It serves little to no purpose other than selling newspapers.
And thus you answer your own question. The point of media is not to educate; or inform; or entertain. The point of media is to make money. Note that individuals working in the field may have other priorities, but they will of course only be allowed to pursue those if and when they coincide with the real objective.
Um, what happened when we forgot how to crank-start the engine or manually adjust the spark timing when driving? Has the general loss of knowledge about how to properly use an inkstone led to problems?
Yep, with every new advance in how we interact with the world, we get a loss of knowledge on how we used to do it before. Is that necessarily bad? No.
Some "primitive" knowledge is naturally very important to keep around; indeed, some could save your life. Things like how to use a map and compass (rather than GPS)or how to set and maintain a fire and where to find good shelter.
A lot of forgotten knowledge, however, is best forgotten by anyone but the curious or historically interested. People interested in old writing technologies will certainly want to know all about how to make a quill. I won't ever need to know that, and neither will anybody else.
If manual parking as a skill disappears, well, good riddance. As a matter of fact, if manual _driving_ becomes a thing of the past, I would not shed any tears, unlikely as that would be considering the psychological factors of driving.
what _specifically_ did it do that made it not worthwhile? you don't just say that for no reason, it offended you somehow.
No, no no - it didn't offend me in any way. It worked quite well, did everything it's supposed to, reasonably fast and stable.
But it didn't do anything that was markedly _better_ than Linux either. As i started with Linux, I find my way around it better than I do a BSD system, and, as I stated, I just did not find any reason to continue with BSD over Linux. Your mileage obviously varies, of course; the reason having multiple systems to choose from is a good idea.
For something a lot closer to FreeBSD in style, you would go with Debian. I don't use Debian, though; again, I have a distro I like and feel comfortable with, and see little reason to change just for the sake of change (I have tried out Debian but, as for FreeBSD, I did not find a reason to stick with it). I have switched distros once, from Slackware to Redhat, around rh6 or so. Having package management was a big enough step forward that it was worth it.
Eventually, if redhat drops the ball on its development and some other distro becomes significantly better, I would change again.
As for compiling the kernel, I just have never had any problems with it. Load the old config file, and just change the specific stuff I want to change from the previous kernel. If it's just a kernel upgrade, I do a "make oldconfig" and it will ask about those parameters (if any) that are new only.
That "shrink the kernel" sport you mention _is_ very unusual today. The vast majority will just want the OS to quietly do its job so they can get on with _their_ job and will stick with whatever kernel they got on installation.
By the way Dr. Moren,...
Whoa, easy on the titles; I'm still not used to that.:)
This is an excellent illustration of what I was saying. "Neater" startup, doesn't enable rpc or nfs by default (could be seen as a drawback for shops using those features). Kernel compilation procedural differences - something that will be done by one user in a hundred? Thousand? And of those doing their own kernel compile, how many will happen to stumble on Linux kernel compilation but not BSD? How many will experience the opposite problem?
This is the point. You bring up a few "sort-of-nice and besides, many Linux distros have them as well" kind of stuff. Again, considering that so much software is written with Linux, rather than BSD, in mind, for most it is very doubtful if it is worth it.
I have tried FreeBSD. It was nice. It was not really worth it, though.
Well, for most users, there is very little difference in stability between Linux and xxxBSD - whatever difference there is will only be noticeable in a server farm setting, and perhaps not even there.
And then, today, most Unix apps are being written for Linux. Of course, it's quite easy to port them or run them in a Linux compatibility environment, but if 90% of the visible apps you run are for Linux to begin with, then why run anything else? This is btw a reason I don't understand the excitement about Wine - it's good for keeping one, maybe two legacy applications when moving to Unix, but if you end up spending your day in Word and Outlook under Wine it's really easier and simpler to just stay with Windows.
What I am saying is that there is no _compelling_ reason for the vast majority of users and admins to pick a BSD rather than Linux. There may be some minor benefits, but there are some drawbacks as well.
Um, how do you manage to spend 400e a month on food?:)
I spend about e160 or so on groceries. One thing - I rarely eat out, and when I do it is as a social thing. Restaurant food tends to become all the same, it is expensive and it's a lot less healthy than stuff you make yourself.
That I really enjoy cooking may have something to do with my relatively low costs as well - I like doing things from raw ingredients rather than premade stuff, I like to bake, and I do tend to take advantage of temporary offers and such. If I find good quality minced meat for sale, for example, I may make a huge pot of chili (well, my interpretation of chili) and freeze in portions, and so on.
