The point is that GNU/Linux has a wonderful and reliable installation system: compile from source. Now that machines are getting more and more "powerful", things like Gentoo are long awaited dreams came true.
If you're not producing free software/open source, then you're not welcome in the GNU/Linux world. I know this just sounds mean. But it's a philosophy that started this all (Linus after declared to have used the GPL not as an ideological "path" to follow, but as a way to get his "Linux" to spread as fast as possible, so you see there's space for commercial developers too), and it's philosophy that'll keep it running.
Now, you're free to dismiss these things as "crap" from a stallmanian advocate of Free Software, but I think that the importance of the source code in terms of: adaptability, performance once compiled and speed when finding/fixing bugs, isn't arguable.
GNU/Linux doesn't mean changing OS. It does mean changing the system things go along. Proprietary programs under it will _always_ struggle. Period. Don't you like it? Use M$ Windows.
Btw, I've seen some closed-source apps coming with their installer, which did a rather good job. "APIs" for an installation are a Windows concept... if you know *n?x syscalls, you're on the go, sir! (And they almost never change, too, as Stevens loves to remember!) In this sense, compiling from source assure you that you don't depend on other crap, things that if tomorrow they'll change, they'll roast your butt, pardon my klatchian. You really need just a four line script:
- #!/bin/sh
- cd packagenamedir
-./configure
- make && su -c "make install" && make distclean
Have dependencies to check? Use emerge, then. You just need to change a couple of lines in the ebuild every new release you do, not a lot of an effort after all...
Windows can still run apps from 1991.
This is quite false. It can run SOME apps from 1991 (I assume that you're speaking about Win2000 and XP, both relying on NT technology), but they're not so much. HAL can be a great thing, but it has its problems, expecially when emulating DOS code from 1991 (yes, in 1991 DOS was still there), and my old Compaq TabWorks for Win3.11 doesn't run on new Windowses. The APIs have bloated and changed with time and, as a result, I remember that a lot of programmers, when XP and 2000 came out, had to let available _two_ versions of their programs. And also old programs for "numerical control machines" (sorry, i ain't english, and so i don't know if this is their english real name) that run in win95 won't run on win98 (thing that i had discovered at my expenses in about 30h of work in 2 days)!
Moreover, Microsoft for a lot of years (at least until NT tech did not prevail, and that was in 2002, but remember the number of users still using Win98) only shipped for x86. GNU/Linux (or *BSD, for example) was able to run on: ppc, x86, x86_64, arm, sparc, mips, ppc64, amd64, hppa... (vcr, cell phones, ovens...:p).
You can't expect the Linux desktop to become standard if it doesn't embrace any standards itself
Yep, you're right (and that's the reason why w3c standard compliant html isn't displayed properly in IE). Standards are there to help you, I agree. They're called: IEEE, ANSI, POSIX... not "new API for an installation method". And if you refer, as many others, as thing as "why there have to be 6 different mail readers to choose between, when i need just one?" then it's the same old story. I like to have the possibility to choose. I don't use Windows also because of that.
SuSE pared down the complexity but suffered from initially puzzling settings (icons on its desktop respond to single clicks instead of double clicks).
Actually double-click is patented, don't you know that!?
Ye gods, single-click SHOULD be the default for anyone that doesn't want a carpal tunnel syndrom in a couple of mouse kilometers. Thanks Billy to force us to use it. Amen.
This article has been prepared for tomorrow edition of an Italian leftist newspaper, L'Unità.
Maybe there's a little bit of populism about that too (actually, there is a lot: L'Unità has always expressed its bad feelings with the Bush family and decisions), but it's interesting seeing that:
a) Someone there often reads Slashdot (this isn't the first article appearing the same day in both places)
b) Although they can't spell "Mozilla" in the right way, they give a try to explain what are the advantages of Free Software over proprietary one (doing a little bit of confusion with OpenSource, but unfortunately we're used to that here in Italy)
ActiveX was meant to make it easy to add the latest interactive multimedia and other features to sites, but instead it's become a tool for sneaking spyware onto unsuspecting PCs.
