Does the FCC's internet principles not apply to both? Does it matter if I provide internet over cables, wirelessly, or over a series of tubes? I didn't think that was the point.
Ironically, the entire point of a phone is to stream continuous audio data. It's weird that they would forbid that data from being sent over IP, but it is okay to send it over whatever protocol is used for voice communications.
I don't think I'm understanding what this is. What W3C specification exists for a Javascript drawing API? I don't want Firefox embracing and extending web protocols. The other changes are in line with W3C specs, but this sounds like a cool whizzbang thing that developers might like. I don't want that stuff in there. If you want a drawing API, use Flash, or Java, or something else.
Can you post a link on the relationship between video games and Alzheimer's? Or do you mean we will all get fat and die of heart disease before we are old enough to get Alzheimer's?
This is not a tool for piracy. If they want to stop piracy, they need to stop the people who are dumping roms. And you won't find tools to dump roms quite so easily. Attacking the companies that make legitimate devices lazy and anti-customer.
That's an interesting idea, if we can find where it ends. Surely patenting buttons a calculator is senseless. But software is completely open-ended.
Where would the logic end? If I design a new latch out of 3 screws and a flexible piece of metal, can someone argue against my patent saying that this is exactly the intended use of a screwdriver and a hammer? Or perhaps we could extend this logic to copyrights since the intended use of a pen is to write?
They aren't saying that this material would make a more efficient refrigerator, only that it would be a simpler/cheaper one. I am guessing that places that don't have refrigeration are that way due to a lack of a power source. I'm not sure this will help.
This foolishness is a recent development too. I doubt anyone has a patent on ordering from a mail order catalog...with a particular number of pen strokes . But for some brain-dead reason, adding "network" or "internet" makes it non-obvious.
I don't know of any way to deal with this problem. NOT having an account lockout means someone can brute-force a password. Having an account lockout means someone can DOS the account.
You could probably minimize the problem by doing the lockout by IP address or something, but ultimately you can't solve this problem in it's entirety. Account lockouts are a trade-off.
I'd really like to see someone test this and put it to bed. These articles are speaking in theory, not practice. I remember reading articles only 2 years ago about people buying SSDs and having them wear-out in a matter of hours under intensive use. (One of them was a Slashdot article, but I'm too lazy to find it).
I'm not saying that the original poster is right to criticize your SUV use without knowing your life, but your reaction is over extreme.
By this logic, EVERYTHING in life that humans create could be defined as decadent waste.
No, not everthing. Just those things that have significant cost to the planet, with nearly no gain. For example, an air conditioner is probably not decadent waste. But running an air conditioner at 68 degrees on a 110 degree day is decadent waste. Having an SUV isn't necessarily decadent waste. But having an SUV just to transport a single person solely because the driver likes to see over the heads of others, is decadent waste. Or using an SUV to transport 3 kids when a mid-size car ca do that and get 3 times the gas mileage.
before you throw stones at my SUV, why don't you list all the areas in your glass house in which you expend energy to make your life better.
This person doesn't need to list all of their ills in order to criticise yours.
That's why they should pay you for the electricity, but still bill you for the maintenance of the power lines. They are separate services from separate companies and should have separate bills. In Maryland, for example, there is a local power company that maintains your power lines, but multiple power generation facilities that provide power. A resident selects who will provide their power, and they pay that company for power, and the other company for the maintenance.
This is another case, much like broadband, where government (and people) have confused the transmitter with the source. My local phone company should maintain the phone lines, but should not do anything with the bits that go over the lines. Similarly, when I put power back on the power grid I should not be paid by the company that maintains the power lines, I should be paid by the company that generates the power.
I think part of the Olympic Committee's goals is to pick places like this in order to help develop them. They figure the city will make enough money from the even to afford these types of improvements.
This is where companies can shine. They should spend some money cleaning-up their emissions, then they could continue to operate during those 9 weeks (with permission from the government of course) and actually profit from improving the environment.