I don't have a car, but I do have a motorcycle. That said, Lund is small enough that I usually walk wherever I need to go. And clothing, well, let's just say I am a computer nerd turned scientist - as long as it doesn't have holes in embarrassing places it's still good to wear.:)
Again, my - for you - low monthly costs (not including rent and stuff, of course) is not due to a lack of income - I really do live pretty much exactly the way I want. Raise my income and I would just end up saving more each month.
Well, either that, or the US will gradually fade into a relatively poor has-been over the next generation or so (unlikely though it is).
Thing is, protectionism does not help in the long run.
Say you stop the movement of IT services abroad. Those Indian programmers aren't going to shrug and go do something else just because of a lack of US customers. They will find other IT stuff to do, cheap. Industries in other countries will benefit from this lower cost (and don't forget that for most of the US industry, this outsorcing is a basically good thing).
Meanwhile, US industries are still paying through the nose for their IT stuff. They will have a more difficult time exporting to other countries. And they will get squeezed by foreign companies underbidding them in _their_ area, since their competitors have lower costs. You have just moved the pressure from the IT industry to other industries. Of course, you could add protectionist measures to protect them as well, but each time you do so, it will give rise to punitive measures from other countries, making it even more difficult to export anything.
Look at the steel tariff debacle. It has ended up hurting the US economy far more than inexpensive imported steel ever did.
Hey, I'm Swedish - I root for the Indians any day. From a third-party perspective, that money does a lot more good in a poor country than in a rich one. For that matter, if it was between Sweden and India, I'd root for India as well.
I work in science, and as a researcher, moving to the job is not only a fact of life, but a requirement to get anywhere, career-wise. And yes, you need to accept whatever local salary and job conditions you are offered. I am shortly moving to Japan for a while, and will get a - for me - very good salary (well, it's a stipend, so no pension benefits or anything. Oh well.). Would I go to an Indian university, I'd accept the corresponding hit in payment. I have a bit of a difficult time feeling great symphaty for people making $50k a year bemoaning that they may have to move abroad to get a job, or that their employers are looking at cheaper options.
Um, it doesn't add up. 14k is a little over $1000 a month. That is about twice what I use for the same kind of things each month here in Sweden (and it's not because I couldn't afford to spend more, I just don't need it). Groceries, transportation, the occasional night out and so on. And note that a lot of stuff like that is more expensive here than in the US.
I think you and I may have a very different view of what constitutes unpleasant living.
To put the 100k in perspective for me, I have a PhD and my salary as a researcher is at around $30k.
Not only will people be unhappy - all those people not using whatever is "chosen" will merrily ignore that choice and continue to push their preferred desktop, writing apps, and so on.
You would accomplish exactly nothing, except polarize the community even further over this issue. All those areas where we do have a standard (and they are a lot of them by now), have been accomplished by everybody involved in the development coming to a consensus - no a majority decision - before establishing the standard.
And I do not see anybody coming to a consensus over the desktop as a whole now or ever.
If we offer something that is very much like Windows, then why switch at all? OS/2 was a better Windows than Windows, and it died on the desktop.
In my view, offering something where _you_ choose what it is going to be like, is a compelling argument. You are deployer for tenthousand desktops in your organization? Customize the hell out of the desktop, making it do - and not do - exactly what your employees need. You a 133t |-|4xx0r? Throw enough Enlightenment and other eye candy at your machine to choke a rhinoscerus. You a small business owner? Just go with the defaults for your distro and everything will work fine.
Another classical warning I've seen was on my previous motorcycle.
There was a prominent sticker telling me not to lock the steering head lock while driving. It felt a little unnseccesary, considering you had to turn off the engine (to get the key out) and be able to reach forward to the side of the steering head with a small, fiddly key, all while keeping the steering fully turned to one side, as that's the only position where that lock will actually engage.
If you are able to actually do this, you don't need a warning sticker - you need a television contract.
Actually, Ie done that with a pizza. It came in a sort of plastic tray with a tear-off plastic cover. The instructions was to "remove the cover and put the pizza in the oven". I was tired, unfocused (and had had quite a few beers), so I removed the plastic cover, and put the pizza in the oven - still in the plastic tray.
It takes quite a bit of work to get rid of melted, burnt, pizza-flavoured plastic from an oven.