Now, we all know that ActiveX, a technology that has been around for years and years, is perfectly insecure. Moreover, now there are other ways to do most things that ActiveX achieves: Java apps, server side scripting (with, let's say, PHP) and many more. Secure ones.
So what? We have better alternatives. Microsoft obviously won't drop ActiveX support from IE until someone still asks for it. Then, the problem is with companies and sites that make use of them.
It's strange that someone would still be using something that's not portable, and an increasing audience won't be able to benefit from (if they follow CERT raccomandations, at least:).
At last, I think that sooner or later ActiveX will disappear (given Microsoft doesn't try some horrible marketing move), because no-one wise will use it. Many users have been educated to click "NO" to those popups requiring you to install a BHO... so new site will have an hard battle against users' suspicion. The problem here is: will Microsoft let this happen, or has it some interest in keeping a buggy technology alive?
I remember it were just for one reason I switched to Mozilla Suite (no, Firefox just doesn't suits me;): they don't have the possibility to use ActiveX.
PS: also the pop-up blocking thingie has been useful, but I am a Mozilla user since before it was introduced.
Oh, good, so if you use Linux, then we prevent you from access our update. They still think that people will erase their linux partitions and keep the others, but people aren't the same of 4 yrs ago...
Maybe I'm just a little bit paranoic, but... isn't all this a little bit too ``intrusive''?
I mean, that ``me windows, me download, me install''...
In short time we'll start to read strange messages from a infamous clip saying: ``who's your daddy?'' and ``my name's bredd, and i'm the law'' and windows will also tell you where you want to go today, tomorrow and all the other days of the week (including holidays). Period.
A more serious note: WCS (or how it's called) isn't Yet Another Way to tie software makers to Microsoft? Companies will surely need a certificate from Redmond for their app if they want to be listed (or else, we would find ``p0rn critical updates'' there in no time). Does this brings in some more non-clear, non-disclosure, expensive and absurd agreements for developers?
And... do they really think all this will help security??? More features means more ways to hijack something, haven't they learnt? So now they should worry about worms that affect Internet Explorer AND that stupid security center AND their firewall AND...etc. Thank you Bill&Steve for delivering us a lot of new ways to send a Windows machine down the malware's privy.
----
In the end: Call me stupid, but I won't get back from my tux world.
I was 12, it was eight yrs ago, and I was truly inexperienced. I opened "MS-DOS prompt" in Win95 to change some files attributes... so I did:
attrib \s +s c:\<space>\path\filename.ext
...and hit "enter".
Random results at reboot (really really strange, try it if you've a day off:), and a consequential mega-format on my 486DX4. Without Windows disks.
Then I learnt: Take Yer Time With That Spacebar.
I passed to GNU/Linux.
rm -Rf / var/log/*
;)
Re:C AND C++ ARE THE WORST LANGUAGES EVER DEVELOPE
on
Practical C++
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
In fact, Mr. Knuth wrote "The Art Of Computer Programming" with MIX...
Anyway, for those who love java and such languages... you simply like them because you don't have to know what you're doing. I say: first learn C or C++ AND assembly, then learn java (or other high-level languages), so you'll have a grasp on what the compiler/interpreter does with what you write, and you'll understand the other ones fully. Don't hate pointers... they're your best friend.
Btw, why do you think that c and c++ are so widely used still today, if they suck so much?
I haven't said it's fair, or understandable. It's just italian law.;)
Taken to the letter, I admit it, but this is true. Theorically (but you've got to find a good lawyer to sue someone on this) it's also forbidden listening to music with a stereo in public places, since it's violating the law that "forbids the reproduction of copyrighted music in public places, for money or for free" to an audience. You can just listen to it indoor, at home ("domestic usage"), but watching it with your family is already a violation of the law.
Beware, if you listen music with your portable cd player in bus... if someone doesn't like it, then he can denounce you to SIAE!:)
------
2004 : twenty years after 1984. Things got improved. For worse.
"Can the RIAA sue me for listening to a song I hear on my friends CD player if I have not purchased the song? Of course not."
Well, I ain't sure the RIAA. But I know that here in Italy the SIAE can do it for sure. Obviously, they cannot check _everyone_, but they have the power to do so, if they will. Think about that.
Slashdot Mirror
As long as they have cookie support. Links didn't, if I reckon correctly.
