Look, Mr Preachy, I'm not sure who you are trying to impress or what you are trying to achieve by this. By posting your unhelpful, snide remarks as an AC, your input is about as relevant and interesting to me as the stupid spiderman film this forum is about.
And you think you can lecture me about being indoors too much? How the hell do you know what my life is like? For all you know, I'm posting this from a laptop in the park or a cellphone in the desert. Stupid, boring, petty, pedantic moron. If I had such useless things to say, I'd do it as an AC too.
Poor kittens. As long as they are helping others though...
More seriously, the developmental side of things is crucial. Without a brain programmed properly (in childhood), it's going to be pretty difficult to learn how to translate the data coming out of the eye into a usable picture of your environment. Being born blind is going to be a life sentence for a while yet.
But, on the plus side, kids who grow up without vision often pick up other skills on the side. Obviously braille reading and writing skills are the main, but blind people often pick up other skills to help them do all the little things we take for granted, such as moving around by feel and using sound to locate doors and other objects.
It's not that bad. I'm not blind, but I do know and work with quite a lot of people who are, and you would be amazed at their independence and their quality of life. Like you suggested, many people who have never been able to see are perfectly content with their 'disability', and indeed can't imagine anything else. One of my friends says that if sight-restoring operations were possible in an everyday sense (which they certainly aren't), he would probably not take it. I'm not sure how typical of the blind community this is though.
The people who do really have trouble, obviously, are people who go blind later in life. They suffer more because they obviously didn't grow up blind, and thus didn't develop braille skills and other blind-person tricks like click-navigation (Seriously, a few people I know can point unerringly at furniture, doors and windows after clicking their fingers a few times!) These things take time, and a lot of older people unfortunately believe too strongly in the 'old dogs can't learn new tricks' maxim. The shock of this and the isolation that can come with blindness sometimes cause as many problems for older blind people than their actual physical condition.
True, NT5.x multitasks pretty well IME. My 2000 box runs a similar load to the one you described, plus the odd office app or two, and about 10 tabs in firefox. No dramas, only the odd squeak of annoyance from winamp as my useless softmodem loses the plot occasionally. This is just a p4 2.4 with 512mb, and a slow ol' HDD to boot.
I have noticed similar problems on XP boxes in the past, and I agree with your diagnosis - there's something not quite right somewhere. I don't know much about XP, but in win2000 it's good to occasionally have a look in the task manager's process pane to make sure that you're not running piles of junk in the background. Also check that all your drivers are present and correct - I had awful Heisenbug problems with a flaky driver for the AGP bridge on my motherboard at one stage.
From what the parent said, I think Pacifist is more like an extraction utility to isolate and use parts of a package... think of Microsoft's CAB file format. Please, Mac people, correct me if I'm wrong (which is very probable!)
>Games on the PC are a different animal, the rate of piracy is much lower.
I'm not sure about that one. I know a *lot* of people who regularly and methodically pirate all their games for their friends
I think software piracy across all fields is pretty rampant, to be honest. Although, I have never been spammed with ads for 'cheap' games like I do for applications (you know the ones, "Legitimate Software!" $50 for anything), and the markup for real pirates is probably much higher on apps, so you do certainly have a point.
I have to say I agree with your general line of argument (that MS are entitled to bundle IE with windows), but not with a few specific points:
(1) Yes, distributions do tend to favour one desktop environment/browser/etc over the other, but you can change for a different one. Sure, things might not work as well (like KDE and Fedora), but you are able to change.
(2) I'm not sure that anyone I know has ever advocated the removal of IE from windows for disk space reasons... more security and usability IME.
But, as I said, I agree with your general point. Much as I dislike it, IE and windows explorer are, if not one and the same, too closely linked to be easily separated. I also think for a lot of people having one standard browser that is easy to find and operate(?) is actually quite useful.
I'm not sure that explorer is used for rendering help files by the way... someone with a lot more technical knowledge will probably correct me here, but I'm pretty sure that, in win2k and later, help files are rendered by a separate program (which eats about 10 meg of memory!)
agreed, I certainly see your point. I would also argue that for a certain subset of nerds, (myself included) politics is a vital and useful part of my existence and philosophy. As a philosophical nerd, i think it's relevant, but I realise that I don't fit the standard nerd stereotypes. It's an interesting point, thanks for bringing it up!
That's EXACTLY what I'm trying to say - I think I phrased it very poorly. It is obviously OT and should have been modded as such, NOT as a troll. I don't really care about the political content one way or the other; I just want the 'troll' mod to be reserved for real trolls.
I see your point. I have been around here long enough to not feed trolls, but it still bugs me that people apparently moderate with about 2 seconds of thought sometimes. I think that the 'troll' mod needs to be used a little more sparingly.
and yes, it is technically correct (the best *kind* of correct!) that this is all OT, but it's the best way to bring modding 'issues' to people's attention.
Thanks for the info. I couldn't be bother causing the browser any more pain trying to render it, or even to download the wretched evil source to my machine via wget. I figured it would be some nasty IE exploit, it's the same old crap, if you'll pardon the pun. It's about time we got some new, interesting trolls... what's happened to innovation? Sigh.
Damn right. And with the Moore film, people couldn't wait to come out and complain about it not being relevant to Slashdot... not today tho. You're the first, though it's already crossed my mind!