Yep, our company (www.area17.nu) is pretty much all Linux by now. Of course, the entire outfit consists of me and two other people so it might not have quite the impact you have:)
Ugh, don't say that. I'm moving to Japan and am utterly dependent on a continuous flow of good quality coffee during the day.
I mean, that price is ridiculous. Decent quality Arabica goes for about $3 for 500g here - that would make coffee ten times more expensive in Japan. Maybe I should just fill my suitcases with coffee instead of clothing and stuff...
Yep. It's hot. Blowing on it, sipping _very_ carefully in the beginning, until it gradually starts to cool off. And, yes, spilling a small amount stings a little. Spilling a whole cup would very likely result in injury.
None of which preclude the fact that it is very good coffee, though.
Thiing is, it's not temperature that is important, it's amount of energy. Small amounts cool very rapidly when ingested and is no problem. A few spilled drops likewise does simply not have the energy to do any damage. Get a whole pot over you on the other hand and it's certainly emergency services time - which is why it's so important to have child-proof stuff in the kitchen, as they are far more likely to get something like a hot coffeepot over themselves than an adult.
But, as adults we are supposed to know better. We are supposed to be able to understand the immediate consequences of our actions and plan accordingly. Putting a flimsy styrofoam cup filled with hot liquid between your legs and start yanking on the lid is not conductive to a continued healthy existence.
Lots of stuff is dangerous, even as they are beneficial in one way or another. Hot liquid can be dangerous. Messing around with high-voltage equipment can be lethal. Many, many things in our environment are sharp, or pointy, or slippery or unsteady, or just plain not designed for a grown person to stand on, climb on, get thrown into or jump over. That's the way this world is. Someone that utterly disregards all built in warnings ("These mower blades really move fast don't they? Maybe I shouldn't put my hands under it while it is running.") will get into deep trouble sooner or later.
Child-proofing the world just leads to a world nobody wants to live in. And it won't help - if we cover the world in impact-absorbing foam, someone will find a way to choke on the foam.
95 degrees Celsius isn't "superheated" - it's the preferred temperature for brewing coffee. Many - especially cheap - home brewers get the temperature too low, with pissy coffee as a result.
Actually, a better way to brew good coffee is one of those push thingies - you boil water, and pour it right over the coffee grounds in the pot, wait maybe 2-3 minutes, then filter and drink. It is still well over 90 degrees at that point. It is also a fine cup of coffee.
So congratulations; thanks to this "reasonable" lawsuit, you can't get a really well-made cup of coffee in the US anymore.
And extrapolating current trends, you don't object to calling the US, Mexico and Canada one country either?
There are a lot of resistence towards too much integration in Europe; not surprising, what with the large cultural, political and linguistic differences. If Europe ever coalesces into one state, it will take quite a lot more than one or two generations. More likely, this will never fully happen.
Not vegetarians - vegans. And it may (at least here) be more about them firebombing meat trucks, chaining themselves to butcher shops and "liberating" minks (which promptly proceed to kill off the local bird population and die from starvation once winter sets in) than with the actual dietary choices.
To put it in another way, some subset of vegetarians, especially vegans, see their choice as a political one, rather than a personal one. And any political movement, especially when radical and extremist, will get negative reactions from those not buying into their agenda - the vast majority of people, in this case.
Yep. There is one fun exercise a class can do to a teacher if they want:
Decide on some desired behavior (the typical example would be standing by the door, and/or standing with the back towards the class). Then, whenever the teacher does something that is a bit like the desired behavior - moves a step or two towards the door, for example, some people should perk up a little, smile a little more and show a little more interest in what the teacher says. If the teacher moves away from the desired goal, do the opposite - lose concentration, look less happy and so on.
_If_ the class does this unobtrusively, so the teacher does not conciously notice something going on, you are likely to have that teacher finishing up the class standing next to the door, talking over his shoulder.
In social animals, such as humans, the most powerful reinforcer of them all is social interaction. It works far better than any other rewarding stimulus.
I partially agree. C++ as a whole is a mess. However, if you treat it as "C++ Lite" or "C with objects" it becomes far more manageable. Yes, polymprphism, operator overloading and templates are powerful concepts. They also tend to bite you in tender areas, no matter how careful you are. Just treat it as C, but with a nifty object type and you will be fine.
In fact, I'd wish the C standard would pick up the good pieces of C++ for the next iteration.
