Wiring harnesses are heavy, expensive and difficult to install and maintain. If this can make a significant weight and complexity reduction, it may well be more than worth the added upfront cost.
Just curious... why would using a GPS on foot have anything to do with being from the US or not?
A not very serious comment implying the fairly heavy focus on car-related uses of GPS in the US (and you have the same focus in Japan for that matter - lots of devices for finding addresses in cars, very few for doing so on foot).
you never had a gps? Try one out, it might change your life.
I do have a GPS, and yes, it makes a big difference. I just never had any actual use in a vehicle.
I can find the general area of any address or description just fine; there is no need for GPS for that. Finding the exact building in a block, however, or finding the precise point of a cache, would be difficult, however.
Whenever I have had a use for a GPS unit, I have been on foot, not in a vehicle. That is why I'm wondering.
I know, this may be foreign to the US contingent of the/. crowd, but where is the handheld version?
At least I pretty much never use GPS in a vehicle; even when I want to get to a specific address (not an easy feat in Japan), I would use maps to get to the general area, then get to the actual point (like a geocache or an address) on foot.
Yes I accept arguments about life-critical machines. But is there no middle ground?
I think that perhaps you are misstating the question. The regulations are not for the help or convenience of either the manufacturer or the buyer, really - they're for third parties that don't have a choice in the matter
If the regulations are too onerous - if, in other words, some criteria don't actually help third parties - then the solution is to change the regulations for everyone, not to give an exception to some but not others.
If they do help protect third parties, then everybody should follow them.
To put it another way - as a homeowner, you are perfectly free to patch your leaky roof with newspaper and wallpaper glue if you want. You're the only one affected, after all. You are _not_ allowed to keep a tree that is threatening to fall on a neighbours house, on the other hand. As for wiring, that should be pretty obvious why an electrician should not be allowed to ignore safety standards no matter how much a (non-trained) homeowner wants to cut corners.
Again, if your device is interfering with something I use, that hurts me no matter what the size of your company. I never got the "choice as a consumer" whether some jerk bought it while ignoring RF-reglations.
Ifthere is absolutely no risk of interference or other problem even when cutting corners, on the other hand, then the regulations should change for everybody.
Well, to take a less extreme example - if you're just a small building contractor, you don't actually need to follow the building code, right? I mean, it's only a few houses after all - not many families will be afflicted.
The second thing I really have against the idea is precisely that it becomes less expensive. You get a license to compete unfairly with larger firms, being able to undercut them on one-off or specialized jobs not by being better or more innovative, or have a more dedicated staff (all of which can easily be true for a small firm), but by not having a common playing field. That kind of regulatory discrimantion also tends to bring firms to be "innovative" in order to take advantage - a larger firm may well consist of ten or fifteen individual "firms", all small enough to get the exceptions, and all owned by a holding company and with extensive "support contracts" to each other.
FCC/CE requires that everyone meet the regulations. I suggest that exceptions could be made for startups and small mfrs, where appropriate disclosures are made to their custmoers.
Um, but why? Look at it from the point of someone getting the hard end of this not-so-compliant device. It doesn't matter to them if the thingy making hell with their tv recepion was built by Toshiba or Carl's Carparts and Computer Peripherals - it's still just as interfering.
To take it to the extreme, would you accept a lower standard for hospital devicces or drugs simply because they are made by a manufacturer too small to actually meet regulatory standards?
Opening Word documents for opening, and writing native documents for writing (of course). It does open its own output fine. Forgot to mention that I have found no way of adding furigana to the text I write - though there may be a way and I just don't know how. Being able to write vertically would be nice as well.
Writing Japanese sort of, kind of works. Opening documents written using kanji with furigana, however, craps out every single time. The kanji loses its baseline and the furigana is lost altogether. And even documents written with just straight kanji+hiragana will get the wrong margins, mysterious rendering errors and mixed-up fonts. And here, that is "average, ordinary" documents. Abiword is actually better (though still not at all good) at opening such documents - it doesn't support writing it at all, though.
So yes, OOo is nice to have. Here it's not yet a viable solution, though.
Re:I've considered that one...
on
OQO For Sale
·
· Score: 1
But the OQO does have a keyboard and pointing stick built in. The screen slides upward to reveal it...
I should learn to preview... What I meant (and what I stupidly thought I'd said) was to have a real, typing capable keyboard. The OQO (and most similar machines) have either a thumb-type or index-finger-type mini keyboard (the Zaurus and the Yopy would be other examples of that size), or come without a built-in keyboard at all, which would require some attachable solution (the Sony has/had an attachable, foldable keyboard as part of the package).
After having used first a Palm, then a Yopy for years, I am not fond of either solution. I realized that by going up in size another step, so to speak, I could get essentially a real laptop, with a bigger (easier to see) screen, a "real" keyboard, and better specs, for the same price.
I've considered that one...
on
OQO For Sale
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I've looked at that one, as well as the Sony U series, but basically, I've come to the conclusion that I really want a keyboard as well, not a writable screen. So much of what I do involves writing in one form or another. I've ended up ordering one of these instead. Sure, it won't (quite) fit into a coat pocket - you need to have it in your bag - but it is a lot more computer for about the same price.