You aren't disagreeing. I didn't say that there was no case where this approach isn't valid. It just isn't a good idea to do for 10 years straight without ever stepping back and looking at what the code actually does:)
If you are doing a hotfix to production code that is going to have minimal QA time, then yeah, do the minimum change.
In this particular case that I described, nobody wanted to make the change. None of the other developers could document what the code did or could tell if it met the specs. It was constantly changing and constantly wrong.
I know lots of smart developers who have tried Linux and ported apps to it, just to expand their knowledge of the operating system and learn how to port stuff and to keep their skills up-to-date. But most of them fallback to Windows. The more pragmatic ones switch to OS X because it is just like a Unix OS, but with far greater usability.
At one point I kept a blog of all the troubles I had with using Linux. Most of the items were really simple things that made it very difficult to use. But often even constructive comments were met with disdain, so I gave up. No sense in complaining to a deaf audience.
This all comes back to the zealous Linux pragmatism where truly constructive criticism is turned into that with-us-or-against-us mentality.
Forget this pointless stuff about tabs and spacing, I've seen some really brain-dead policies.
1) Source Control Substitute At one shop, there were designers who edited XML + image files (kinda like web pages, but not quite). There was a compiler that built this all into a single executable. They were not permitted to edit the source directly, and had to work on copies. And those copies must be on the network instead of their local drive. And source control was not allowed.
So instead of people having local copies and then committing their work, everyone made a duplicate copy on the network for each thing they did. It took hours to make the copies, and the compile times went from a few minutes to 45 minutes. Plus, the network drive kept running out of space due to all the gzillions of copies of everything.
2) Making the "minimal" change required I worked for a US government contractor and they wanted each change to have the minimal impact on the system that was possible. So, basically nobody ever removed code, only added. One time I encountered a huge nested if statement that spanned hundreds of lines. Upon looking at the cases, I noticed that many of them were the same. Like:
if (a)
if (b)
do x
else
do y else
if (b)
do x
else
do x
which can, of course, be simplified to:
if (a and not b) do y else do x
This was because people had to make the MINIMAL change required each time a change was made. And removing a level of the if statements was more lines of code modified than just changing "do y" to "do x"
Imagine this, but with dozens of cases spanning hundreds of lines. I spent almost a day to build a chart listing what each combination of variables did, and finally chopped hundreds of lines of code to about 10 lines. Turns out that after years of changes, most of the cases now did the same thing.
I complained to my ISP years ago that they did this. But what recourse do I have? They are the only DSL provider in my area. My other option is Comcast.
This is the problem with the stupid telecom monopolies in the U.S. They are granted monopolies, but they don't have to behave fairly. argh!
The first amendment says "congress shall make no law..." which is why it doesn't apply to civil contracts. It specifically states that this is a limitation of congress.
The 13th amendment says "...shall exist within the United States" so the amendment applies to the peoples within the country, not purely the government.
The court itself is a government actor, and therefore by enforcing a fair-use limiting contract the court is depriving fair use 1st amendment rights.
I don't think that works. Since the court is necessary to enforce any civil contract, by that logic civil contracts could never do anything that is unconstitutional. But civil contracts do that type of thing all the time.
The key difference between selling student editions of software and using software on a non-approved device is this: One is a condition of the price of the sale, the other is a condition of the use of the product.
Slashdot Mirror
Does the FCC's internet principles not apply to both? Does it matter if I provide internet over cables, wirelessly, or over a series of tubes? I didn't think that was the point.
Ironically, the entire point of a phone is to stream continuous audio data. It's weird that they would forbid that data from being sent over IP, but it is okay to send it over whatever protocol is used for voice communications.
Do any American troops ever consider the fact that people might be LIVING in that regions after the war ends?
You must have a different definition of war than they do.
Also, depleted uranium isn't that radioactive. The real concern is that uranium is poisonous.
I don't think I'm understanding what this is. What W3C specification exists for a Javascript drawing API? I don't want Firefox embracing and extending web protocols. The other changes are in line with W3C specs, but this sounds like a cool whizzbang thing that developers might like. I don't want that stuff in there. If you want a drawing API, use Flash, or Java, or something else.