On thge other hand, whenever a submitter does not begin by saying what the subject is all about here on Slashdot, he/she gets flamed to hell and back for not doing so.
On the whole, far better to be a little obvious than a little obscure.
However, it is also a reality of doing business that you treat your customers with some care even when they are in the wrong, particularily when the problem is due to inattention or negligence, rather than willful infringement. Thjat is, you do so if you want to keep them as customers.
To take a better example: your company sells boxes of widgets to another company periodically. One time it turns out the payment hasn't arrived in time - in fact, it's rather late. Do you:
a) call/send a polite letter to your contact wondering what has happened;
b) have the employee handling this customer visit in person, both to affirm the business relationship, and incidentally remark on the unfortunate delay on the latest payment; or
c) sue them for the full amount, interest due and damages, and hang them out in the trade press as criminal assholes.
If you want to continue selling widgets to them, c is not an option - except if they are so small customers they are irrelevant, or you're so confident on you being irreplaceabe that they will continue buying from you no matter what you do.
If you feel the last approach is fine, I wish you good luck if you would ever decide to go into business.
In any case, the real meat of this piece is not that they became disgruntled, but that Linux does work fine as an alternative for a business of their size.
He wasn't objecting to being nonconformant, license-wise. He is objecting to the manner in which he was treated as a customer. He objected to the very heavy-handed way they treated it, and to the way they decided to hang him out publicly as an example. He also objects to the steep fines imposed (without any court sanction), and the way the law in practice makes it impossible for smaller businesses to contest the BSA assertions in court.
_If_ they would attack GPL, and if they had a better argument than "copyright law outlaws more than one copy no matter what the license", and if they prevailed, then yes, things would be messy.
But observe that all this talk - whether claims that they have IP in the kernel, or that GPL is not a valid license - have been just verbal spouting from McBride and his associates (I tactfully refrain from making an observation on the probably body orifice from which this runny flood of crap should come from). There is no lawsuit alleging either. Let me reiterate: They have not claimed this anywhere except in the media.
This does look suspiciously like a way to simply talk up the stock price, and to send up smokescreens to take focus away from the contract dispute that they _do_ have with IBM.
Slashdot Mirror
It serves little to no purpose other than selling newspapers.
And thus you answer your own question. The point of media is not to educate; or inform; or entertain. The point of media is to make money. Note that individuals working in the field may have other priorities, but they will of course only be allowed to pursue those if and when they coincide with the real objective.
Um, what happened when we forgot how to crank-start the engine or manually adjust the spark timing when driving? Has the general loss of knowledge about how to properly use an inkstone led to problems?
Yep, with every new advance in how we interact with the world, we get a loss of knowledge on how we used to do it before. Is that necessarily bad? No.
Some "primitive" knowledge is naturally very important to keep around; indeed, some could save your life. Things like how to use a map and compass (rather than GPS)or how to set and maintain a fire and where to find good shelter.
A lot of forgotten knowledge, however, is best forgotten by anyone but the curious or historically interested. People interested in old writing technologies will certainly want to know all about how to make a quill. I won't ever need to know that, and neither will anybody else.
If manual parking as a skill disappears, well, good riddance. As a matter of fact, if manual _driving_ becomes a thing of the past, I would not shed any tears, unlikely as that would be considering the psychological factors of driving.
what _specifically_ did it do that made it not worthwhile? you don't just say that for no reason, it offended you somehow.
...
:)
No, no no - it didn't offend me in any way. It worked quite well, did everything it's supposed to, reasonably fast and stable.
But it didn't do anything that was markedly _better_ than Linux either. As i started with Linux, I find my way around it better than I do a BSD system, and, as I stated, I just did not find any reason to continue with BSD over Linux. Your mileage obviously varies, of course; the reason having multiple systems to choose from is a good idea.
For something a lot closer to FreeBSD in style, you would go with Debian. I don't use Debian, though; again, I have a distro I like and feel comfortable with, and see little reason to change just for the sake of change (I have tried out Debian but, as for FreeBSD, I did not find a reason to stick with it). I have switched distros once, from Slackware to Redhat, around rh6 or so. Having package management was a big enough step forward that it was worth it.
Eventually, if redhat drops the ball on its development and some other distro becomes significantly better, I would change again.
As for compiling the kernel, I just have never had any problems with it. Load the old config file, and just change the specific stuff I want to change from the previous kernel. If it's just a kernel upgrade, I do a "make oldconfig" and it will ask about those parameters (if any) that are new only.
