I stand corrected as well. I do believe that F/OSS (as I will write it correctly frow now on) can be grouped together as part of the intellectual property revolution which is currently taking place, however, I now understand their differences as well. I still stand firmly behind my opinion that successful commercial F/OSS projects are vital to the lives of both the individual movements as well as the greater revolution, but it doesn't appear that you were trying to argue that point as the GP did. I thank you for pointing out my erroneous generalization and politely re-educating me.
Humour (humor in American English)... [yadda yadda]
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Rumour (rumor in American English) is a piece of purportedly true information that is circulated without substantiating evidence. Rumors can range from simple gossip to advanced propaganda techniques. The classic mode of rumor transmission is person-to-person, as in gossip. With the advent of the Internet many rumors have been transmitted via email and more recently blogging, as is the case with various hoaxes and urban legends.
(Ignorant readers see harmless, tongue-in-cheek writing and assume it is factual, then go off and repeat everything they've read trying to sound intelligent. Kind of like a parrot, but dumber. I present as evidence all the people who misunderstand FOSS (see some of my replies) by assuming any software which costs money is inherently evil. My reply was meant only to your words and not yourself. I realized you may or may not have been joking but decided my reply was worth posting for others' benefit if nothing else.)
Your misinterpretation of Richard Stallman's beliefs: commercial software deprives people of vital rights - ie, they are evil
Richard Stallman's own words: ``Free software'' does not mean ``non-commercial''. A free program must be available for commercial use, commercial development, and commercial distribution. Commercial development of free software is no longer unusual; such free commercial software is very important.
FOSS = Free Open Source Software. Free as in Freedom to modify and redistribute software and open source being self-defining. Free software by itself denotes the same thing, using the term FOSS is just being redundant so people realize you don't simple mean free (as in price) software.
Statements like this are hurtful to the FOSS movement. Assuming all commercial interests are inherently evil is ignorant, being able to create profitable, Free (as in FOSS) commercial projects is vital to the survival of the whole movement. The majority of skilled programmers will eventually go where the money is, especially once they have a family, simply not having time to freely (as in $$$) contribute to FOSS projects. In a capitalist world such as we live in, money is life blood. Good-will contributions and free press will only last so long. Once the bandwagon's run out of gas who will be left? People who can make a living in FOSS, that's who.
It actually says "never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups"... its a joke, way to selectively quote it (like you do everything). You should be a journalist.
Maybe you should try reading more carefully. I just gave examples of two completely different patents. One could patent the devices used to create an item. And another (completely different) patent could cover the functions of that same item. Also, why did you feel it was necessary to throw insults all of a sudden. If you need to improve your self esteem there are other (healthier) ways.
You are right, I wrote my post too quickly and didn't review it. I meant to say that although you do not patent a physical item you can patent the devices for creating a physical item. I went on to talk about submitting a detail of how a machine operates and meant to illustrate that as another form of a patent. Thanks for pointing out my inconsistencies. I will read my posts more carefully when I write them.
It did not take the time and effort that a real physical invention (e.g.: a washing machine) requires, and that the inventors of the patent system (who thankfully (or maybe not so) didn't get a patent on their idea...oh wait...) envisaged being required for a patent to be granted.
Someone could invent this from their armchair and it is just a mathematical formula.
You do not patent a physical item, you patent the devices for creating the physical item. Do you think you ship a new washing machine down to the patent office to patent it? No, you submit the technical drawings and a description of the processes used to create the machine, and how the machine operates. Hence processes are what patents are all about. You don't ever have to even create the physical item to patent it, just have the idea. Your arguments on patent law are about as valid as a blind person's critique of a painting.
Collateral damage is a terribly unfortunate side effect of war. I realize that not everyone killed is a member of the military, but collateral damage is still not terrorist action.
Bush and Blair engaged in military action and whether you agree with it or not those killed are members of a military. Comes with the territory. Bin Laden killed 5000 innocent civilians. Your comparison is ridiculous. I suppose you also think that members of the military are terrorists. Or would you prefer baby killers? People like you are what are bringing America down, not right-wing conversatives.
Added note: I'm not a right-wing, religious conservative. I am, however, in the United States Marine Corps.
From the abstract Linus is quoted, calling all you kernel coders a herd of cats.
From the article Torvalds has quipped that his job is a lot like "herding cats."
"Herding cats" is meant to be an oxymoron. Cats operate in small, tight-knit prides and not large herds; they are strong-willed and typically follow their own program. Linus was just trying to convey the difficulty of managing a large group of programmers who all have their own, unique reasons for doing what they do. As is demonstrated time and time again here at/., most nerds have trouble seeing the other side of an argument (read: we always think we're right). This brings about the cat metaphor.
For those who don't RTFA, this might be taken out of context as an insult to kernel contributors. Just wanted to clear that up.
No they don't, they all have centralized servers that at least do a modicum of traffic routing. What I was talking about is just sending out blind packets to find other users and then connect to them. You obviously didn't read what I wrote, but thanks for being a smartass.
Tied down by what? Finish it, GPL it, release it, done deal.