Can you post a link on the relationship between video games and Alzheimer's? Or do you mean we will all get fat and die of heart disease before we are old enough to get Alzheimer's?
The Nintendo DS is homebrew heaven. There are dozens of mod chips for the DS. And many, many forums and libraries for homebrew applications. There's several development wiki's and some must have applications.
This is not a tool for piracy. If they want to stop piracy, they need to stop the people who are dumping roms. And you won't find tools to dump roms quite so easily. Attacking the companies that make legitimate devices lazy and anti-customer.
That's an interesting idea, if we can find where it ends. Surely patenting buttons a calculator is senseless. But software is completely open-ended.
Where would the logic end? If I design a new latch out of 3 screws and a flexible piece of metal, can someone argue against my patent saying that this is exactly the intended use of a screwdriver and a hammer? Or perhaps we could extend this logic to copyrights since the intended use of a pen is to write?
They aren't saying that this material would make a more efficient refrigerator, only that it would be a simpler/cheaper one. I am guessing that places that don't have refrigeration are that way due to a lack of a power source. I'm not sure this will help.
It looks much better than Comcast cable.
I actually don't mind the purely mathematical or purely algorithmic patents. Phil Katz patented some efficient string matching algorithms that became a well-known compression program. He was a pioneer who pushed the field of CS. If Burrows and Wheeler wanted to patent their algorithm and license it as a compression technology, then awesome. And if the Fraunhofer institute found an efficient lossy way of compressing DCT using psychoacoustic modeling and licensed it, that's good for everyone.
The problem with software patents are with the system itself: ...over the internet or running an escrow service...over the internet or even buying something from a catalog...in a particular number of mouse clicks Those are not patentable. Those are absurd.
1) They are too long. You could renew a software patent for a period of time that is actually longer than the home computer has even existed. That's not reasonable.
2) The patents on things that are NOT algorithmic. Like adding "over a network" to regular everyday things and claiming that is patentable. Running an auction
This foolishness is a recent development too. I doubt anyone has a patent on ordering from a mail order catalog...with a particular number of pen strokes . But for some brain-dead reason, adding "network" or "internet" makes it non-obvious.
I don't know of any way to deal with this problem. NOT having an account lockout means someone can brute-force a password. Having an account lockout means someone can DOS the account.
You could probably minimize the problem by doing the lockout by IP address or something, but ultimately you can't solve this problem in it's entirety. Account lockouts are a trade-off.
If you know of a solution, please post it.
Excerpt from War of the Disks: A Close-in Analysis of the Hard Disk Drive vs. the Solid State Disk
"Although the most common Flash chips have around 300,000 write cycles, the best Flash chips are rated at 1,000,000 write cycles"
I'd really like to see someone test this and put it to bed. These articles are speaking in theory, not practice. I remember reading articles only 2 years ago about people buying SSDs and having them wear-out in a matter of hours under intensive use. (One of them was a Slashdot article, but I'm too lazy to find it).
I'm not saying that the original poster is right to criticize your SUV use without knowing your life, but your reaction is over extreme.
By this logic, EVERYTHING in life that humans create could be defined as decadent waste.
No, not everthing. Just those things that have significant cost to the planet, with nearly no gain. For example, an air conditioner is probably not decadent waste. But running an air conditioner at 68 degrees on a 110 degree day is decadent waste. Having an SUV isn't necessarily decadent waste. But having an SUV just to transport a single person solely because the driver likes to see over the heads of others, is decadent waste. Or using an SUV to transport 3 kids when a mid-size car ca do that and get 3 times the gas mileage.
before you throw stones at my SUV, why don't you list all the areas in your glass house in which you expend energy to make your life better.
This person doesn't need to list all of their ills in order to criticise yours.
That's why they should pay you for the electricity, but still bill you for the maintenance of the power lines. They are separate services from separate companies and should have separate bills. In Maryland, for example, there is a local power company that maintains your power lines, but multiple power generation facilities that provide power. A resident selects who will provide their power, and they pay that company for power, and the other company for the maintenance.