That "shrink the kernel" sport you mention _is_ very unusual today. The vast majority will just want the OS to quietly do its job so they can get on with _their_ job and will stick with whatever kernel they got on installation.
By the way Dr. Moren,
Whoa, easy on the titles; I'm still not used to that.
This is an excellent illustration of what I was saying. "Neater" startup, doesn't enable rpc or nfs by default (could be seen as a drawback for shops using those features). Kernel compilation procedural differences - something that will be done by one user in a hundred? Thousand? And of those doing their own kernel compile, how many will happen to stumble on Linux kernel compilation but not BSD? How many will experience the opposite problem?
This is the point. You bring up a few "sort-of-nice and besides, many Linux distros have them as well" kind of stuff. Again, considering that so much software is written with Linux, rather than BSD, in mind, for most it is very doubtful if it is worth it.
I have tried FreeBSD. It was nice. It was not really worth it, though.
Well, for most users, there is very little difference in stability between Linux and xxxBSD - whatever difference there is will only be noticeable in a server farm setting, and perhaps not even there.
And then, today, most Unix apps are being written for Linux. Of course, it's quite easy to port them or run them in a Linux compatibility environment, but if 90% of the visible apps you run are for Linux to begin with, then why run anything else? This is btw a reason I don't understand the excitement about Wine - it's good for keeping one, maybe two legacy applications when moving to Unix, but if you end up spending your day in Word and Outlook under Wine it's really easier and simpler to just stay with Windows.
What I am saying is that there is no _compelling_ reason for the vast majority of users and admins to pick a BSD rather than Linux. There may be some minor benefits, but there are some drawbacks as well.
Um, how do you manage to spend 400e a month on food? :)
:)
I spend about e160 or so on groceries. One thing - I rarely eat out, and when I do it is as a social thing. Restaurant food tends to become all the same, it is expensive and it's a lot less healthy than stuff you make yourself.
That I really enjoy cooking may have something to do with my relatively low costs as well - I like doing things from raw ingredients rather than premade stuff, I like to bake, and I do tend to take advantage of temporary offers and such. If I find good quality minced meat for sale, for example, I may make a huge pot of chili (well, my interpretation of chili) and freeze in portions, and so on.
I don't have a car, but I do have a motorcycle. That said, Lund is small enough that I usually walk wherever I need to go. And clothing, well, let's just say I am a computer nerd turned scientist - as long as it doesn't have holes in embarrassing places it's still good to wear.
Again, my - for you - low monthly costs (not including rent and stuff, of course) is not due to a lack of income - I really do live pretty much exactly the way I want. Raise my income and I would just end up saving more each month.
Well, either that, or the US will gradually fade into a relatively poor has-been over the next generation or so (unlikely though it is).
Thing is, protectionism does not help in the long run.
Say you stop the movement of IT services abroad. Those Indian programmers aren't going to shrug and go do something else just because of a lack of US customers. They will find other IT stuff to do, cheap. Industries in other countries will benefit from this lower cost (and don't forget that for most of the US industry, this outsorcing is a basically good thing).
Meanwhile, US industries are still paying through the nose for their IT stuff. They will have a more difficult time exporting to other countries. And they will get squeezed by foreign companies underbidding them in _their_ area, since their competitors have lower costs. You have just moved the pressure from the IT industry to other industries. Of course, you could add protectionist measures to protect them as well, but each time you do so, it will give rise to punitive measures from other countries, making it even more difficult to export anything.
Look at the steel tariff debacle. It has ended up hurting the US economy far more than inexpensive imported steel ever did.
Hey, I'm Swedish - I root for the Indians any day. From a third-party perspective, that money does a lot more good in a poor country than in a rich one. For that matter, if it was between Sweden and India, I'd root for India as well.
I work in science, and as a researcher, moving to the job is not only a fact of life, but a requirement to get anywhere, career-wise. And yes, you need to accept whatever local salary and job conditions you are offered. I am shortly moving to Japan for a while, and will get a - for me - very good salary (well, it's a stipend, so no pension benefits or anything. Oh well.). Would I go to an Indian university, I'd accept the corresponding hit in payment. I have a bit of a difficult time feeling great symphaty for people making $50k a year bemoaning that they may have to move abroad to get a job, or that their employers are looking at cheaper options.