My concept of how it might work:
First, no server application or central server of any kind.
Second, Client application (psuedo-server as well) sends out constant "seeker" packets blindly that it also responds to whenever it receives some. When it receives a response on a seeker packet a connection is established, forming a web of clients. Once 5 or so connections are established, we can stop sending out seeker packets. Do to the nature of the network, once we hit that many connections we have probably "connected" to the entire network.
When a search request is sent out, it goes to the entire network because every client which receives a request sends it out to all their connections as well. Clients with no local matches do nothing after that. Clients that have a local match to the search send a directed response to the initial requestor. Reponses contain enough information to determine which files are identical. Identical responses are all grouped together, and then all responses are sorted based on relevance.
When you choose to download a file, a connection request will be sent out to all those who responded for that file. All available connections are then managed locally (and updated regularly) as individual packet requests are sent out to all responders to the connection request. Once a packet fails 3 or so times that responder is removed from the list of available connections and the packet is requested from someone else.
I typed this quickly at work, so if there are any gross inconsistencies or obvious errors please don't flame me. It's just my idea of how this thing might work.
So, what language do developers use to target this? Is it something elegant designed for the problem at hand?
It's not that an extremely elegant lanuage is needed for an application like this, just that C is too... unelegant. C was created at a time when simplicity, hence speed, was much preferrable to the overhead involved with a more refined language. As times progress though, and computer power continues to grow exponentially, the human factor will eventually be the limiting factor in all of programming. Using managed code and overhead-laden, high-level languages will not produce a noticable speed difference. What will make a difference will be the fact that a programmer is unable to track all his memory allocation and garbage collection or the shared access by 50 separate threads to his data structures.
Does anyone else find it humorous that Robert McHenry's note about Alexander Hamilton's birthday,
While the day and month of Hamilton's birth are known, there is some uncertainty as to the year, whether it be 1755 or 1757. Hamilton himself used, and most contemporary biographers prefer, the latter year.
Is exactly what has been appended into the wikipedia article as a note. Just thought it was kind of funny they used his own text criticizing Wikipedia to update and improve it =)
A completely independent (and expensive) research panel has discovered Kim Jong II's under-fed and over-zealous hordes of hackers are using LINUX to create the latest variants of evil Windows-seeking worms. Not too worry though, high-priority fixes for Mydoom.NK, Bagle.NK and Bugbear.NK will be available via Windows Update within two or three weeks of their catastrophic releases.
Now THAT would be an election like in the old days! Let them fight each other to the death!
Please cite one historical reference of an election where the candidates fought to the death. Exactly which old days are you talking about, 1963 maybe? Even though it's merely a different means to the same end, I still wouldn't consider Johnson's hit on Kennedy an electoral fight to the death..
I believe that comment was referring to the size of PSP games, which would be electronically distrubted bia the PS3 home network edition or whatever they called it. That would make sense (asssuming the games are compressed) because the PSP is supposed to have 30MB of RAM per the same discussion.
Slashdot Mirror
I stand corrected as well. I do believe that F/OSS (as I will write it correctly frow now on) can be grouped together as part of the intellectual property revolution which is currently taking place, however, I now understand their differences as well. I still stand firmly behind my opinion that successful commercial F/OSS projects are vital to the lives of both the individual movements as well as the greater revolution, but it doesn't appear that you were trying to argue that point as the GP did. I thank you for pointing out my erroneous generalization and politely re-educating me.
Humour (humor in American English)... [yadda yadda]
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Rumour (rumor in American English) is a piece of purportedly true information that is circulated without substantiating evidence. Rumors can range from simple gossip to advanced propaganda techniques. The classic mode of rumor transmission is person-to-person, as in gossip. With the advent of the Internet many rumors have been transmitted via email and more recently blogging, as is the case with various hoaxes and urban legends.
(Ignorant readers see harmless, tongue-in-cheek writing and assume it is factual, then go off and repeat everything they've read trying to sound intelligent. Kind of like a parrot, but dumber. I present as evidence all the people who misunderstand FOSS (see some of my replies) by assuming any software which costs money is inherently evil. My reply was meant only to your words and not yourself. I realized you may or may not have been joking but decided my reply was worth posting for others' benefit if nothing else.)
commercial software deprives people of vital rights - ie, they are evil
Richard Stallman's own words:
``Free software'' does not mean ``non-commercial''. A free program must be available for commercial use, commercial development, and commercial distribution. Commercial development of free software is no longer unusual; such free commercial software is very important.
You stand corrected, and might want to review Richard Stallman's definition of Free software.
FOSS = Free Open Source Software. Free as in Freedom to modify and redistribute software and open source being self-defining. Free software by itself denotes the same thing, using the term FOSS is just being redundant so people realize you don't simple mean free (as in price) software.
Statements like this are hurtful to the FOSS movement. Assuming all commercial interests are inherently evil is ignorant, being able to create profitable, Free (as in FOSS) commercial projects is vital to the survival of the whole movement. The majority of skilled programmers will eventually go where the money is, especially once they have a family, simply not having time to freely (as in $$$) contribute to FOSS projects. In a capitalist world such as we live in, money is life blood. Good-will contributions and free press will only last so long. Once the bandwagon's run out of gas who will be left? People who can make a living in FOSS, that's who.