I think the idea was that free use of the patent would be granted for the open source implementation (pretty much a prerequisite of releasing it as OSS, as you point out). If you want to make a closed implementation, you'd have to negotiate licensing as usual.
Well, I use a Gramin Geko, though that one has a serial cable that I use over USB with a serial-to-USB converter. It works. See if you can access it over the ttyUSB device?
Ubuntu seems like a very promising alternative/friendly face to Debian. They seem to have a very active community already. We'll see how it shapes up after they release.
I've been in the market for a new laptop just now, and I looked long and hard at the PowerBook 12", but in the end, the lack of wireless support made me go elsewhere (a Panasonic "Let's Note" in fact).
It's a shame; the hardware is quite nice, otherwise.
Because it is always worth noting when a company does the right thing, and especially when they usually are deep in the murky end of the ethical pool.
This _may_, hopefully, mean that at some point in the future we may actually see a text reader tablet from them that will allow you to store your own stuff on it - in a standard format such as html - and not just lease content from them. At that point, I'd actually consider buying it.
It is a BankID, which is used on several other sites as well. Won't get rid of it even if I switch banks - and as I reside in Japan right now, switching banks (or doing any banking in person) is pretty much impossible for me.
I won't be upgrading until my bank and other "serious" Swdish websites requires the upgrade for the login/security applet crap I need to run every time. Until then I will not even breathe on the VM or runtime. It is kind of flaky already, and it would be a minor disaster to be locked out of my bank just because that applet stops working.
I did not say "forget about it". I just said, do not attempt to preserve it to the point where you remove the reason for preservation in the first place.
We could put paintings in specially designed steel crates, in a nitrogen atmosphere, weld them shut, encase in uge blocks of concrete and store at the bottom of a mine. That will save them for a long, log time (though not forever). That will also make the works utterly pointless - they may as well have been destroyed for all practical purposes.
An open society makes for an excellent parallel, actually. You should not ignore security (as a broad term) altogether, but if you are too heavy-handed and too intrusive, you end up destroying the very freedoms that you are attempting to preserve.
Slashdot Mirror
And don't even get me going on the early British cars with the Lucas electrics.....
Ahh, Lucas - inventor of the electric darkness.
Reminds me of the old joke of why the Brits don't have a computer industry? They have yet to figure out a way to make a CPU leak oil.
Wiring harnesses are heavy, expensive and difficult to install and maintain. If this can make a significant weight and complexity reduction, it may well be more than worth the added upfront cost.
Just curious... why would using a GPS on foot have anything to do with being from the US or not?
A not very serious comment implying the fairly heavy focus on car-related uses of GPS in the US (and you have the same focus in Japan for that matter - lots of devices for finding addresses in cars, very few for doing so on foot).
you never had a gps? Try one out, it might change your life.
I do have a GPS, and yes, it makes a big difference. I just never had any actual use in a vehicle.
I can find the general area of any address or description just fine; there is no need for GPS for that. Finding the exact building in a block, however, or finding the precise point of a cache, would be difficult, however.
Whenever I have had a use for a GPS unit, I have been on foot, not in a vehicle. That is why I'm wondering.
I know, this may be foreign to the US contingent of the /. crowd, but where is the handheld version?
At least I pretty much never use GPS in a vehicle; even when I want to get to a specific address (not an easy feat in Japan), I would use maps to get to the general area, then get to the actual point (like a geocache or an address) on foot.
Yes I accept arguments about life-critical machines. But is there no middle ground?
I think that perhaps you are misstating the question. The regulations are not for the help or convenience of either the manufacturer or the buyer, really - they're for third parties that don't have a choice in the matter
If the regulations are too onerous - if, in other words, some criteria don't actually help third parties - then the solution is to change the regulations for everyone, not to give an exception to some but not others.
If they do help protect third parties, then everybody should follow them.
To put it another way - as a homeowner, you are perfectly free to patch your leaky roof with newspaper and wallpaper glue if you want. You're the only one affected, after all. You are _not_ allowed to keep a tree that is threatening to fall on a neighbours house, on the other hand. As for wiring, that should be pretty obvious why an electrician should not be allowed to ignore safety standards no matter how much a (non-trained) homeowner wants to cut corners.
Again, if your device is interfering with something I use, that hurts me no matter what the size of your company. I never got the "choice as a consumer" whether some jerk bought it while ignoring RF-reglations.
Ifthere is absolutely no risk of interference or other problem even when cutting corners, on the other hand, then the regulations should change for everybody.
Well, to take a less extreme example - if you're just a small building contractor, you don't actually need to follow the building code, right? I mean, it's only a few houses after all - not many families will be afflicted.
The second thing I really have against the idea is precisely that it becomes less expensive. You get a license to compete unfairly with larger firms, being able to undercut them on one-off or specialized jobs not by being better or more innovative, or have a more dedicated staff (all of which can easily be true for a small firm), but by not having a common playing field. That kind of regulatory discrimantion also tends to bring firms to be "innovative" in order to take advantage - a larger firm may well consist of ten or fifteen individual "firms", all small enough to get the exceptions, and all owned by a holding company and with extensive "support contracts" to each other.