Um, it doesn't add up. 14k is a little over $1000 a month. That is about twice what I use for the same kind of things each month here in Sweden (and it's not because I couldn't afford to spend more, I just don't need it). Groceries, transportation, the occasional night out and so on. And note that a lot of stuff like that is more expensive here than in the US.
I think you and I may have a very different view of what constitutes unpleasant living.
To put the 100k in perspective for me, I have a PhD and my salary as a researcher is at around $30k.
Not only will people be unhappy - all those people not using whatever is "chosen" will merrily ignore that choice and continue to push their preferred desktop, writing apps, and so on.
You would accomplish exactly nothing, except polarize the community even further over this issue. All those areas where we do have a standard (and they are a lot of them by now), have been accomplished by everybody involved in the development coming to a consensus - no a majority decision - before establishing the standard.
And I do not see anybody coming to a consensus over the desktop as a whole now or ever.
If we offer something that is very much like Windows, then why switch at all? OS/2 was a better Windows than Windows, and it died on the desktop.
In my view, offering something where _you_ choose what it is going to be like, is a compelling argument. You are deployer for tenthousand desktops in your organization? Customize the hell out of the desktop, making it do - and not do - exactly what your employees need. You a 133t |-|4xx0r? Throw enough Enlightenment and other eye candy at your machine to choke a rhinoscerus. You a small business owner? Just go with the defaults for your distro and everything will work fine.
Another classical warning I've seen was on my previous motorcycle.
There was a prominent sticker telling me not to lock the steering head lock while driving. It felt a little unnseccesary, considering you had to turn off the engine (to get the key out) and be able to reach forward to the side of the steering head with a small, fiddly key, all while keeping the steering fully turned to one side, as that's the only position where that lock will actually engage.
If you are able to actually do this, you don't need a warning sticker - you need a television contract.
Actually, Ie done that with a pizza. It came in a sort of plastic tray with a tear-off plastic cover. The instructions was to "remove the cover and put the pizza in the oven". I was tired, unfocused (and had had quite a few beers), so I removed the plastic cover, and put the pizza in the oven - still in the plastic tray.
It takes quite a bit of work to get rid of melted, burnt, pizza-flavoured plastic from an oven.
Yep, our company (www.area17.nu) is pretty much all Linux by now. Of course, the entire outfit consists of me and two other people so it might not have quite the impact you have :)
Ugh, don't say that. I'm moving to Japan and am utterly dependent on a continuous flow of good quality coffee during the day.
I mean, that price is ridiculous. Decent quality Arabica goes for about $3 for 500g here - that would make coffee ten times more expensive in Japan. Maybe I should just fill my suitcases with coffee instead of clothing and stuff...
Yep. It's hot. Blowing on it, sipping _very_ carefully in the beginning, until it gradually starts to cool off. And, yes, spilling a small amount stings a little. Spilling a whole cup would very likely result in injury.
None of which preclude the fact that it is very good coffee, though.
Thiing is, it's not temperature that is important, it's amount of energy. Small amounts cool very rapidly when ingested and is no problem. A few spilled drops likewise does simply not have the energy to do any damage. Get a whole pot over you on the other hand and it's certainly emergency services time - which is why it's so important to have child-proof stuff in the kitchen, as they are far more likely to get something like a hot coffeepot over themselves than an adult.
But, as adults we are supposed to know better. We are supposed to be able to understand the immediate consequences of our actions and plan accordingly. Putting a flimsy styrofoam cup filled with hot liquid between your legs and start yanking on the lid is not conductive to a continued healthy existence.
Lots of stuff is dangerous, even as they are beneficial in one way or another. Hot liquid can be dangerous. Messing around with high-voltage equipment can be lethal. Many, many things in our environment are sharp, or pointy, or slippery or unsteady, or just plain not designed for a grown person to stand on, climb on, get thrown into or jump over. That's the way this world is. Someone that utterly disregards all built in warnings ("These mower blades really move fast don't they? Maybe I shouldn't put my hands under it while it is running.") will get into deep trouble sooner or later.
Child-proofing the world just leads to a world nobody wants to live in. And it won't help - if we cover the world in impact-absorbing foam, someone will find a way to choke on the foam.
95 degrees Celsius isn't "superheated" - it's the preferred temperature for brewing coffee. Many - especially cheap - home brewers get the temperature too low, with pissy coffee as a result.