I was correcting your translation of the Spanish. I assumed you could read the English portion of it. Maybe I give you too much credit?
It actually says "never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups" ... its a joke, way to selectively quote it (like you do everything). You should be a journalist.
Maybe you should try reading more carefully. I just gave examples of two completely different patents. One could patent the devices used to create an item. And another (completely different) patent could cover the functions of that same item. Also, why did you feel it was necessary to throw insults all of a sudden. If you need to improve your self esteem there are other (healthier) ways.
You are right, I wrote my post too quickly and didn't review it. I meant to say that although you do not patent a physical item you can patent the devices for creating a physical item. I went on to talk about submitting a detail of how a machine operates and meant to illustrate that as another form of a patent. Thanks for pointing out my inconsistencies. I will read my posts more carefully when I write them.
I hope you're agreeing with my post, because that's what I said too.
Someone could invent this from their armchair and it is just a mathematical formula.
You do not patent a physical item, you patent the devices for creating the physical item. Do you think you ship a new washing machine down to the patent office to patent it? No, you submit the technical drawings and a description of the processes used to create the machine, and how the machine operates. Hence processes are what patents are all about. You don't ever have to even create the physical item to patent it, just have the idea. Your arguments on patent law are about as valid as a blind person's critique of a painting.
So is a murderer who drives the speed limit.
Collateral damage is a terribly unfortunate side effect of war. I realize that not everyone killed is a member of the military, but collateral damage is still not terrorist action.
Bush and Blair engaged in military action and whether you agree with it or not those killed are members of a military. Comes with the territory. Bin Laden killed 5000 innocent civilians. Your comparison is ridiculous. I suppose you also think that members of the military are terrorists. Or would you prefer baby killers? People like you are what are bringing America down, not right-wing conversatives.
Added note: I'm not a right-wing, religious conservative. I am, however, in the United States Marine Corps.
I wasn't implying he made it up, just explaining what it meant.
Linus is quoted, calling all you kernel coders a herd of cats.
From the article
Torvalds has quipped that his job is a lot like "herding cats."
"Herding cats" is meant to be an oxymoron. Cats operate in small, tight-knit prides and not large herds; they are strong-willed and typically follow their own program. Linus was just trying to convey the difficulty of managing a large group of programmers who all have their own, unique reasons for doing what they do. As is demonstrated time and time again here at /., most nerds have trouble seeing the other side of an argument (read: we always think we're right). This brings about the cat metaphor.
For those who don't RTFA, this might be taken out of context as an insult to kernel contributors. Just wanted to clear that up.
It was meant in jest, I understand what OSS is and I use Linux regularly. Sorry it didn't come off that way.
...those of us that use Free Sofware exclusively...
Read: Leeches
No they don't, they all have centralized servers that at least do a modicum of traffic routing. What I was talking about is just sending out blind packets to find other users and then connect to them. You obviously didn't read what I wrote, but thanks for being a smartass.
Tied down by what? Finish it, GPL it, release it, done deal. My concept of how it might work: First, no server application or central server of any kind. Second, Client application (psuedo-server as well) sends out constant "seeker" packets blindly that it also responds to whenever it receives some. When it receives a response on a seeker packet a connection is established, forming a web of clients. Once 5 or so connections are established, we can stop sending out seeker packets. Do to the nature of the network, once we hit that many connections we have probably "connected" to the entire network. When a search request is sent out, it goes to the entire network because every client which receives a request sends it out to all their connections as well. Clients with no local matches do nothing after that. Clients that have a local match to the search send a directed response to the initial requestor. Reponses contain enough information to determine which files are identical. Identical responses are all grouped together, and then all responses are sorted based on relevance. When you choose to download a file, a connection request will be sent out to all those who responded for that file. All available connections are then managed locally (and updated regularly) as individual packet requests are sent out to all responders to the connection request. Once a packet fails 3 or so times that responder is removed from the list of available connections and the packet is requested from someone else. I typed this quickly at work, so if there are any gross inconsistencies or obvious errors please don't flame me. It's just my idea of how this thing might work.
So, what language do developers use to target this? Is it something elegant designed for the problem at hand?
... unelegant. C was created at a time when simplicity, hence speed, was much preferrable to the overhead involved with a more refined language. As times progress though, and computer power continues to grow exponentially, the human factor will eventually be the limiting factor in all of programming. Using managed code and overhead-laden, high-level languages will not produce a noticable speed difference. What will make a difference will be the fact that a programmer is unable to track all his memory allocation and garbage collection or the shared access by 50 separate threads to his data structures.
It's not that an extremely elegant lanuage is needed for an application like this, just that C is too
Ask anyone with a Hauppauge card what they think about Hauppauge's amazing software and driver support..
I believe that comment was referring to the size of PSP games, which would be electronically distrubted bia the PS3 home network edition or whatever they called it. That would make sense (asssuming the games are compressed) because the PSP is supposed to have 30MB of RAM per the same discussion.