.
You should see landlines - they don't even require an "OK" or "call" button. Total scam.
Yes, because then they'd have to support both styles with every future code change. Pretty soon you run into combinatorial complexity where there's just no chance that any useful configuration is going to be well-tested, and code maintenance sucks up time that could be used for new features.
I have mixed feelings about losing the status bar, but I think they did it the right way: Make a design decision, make the source code conform to it, and leave it to an extension developer to maintain some alternate UI if there's enough demand (and there is already an extension for this, as others have pointed out).
Oh, God... he's going to start looking at us again until we abandon the app store, isn't he.
There once was a shampoo that somebody liked. And she told two friends, and they told two friends, and they told two friends, and so on, and so on, and so on.
That's what regulation is.
That's not by government regulation, is it? That's simply the architecture of IPv4 as implemented by the rest of the 'net. GP said that the oligarchy of these gatekeepers was caused by over-regulation. I think the free market led us right here, through entirely unregulated M&A and good old-fashioned competition.
What Internet regulations do you think have led to this? I'm not aware of any.
They are.
They didn't.