Actually, a better way to brew good coffee is one of those push thingies - you boil water, and pour it right over the coffee grounds in the pot, wait maybe 2-3 minutes, then filter and drink. It is still well over 90 degrees at that point. It is also a fine cup of coffee.
So congratulations; thanks to this "reasonable" lawsuit, you can't get a really well-made cup of coffee in the US anymore.
And extrapolating current trends, you don't object to calling the US, Mexico and Canada one country either?
There are a lot of resistence towards too much integration in Europe; not surprising, what with the large cultural, political and linguistic differences. If Europe ever coalesces into one state, it will take quite a lot more than one or two generations. More likely, this will never fully happen.
Not vegetarians - vegans. And it may (at least here) be more about them firebombing meat trucks, chaining themselves to butcher shops and "liberating" minks (which promptly proceed to kill off the local bird population and die from starvation once winter sets in) than with the actual dietary choices.
To put it in another way, some subset of vegetarians, especially vegans, see their choice as a political one, rather than a personal one. And any political movement, especially when radical and extremist, will get negative reactions from those not buying into their agenda - the vast majority of people, in this case.
Yep. There is one fun exercise a class can do to a teacher if they want:
Decide on some desired behavior (the typical example would be standing by the door, and/or standing with the back towards the class). Then, whenever the teacher does something that is a bit like the desired behavior - moves a step or two towards the door, for example, some people should perk up a little, smile a little more and show a little more interest in what the teacher says. If the teacher moves away from the desired goal, do the opposite - lose concentration, look less happy and so on.
_If_ the class does this unobtrusively, so the teacher does not conciously notice something going on, you are likely to have that teacher finishing up the class standing next to the door, talking over his shoulder.
In social animals, such as humans, the most powerful reinforcer of them all is social interaction. It works far better than any other rewarding stimulus.
I partially agree. C++ as a whole is a mess. However, if you treat it as "C++ Lite" or "C with objects" it becomes far more manageable. Yes, polymprphism, operator overloading and templates are powerful concepts. They also tend to bite you in tender areas, no matter how careful you are. Just treat it as C, but with a nifty object type and you will be fine.
In fact, I'd wish the C standard would pick up the good pieces of C++ for the next iteration.
On thge other hand, whenever a submitter does not begin by saying what the subject is all about here on Slashdot, he/she gets flamed to hell and back for not doing so.
On the whole, far better to be a little obvious than a little obscure.
I understand what you are saying.
However, it is also a reality of doing business that you treat your customers with some care even when they are in the wrong, particularily when the problem is due to inattention or negligence, rather than willful infringement. Thjat is, you do so if you want to keep them as customers.
To take a better example: your company sells boxes of widgets to another company periodically. One time it turns out the payment hasn't arrived in time - in fact, it's rather late. Do you:
a) call/send a polite letter to your contact wondering what has happened;
b) have the employee handling this customer visit in person, both to affirm the business relationship, and incidentally remark on the unfortunate delay on the latest payment; or
c) sue them for the full amount, interest due and damages, and hang them out in the trade press as criminal assholes.
If you want to continue selling widgets to them, c is not an option - except if they are so small customers they are irrelevant, or you're so confident on you being irreplaceabe that they will continue buying from you no matter what you do.
If you feel the last approach is fine, I wish you good luck if you would ever decide to go into business.
In any case, the real meat of this piece is not that they became disgruntled, but that Linux does work fine as an alternative for a business of their size.
Just to get the story _really_ straight:
He wasn't objecting to being nonconformant, license-wise. He is objecting to the manner in which he was treated as a customer. He objected to the very heavy-handed way they treated it, and to the way they decided to hang him out publicly as an example. He also objects to the steep fines imposed (without any court sanction), and the way the law in practice makes it impossible for smaller businesses to contest the BSA assertions in court.
_If_ they would attack GPL, and if they had a better argument than "copyright law outlaws more than one copy no matter what the license", and if they prevailed, then yes, things would be messy.
But observe that all this talk - whether claims that they have IP in the kernel, or that GPL is not a valid license - have been just verbal spouting from McBride and his associates (I tactfully refrain from making an observation on the probably body orifice from which this runny flood of crap should come from). There is no lawsuit alleging either. Let me reiterate: They have not claimed this anywhere except in the media.
This does look suspiciously like a way to simply talk up the stock price, and to send up smokescreens to take focus away from the contract dispute that they _do_ have with IBM.