The point is that GNU/Linux has a wonderful and reliable installation system: compile from source. Now that machines are getting more and more "powerful", things like Gentoo are long awaited dreams came true.
./configure
:p).
If you're not producing free software/open source, then you're not welcome in the GNU/Linux world. I know this just sounds mean. But it's a philosophy that started this all (Linus after declared to have used the GPL not as an ideological "path" to follow, but as a way to get his "Linux" to spread as fast as possible, so you see there's space for commercial developers too), and it's philosophy that'll keep it running.
Now, you're free to dismiss these things as "crap" from a stallmanian advocate of Free Software, but I think that the importance of the source code in terms of: adaptability, performance once compiled and speed when finding/fixing bugs, isn't arguable.
GNU/Linux doesn't mean changing OS. It does mean changing the system things go along. Proprietary programs under it will _always_ struggle. Period. Don't you like it? Use M$ Windows. Btw, I've seen some closed-source apps coming with their installer, which did a rather good job. "APIs" for an installation are a Windows concept... if you know *n?x syscalls, you're on the go, sir! (And they almost never change, too, as Stevens loves to remember!)
In this sense, compiling from source assure you that you don't depend on other crap, things that if tomorrow they'll change, they'll roast your butt, pardon my klatchian.
You really need just a four line script:
- #!/bin/sh
- cd packagenamedir
-
- make && su -c "make install" && make distclean
Have dependencies to check? Use emerge, then. You just need to change a couple of lines in the ebuild every new release you do, not a lot of an effort after all...
Windows can still run apps from 1991.
This is quite false. It can run SOME apps from 1991 (I assume that you're speaking about Win2000 and XP, both relying on NT technology), but they're not so much.
HAL can be a great thing, but it has its problems, expecially when emulating DOS code from 1991 (yes, in 1991 DOS was still there), and my old Compaq TabWorks for Win3.11 doesn't run on new Windowses.
The APIs have bloated and changed with time and, as a result, I remember that a lot of programmers, when XP and 2000 came out, had to let available _two_ versions of their programs. And also old programs for "numerical control machines" (sorry, i ain't english, and so i don't know if this is their english real name) that run in win95 won't run on win98 (thing that i had discovered at my expenses in about 30h of work in 2 days)!
Moreover, Microsoft for a lot of years (at least until NT tech did not prevail, and that was in 2002, but remember the number of users still using Win98) only shipped for x86. GNU/Linux (or *BSD, for example) was able to run on: ppc, x86, x86_64, arm, sparc, mips, ppc64, amd64, hppa... (vcr, cell phones, ovens...
You can't expect the Linux desktop to become standard if it doesn't embrace any standards itself
Yep, you're right (and that's the reason why w3c standard compliant html isn't displayed properly in IE). Standards are there to help you, I agree. They're called: IEEE, ANSI, POSIX... not "new API for an installation method". And if you refer, as many others, as thing as "why there have to be 6 different mail readers to choose between, when i need just one?" then it's the same old story. I like to have the possibility to choose. I don't use Windows also because of that.
Source code. Create once. Runs (almost) everywhere.
SuSE pared down the complexity but suffered from initially puzzling settings (icons on its desktop respond to single clicks instead of double clicks).
Actually double-click is patented, don't you know that!?
Ye gods, single-click SHOULD be the default for anyone that doesn't want a carpal tunnel syndrom in a couple of mouse kilometers. Thanks Billy to force us to use it. Amen.
This article has been prepared for tomorrow edition of an Italian leftist newspaper, L'Unità.
Maybe there's a little bit of populism about that too (actually, there is a lot: L'Unità has always expressed its bad feelings with the Bush family and decisions), but it's interesting seeing that:
a) Someone there often reads Slashdot (this isn't the first article appearing the same day in both places)
b) Although they can't spell "Mozilla" in the right way, they give a try to explain what are the advantages of Free Software over proprietary one (doing a little bit of confusion with OpenSource, but unfortunately we're used to that here in Italy)
Well, some conscience is far better than none.
If you're an italian speaker, here's the link.
They're working to fix this, both with white-lists and other improvements. Some of them should already be in the trunk. Try searching bugzilla.