This is another case, much like broadband, where government (and people) have confused the transmitter with the source. My local phone company should maintain the phone lines, but should not do anything with the bits that go over the lines. Similarly, when I put power back on the power grid I should not be paid by the company that maintains the power lines, I should be paid by the company that generates the power.
I think part of the Olympic Committee's goals is to pick places like this in order to help develop them. They figure the city will make enough money from the even to afford these types of improvements.
This is where companies can shine. They should spend some money cleaning-up their emissions, then they could continue to operate during those 9 weeks (with permission from the government of course) and actually profit from improving the environment.
"News for nerds, stuff that matters"
One out of two ain't bad?
You aren't disagreeing. I didn't say that there was no case where this approach isn't valid. It just isn't a good idea to do for 10 years straight without ever stepping back and looking at what the code actually does :)
If you are doing a hotfix to production code that is going to have minimal QA time, then yeah, do the minimum change.
In this particular case that I described, nobody wanted to make the change. None of the other developers could document what the code did or could tell if it met the specs. It was constantly changing and constantly wrong.
I know lots of smart developers who have tried Linux and ported apps to it, just to expand their knowledge of the operating system and learn how to port stuff and to keep their skills up-to-date. But most of them fallback to Windows. The more pragmatic ones switch to OS X because it is just like a Unix OS, but with far greater usability.
At one point I kept a blog of all the troubles I had with using Linux. Most of the items were really simple things that made it very difficult to use. But often even constructive comments were met with disdain, so I gave up. No sense in complaining to a deaf audience.
This all comes back to the zealous Linux pragmatism where truly constructive criticism is turned into that with-us-or-against-us mentality.
Forget this pointless stuff about tabs and spacing, I've seen some really brain-dead policies.
1) Source Control Substitute
At one shop, there were designers who edited XML + image files (kinda like web pages, but not quite). There was a compiler that built this all into a single executable. They were not permitted to edit the source directly, and had to work on copies. And those copies must be on the network instead of their local drive. And source control was not allowed.
So instead of people having local copies and then committing their work, everyone made a duplicate copy on the network for each thing they did. It took hours to make the copies, and the compile times went from a few minutes to 45 minutes. Plus, the network drive kept running out of space due to all the gzillions of copies of everything.
2) Making the "minimal" change required
I worked for a US government contractor and they wanted each change to have the minimal impact on the system that was possible. So, basically nobody ever removed code, only added. One time I encountered a huge nested if statement that spanned hundreds of lines. Upon looking at the cases, I noticed that many of them were the same. Like:
if (a)
if (b)
do x
else
do y
else
if (b)
do x
else
do x
which can, of course, be simplified to:
if (a and not b) do y else do x
This was because people had to make the MINIMAL change required each time a change was made. And removing a level of the if statements was more lines of code modified than just changing "do y" to "do x"
Imagine this, but with dozens of cases spanning hundreds of lines. I spent almost a day to build a chart listing what each combination of variables did, and finally chopped hundreds of lines of code to about 10 lines. Turns out that after years of changes, most of the cases now did the same thing.
I complained to my ISP years ago that they did this. But what recourse do I have? They are the only DSL provider in my area. My other option is Comcast.
This is the problem with the stupid telecom monopolies in the U.S. They are granted monopolies, but they don't have to behave fairly. argh!
Could it be that the QA department actually used the crack for their own convenience, then the crack made it into their distribution?
The first amendment says "congress shall make no law..." which is why it doesn't apply to civil contracts. It specifically states that this is a limitation of congress.
The 13th amendment says "...shall exist within the United States" so the amendment applies to the peoples within the country, not purely the government.
The court itself is a government actor, and therefore by enforcing a fair-use limiting contract the court is depriving fair use 1st amendment rights.
I don't think that works. Since the court is necessary to enforce any civil contract, by that logic civil contracts could never do anything that is unconstitutional. But civil contracts do that type of thing all the time.
The key difference between selling student editions of software and using software on a non-approved device is this: One is a condition of the price of the sale, the other is a condition of the use of the product.
(IANAL)