FCC/CE requires that everyone meet the regulations. I suggest that exceptions could be made for startups and small mfrs, where appropriate disclosures are made to their custmoers.
Um, but why? Look at it from the point of someone getting the hard end of this not-so-compliant device. It doesn't matter to them if the thingy making hell with their tv recepion was built by Toshiba or Carl's Carparts and Computer Peripherals - it's still just as interfering.
To take it to the extreme, would you accept a lower standard for hospital devicces or drugs simply because they are made by a manufacturer too small to actually meet regulatory standards?
You would have some design latitude if you wanted to, yes:
Swedish Copper Daler
As I said, I can't even write furigana in OOo, so I woldn't know.
Opening Word documents for opening, and writing native documents for writing (of course). It does open its own output fine. Forgot to mention that I have found no way of adding furigana to the text I write - though there may be a way and I just don't know how. Being able to write vertically would be nice as well.
Writing Japanese sort of, kind of works. Opening documents written using kanji with furigana, however, craps out every single time. The kanji loses its baseline and the furigana is lost altogether. And even documents written with just straight kanji+hiragana will get the wrong margins, mysterious rendering errors and mixed-up fonts.
And here, that is "average, ordinary" documents. Abiword is actually better (though still not at all good) at opening such documents - it doesn't support writing it at all, though.
So yes, OOo is nice to have. Here it's not yet a viable solution, though.
But the OQO does have a keyboard and pointing stick built in. The screen slides upward to reveal it...
I should learn to preview... What I meant (and what I stupidly thought I'd said) was to have a real, typing capable keyboard. The OQO (and most similar machines) have either a thumb-type or index-finger-type mini keyboard (the Zaurus and the Yopy would be other examples of that size), or come without a built-in keyboard at all, which would require some attachable solution (the Sony has/had an attachable, foldable keyboard as part of the package).
After having used first a Palm, then a Yopy for years, I am not fond of either solution. I realized that by going up in size another step, so to speak, I could get essentially a real laptop, with a bigger (easier to see) screen, a "real" keyboard, and better specs, for the same price.
I've looked at that one, as well as the Sony U series, but basically, I've come to the conclusion that I really want a keyboard as well, not a writable screen. So much of what I do involves writing in one form or another. I've ended up ordering one of these instead. Sure, it won't (quite) fit into a coat pocket - you need to have it in your bag - but it is a lot more computer for about the same price.
"Perhaps if slashdotters relied on a software patent as their primary source of income, as I do, they wouldn't be so critical of them."
Not a very good argument, is it?
"Perhaps if slashdotters relied on closed source apps as their primary source of income, as I do, they wouldn't be so critical of them."
"Perhaps if slashdotters relied on heroin sales as their primary source of income, as I do, they wouldn't be so critical of it."
I think the idea was that free use of the patent would be granted for the open source implementation (pretty much a prerequisite of releasing it as OSS, as you point out). If you want to make a closed implementation, you'd have to negotiate licensing as usual.
It is actually Alice and Bob, but there was some problem communicating that info in a reliable manner.
I may go out on a limb here, but I believe sites like that generally do have ordinary telephones already. Just go out into the lobby and call.
Well, I use a Gramin Geko, though that one has a serial cable that I use over USB with a serial-to-USB converter. It works. See if you can access it over the ttyUSB device?
Ubuntu seems like a very promising alternative/friendly face to Debian. They seem to have a very active community already. We'll see how it shapes up after they release.
I've been in the market for a new laptop just now, and I looked long and hard at the PowerBook 12", but in the end, the lack of wireless support made me go elsewhere (a Panasonic "Let's Note" in fact).
It's a shame; the hardware is quite nice, otherwise.
Because it is always worth noting when a company does the right thing, and especially when they usually are deep in the murky end of the ethical pool.
This _may_, hopefully, mean that at some point in the future we may actually see a text reader tablet from them that will allow you to store your own stuff on it - in a standard format such as html - and not just lease content from them. At that point, I'd actually consider buying it.
It is a BankID, which is used on several other sites as well. Won't get rid of it even if I switch banks - and as I reside in Japan right now, switching banks (or doing any banking in person) is pretty much impossible for me.
I won't be upgrading until my bank and other "serious" Swdish websites requires the upgrade for the login/security applet crap I need to run every time. Until then I will not even breathe on the VM or runtime. It is kind of flaky already, and it would be a minor disaster to be locked out of my bank just because that applet stops working.
I did not say "forget about it". I just said, do not attempt to preserve it to the point where you remove the reason for preservation in the first place.
We could put paintings in specially designed steel crates, in a nitrogen atmosphere, weld them shut, encase in uge blocks of concrete and store at the bottom of a mine. That will save them for a long, log time (though not forever). That will also make the works utterly pointless - they may as well have been destroyed for all practical purposes.
An open society makes for an excellent parallel, actually. You should not ignore security (as a broad term) altogether, but if you are too heavy-handed and too intrusive, you end up destroying the very freedoms that you are attempting to preserve.