Even here, a note is made about ActiveX:
:).
;): they don't have the possibility to use ActiveX.
ActiveX was meant to make it easy to add the latest interactive multimedia and other features to sites, but instead it's become a tool for sneaking spyware onto unsuspecting PCs.
Now, we all know that ActiveX, a technology that has been around for years and years, is perfectly insecure. Moreover, now there are other ways to do most things that ActiveX achieves: Java apps, server side scripting (with, let's say, PHP) and many more. Secure ones.
So what? We have better alternatives. Microsoft obviously won't drop ActiveX support from IE until someone still asks for it. Then, the problem is with companies and sites that make use of them.
It's strange that someone would still be using something that's not portable, and an increasing audience won't be able to benefit from (if they follow CERT raccomandations, at least
At last, I think that sooner or later ActiveX will disappear (given Microsoft doesn't try some horrible marketing move), because no-one wise will use it. Many users have been educated to click "NO" to those popups requiring you to install a BHO... so new site will have an hard battle against users' suspicion. The problem here is: will Microsoft let this happen, or has it some interest in keeping a buggy technology alive?
I remember it were just for one reason I switched to Mozilla Suite (no, Firefox just doesn't suits me
PS: also the pop-up blocking thingie has been useful, but I am a Mozilla user since before it was introduced.
Oh, good, so if you use Linux, then we prevent you from access our update.
They still think that people will erase their linux partitions and keep the others, but people aren't the same of 4 yrs ago...
Maybe I'm just a little bit paranoic, but... isn't all this a little bit too ``intrusive''?
...etc. Thank you Bill&Steve for delivering us a lot of new ways to send a Windows machine down the malware's privy.
I mean, that ``me windows, me download, me install''...
In short time we'll start to read strange messages from a infamous clip saying: ``who's your daddy?'' and ``my name's bredd, and i'm the law'' and windows will also tell you where you want to go today, tomorrow and all the other days of the week (including holidays).
Period.
A more serious note: WCS (or how it's called) isn't Yet Another Way to tie software makers to Microsoft? Companies will surely need a certificate from Redmond for their app if they want to be listed (or else, we would find ``p0rn critical updates'' there in no time). Does this brings in some more non-clear, non-disclosure, expensive and absurd agreements for developers?
And... do they really think all this will help security??? More features means more ways to hijack something, haven't they learnt? So now they should worry about worms that affect Internet Explorer AND that stupid security center AND their firewall AND
----
In the end: Call me stupid, but I won't get back from my tux world.
And my story:
I was 12, it was eight yrs ago, and I was truly inexperienced. I opened "MS-DOS prompt" in Win95 to change some files attributes... so I did:
attrib \s +s
c:\<space>\path\filename.ext
Random results at reboot (really really strange, try it if you've a day off
I passed to GNU/Linux.
In fact, Mr. Knuth wrote "The Art Of Computer Programming" with MIX...
Anyway, for those who love java and such languages... you simply like them because you don't have to know what you're doing. I say: first learn C or C++ AND assembly, then learn java (or other high-level languages), so you'll have a grasp on what the compiler/interpreter does with what you write, and you'll understand the other ones fully. Don't hate pointers... they're your best friend.
Btw, why do you think that c and c++ are so widely used still today, if they suck so much?
I haven't said it's fair, or understandable. It's just italian law. ;)
Taken to the letter, I admit it, but this is true. Theorically (but you've got to find a good lawyer to sue someone on this) it's also forbidden listening to music with a stereo in public places, since it's violating the law that "forbids the reproduction of copyrighted music in public places, for money or for free" to an audience. You can just listen to it indoor, at home ("domestic usage"), but watching it with your family is already a violation of the law.
Beware, if you listen music with your portable cd player in bus... if someone doesn't like it, then he can denounce you to SIAE! :)
------
2004 : twenty years after 1984. Things got improved. For worse.
"Can the RIAA sue me for listening to a song I hear on my friends CD player if I have not purchased the song? Of course not."
Well, I ain't sure the RIAA. But I know that here in Italy the SIAE can do it for sure. Obviously, they cannot check _everyone_, but they have the power to do so, if they will. Think about that.