It seems like Apple *is* following Jeff's basic philosophy. The user doesn't even have to know that the underlying OS is BSD in MacOS X, do they? The only thing that can get in the way of the user is the GUI environment, Aqua, which certainly isn't a throwback to the 70's.
I don't get it. Whether Flanagan's article is factually correct or not (and I hope mozilla/Netscape developers come up with a response), why does michael feel the need to turn it into a flame? I think it's pretty impressive that Flanagan could dig into mozilla's bug database and find a selection of bugs to highlight. I also think it's a positive side-effect of the open source process that he feels that he can launch a petition to suggest that certain bugs (which, again, he can point to directly in bugzilla) be fixed before the commercial Netscape 6 is released. Besides, what difference would such a delay make to us who are handy with an ftp client? We can download the latest build, either from the commercial tree or the mozilla trunk whenever we wish.
I think the most absurd part of the article is the notion of "signing up" to have the right to download and help test a beta of IE6! It seems so... backwards.
You _can_ play those old Infocom games on Linux! They are actually compiled in "z-code", a platform independent format, which is how Infocom supported so many different types of computers back then (Apples, Ataris, IBMs,...). People since then have "decoded" the format and open source interpreters are available such as "frotz". People are also developing new games in the z-code format using a new compiler called Inform (which is probably much better than what the Infocom folks used). The new games in many cases are better than the Infocom ones and are freely available (usually without source code though, unfortunately:) ). You can find info on all this stuff on rec.games.int-fiction or rec.arts.int-fiction, or search for "Interactive Fiction" on the web. The Interactive Fiction archive can be found at ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive.
In terms of getting the games, Zork I, Zork II, and Zork III can be downloaded for free from Activision's web site. The other games have been packaged on CDs under various titles, the most recent being "Masterpieces of Infocom", again published by Activision.
It seems clear that Microsoft's vision of the software industry is one where Microsoft owns all the land and the other software companies are the serfs, magnitudes smaller in size, working on their niche products (all with Microsoft's operating systems, server tools and development tools) and indirectly supporting Microsoft's monopoly.
It seems that Microsoft has to control the ENTIRE would-be commodity market, the software that everyone needs (OS's, office automation, browsers). Of course, since people want "integration", if anyone was able to take over the market on any of those things, they'd have a huge success on being successful with the other two. That's why they have to do anything they can to protect themselves.
Microsoft is, however, willing to stay out of the small domain-specific markets (in their terms "supporting a competitive environment). In a truly competitive market, however, anyone can build and sell the commodity and they're incredibly cheap. Having to spend $100 for an upgrade on just an OS (which really should be invisible and free, just a part of the computer) every two to three years is just wrong.
One thing to point out is that IF games typically are not open source... perhaps because there isn't the demand because the games are often only written by one person and the source code would give the game's solution away:)
I suppose there would be a lot of reusable code and good working examples of how to implement puzzles, though...
I think this is yet another example of how excellent the open source model is:
The hardware vendor gets to show off their hardware.
The hardware vendors gains some purely positive publicity and goodwill from the community
Everyone else benefits from the contribution.
Plus, a significant contribution can be merely the seed for further developments, since anyone in the world can read the patch and contribute their own. It's a win-win situation all around.
Aside from the possible spam and privacy problems, if the use of such a device became widespread, peoples' natural memory capacity would only degrade further. We would be even more dependent on a technological device to replace our own brains' functions.
Also, will such a device really make our lives less stressful? It's just one more thing to tote around and protect along with our notebooks, PDAs, wallets, keys, etc. etc.
I'm certainly not anti-technology, but we should really consider what a world would be like with a lot of these new toys in it.
Slashdot Mirror
It seems like Apple *is* following Jeff's basic philosophy. The user doesn't even have to know that the underlying OS is BSD in MacOS X, do they? The only thing that can get in the way of the user is the GUI environment, Aqua, which certainly isn't a throwback to the 70's.
Cameron
I don't get it. Whether Flanagan's article is factually correct or not (and I hope mozilla/Netscape developers come up with a response), why does michael feel the need to turn it into a flame? I think it's pretty impressive that Flanagan could dig into mozilla's bug database and find a selection of bugs to highlight. I also think it's a positive side-effect of the open source process that he feels that he can launch a petition to suggest that certain bugs (which, again, he can point to directly in bugzilla) be fixed before the commercial Netscape 6 is released. Besides, what difference would such a delay make to us who are handy with an ftp client? We can download the latest build, either from the commercial tree or the mozilla trunk whenever we wish.
I think the most absurd part of the article is the notion of "signing up" to have the right to download and help test a beta of IE6! It seems so... backwards.
You _can_ play those old Infocom games on Linux! They are actually compiled in "z-code", a platform independent format, which is how Infocom supported so many different types of computers back then (Apples, Ataris, IBMs, ...). People since then have "decoded" the format and open source interpreters are available such as "frotz". People are also developing new games in the z-code format using a new compiler called Inform (which is probably much better than what the Infocom folks used). The new games in many cases are better than the Infocom ones and are freely available (usually without source code though, unfortunately :) ). You can find info on all this stuff on rec.games.int-fiction or rec.arts.int-fiction, or search for
"Interactive Fiction" on the web. The Interactive Fiction archive can be found at ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive.
In terms of getting the games, Zork I, Zork II, and Zork III can be downloaded for free from Activision's web site. The other games have been packaged on CDs under various titles, the most recent being "Masterpieces of Infocom", again published by Activision.
Good luck,
Cameron
It seems clear that Microsoft's vision of the software industry is one where Microsoft owns all the land and the other software companies are the serfs, magnitudes smaller in size, working on their niche products (all with Microsoft's operating systems, server tools and development tools) and indirectly supporting Microsoft's monopoly.
It seems that Microsoft has to control the ENTIRE would-be commodity market, the software that everyone needs (OS's, office automation, browsers). Of course, since people want "integration", if anyone was able to take over the market on any of those things, they'd have a huge success on being successful with the other two. That's why they have to do anything they can to protect themselves.
Microsoft is, however, willing to stay out of the small domain-specific markets (in their terms "supporting a competitive environment). In a truly competitive market, however, anyone can build and sell the commodity and they're incredibly cheap. Having to spend $100 for an upgrade on just an OS (which really should be invisible and free, just a part of the computer) every two to three years is just wrong.
One thing to point out is that IF games typically are not open source... perhaps because there isn't the demand because the games are often only written by one person and the source code would give the game's solution away :)
I suppose there would be a lot of reusable code and good working examples of how to implement puzzles, though...
- The hardware vendor gets to show off their hardware.
- The hardware vendors gains some purely positive publicity and goodwill from the community
- Everyone else benefits from the contribution.
Plus, a significant contribution can be merely the seed for further developments, since anyone in the world can read the patch and contribute their own. It's a win-win situation all around.Aside from the possible spam and privacy problems, if the use of such a device became widespread, peoples' natural memory capacity would only degrade further. We would be even more dependent on a technological device to replace our own brains' functions.
Also, will such a device really make our lives less stressful? It's just one more thing to tote around and protect along with our notebooks, PDAs, wallets, keys, etc. etc.
I'm certainly not anti-technology, but we should really consider what a world would be like with a lot of these new toys in it.