People, do *NOT* click on the last link. Mods, take note - browser breaker, standard pr0n and probable IE exploit (just crashes out the firefox tab, thankfully)
Calm down, my friend. No-one is saying that Mike Moore is some kind of truth-oozing prophet who can never tell a lie. I certainly don't accept everything he says at face value, and I'm sure most right-thinking people don't. But nore do I take Fox News at face value. Get the picture? You can't let anyone else do the thinking for you. That's what has gotten us so far up shit creek without our paddles.
pfffft, flamebait... what a copout! I don't see why I should expend more words than necessary to deal with this unpleasant, stinking turd of a film(industry), and I won't beat around the bush. If that makes what I have to say flamebait, then so be it.
and as for the reviewer, many people have already said what I would like to say, so I'll leave it at that.
I suspect he is trying to make up for the general dislike he has built up by spewing mindless teenage trolling into the mix. 'YHBT. YHL. HAND'
I think we need some new acronyms...
YATR - You *are* thirteen, right?
MSCYR - Mom Says Clean Your Room!
NIOTS - Nothing Interesting or Original To Say
Slashdot Mirror
Look, Mr Preachy, I'm not sure who you are trying to impress or what you are trying to achieve by this. By posting your unhelpful, snide remarks as an AC, your input is about as relevant and interesting to me as the stupid spiderman film this forum is about.
And you think you can lecture me about being indoors too much? How the hell do you know what my life is like? For all you know, I'm posting this from a laptop in the park or a cellphone in the desert. Stupid, boring, petty, pedantic moron. If I had such useless things to say, I'd do it as an AC too.
Poor kittens. As long as they are helping others though...
More seriously, the developmental side of things is crucial. Without a brain programmed properly (in childhood), it's going to be pretty difficult to learn how to translate the data coming out of the eye into a usable picture of your environment. Being born blind is going to be a life sentence for a while yet.
But, on the plus side, kids who grow up without vision often pick up other skills on the side. Obviously braille reading and writing skills are the main, but blind people often pick up other skills to help them do all the little things we take for granted, such as moving around by feel and using sound to locate doors and other objects.
It's not that bad. I'm not blind, but I do know and work with quite a lot of people who are, and you would be amazed at their independence and their quality of life. Like you suggested, many people who have never been able to see are perfectly content with their 'disability', and indeed can't imagine anything else. One of my friends says that if sight-restoring operations were possible in an everyday sense (which they certainly aren't), he would probably not take it. I'm not sure how typical of the blind community this is though.
The people who do really have trouble, obviously, are people who go blind later in life. They suffer more because they obviously didn't grow up blind, and thus didn't develop braille skills and other blind-person tricks like click-navigation (Seriously, a few people I know can point unerringly at furniture, doors and windows after clicking their fingers a few times!) These things take time, and a lot of older people unfortunately believe too strongly in the 'old dogs can't learn new tricks' maxim. The shock of this and the isolation that can come with blindness sometimes cause as many problems for older blind people than their actual physical condition.
True, NT5.x multitasks pretty well IME. My 2000 box runs a similar load to the one you described, plus the odd office app or two, and about 10 tabs in firefox. No dramas, only the odd squeak of annoyance from winamp as my useless softmodem loses the plot occasionally. This is just a p4 2.4 with 512mb, and a slow ol' HDD to boot.
I have noticed similar problems on XP boxes in the past, and I agree with your diagnosis - there's something not quite right somewhere. I don't know much about XP, but in win2000 it's good to occasionally have a look in the task manager's process pane to make sure that you're not running piles of junk in the background. Also check that all your drivers are present and correct - I had awful Heisenbug problems with a flaky driver for the AGP bridge on my motherboard at one stage.
From what the parent said, I think Pacifist is more like an extraction utility to isolate and use parts of a package... think of Microsoft's CAB file format. Please, Mac people, correct me if I'm wrong (which is very probable!)
Also, try the Pacifist site for more info.
>Games on the PC are a different animal, the rate of piracy is much lower.
I'm not sure about that one. I know a *lot* of people who regularly and methodically pirate all their games for their friends
I think software piracy across all fields is pretty rampant, to be honest. Although, I have never been spammed with ads for 'cheap' games like I do for applications (you know the ones, "Legitimate Software!" $50 for anything), and the markup for real pirates is probably much higher on apps, so you do certainly have a point.
I have to say I agree with your general line of argument (that MS are entitled to bundle IE with windows), but not with a few specific points:
(1) Yes, distributions do tend to favour one desktop environment/browser/etc over the other, but you can change for a different one. Sure, things might not work as well (like KDE and Fedora), but you are able to change.
(2) I'm not sure that anyone I know has ever advocated the removal of IE from windows for disk space reasons... more security and usability IME.
But, as I said, I agree with your general point. Much as I dislike it, IE and windows explorer are, if not one and the same, too closely linked to be easily separated. I also think for a lot of people having one standard browser that is easy to find and operate(?) is actually quite useful.
I'm not sure that explorer is used for rendering help files by the way... someone with a lot more technical knowledge will probably correct me here, but I'm pretty sure that, in win2k and later, help files are rendered by a separate program (which eats about 10 meg of memory!)
You bothered to calculate this, and then accuse me of needing to get a life? I really don't care.
It's a sickness. You think you're not addicted, but it takes you over on a daily basis. Perhaps we need a self-help group, or maybe an intervention?
Indeed! He even plagiarised the score that CHUD gave.
agreed, I certainly see your point. I would also argue that for a certain subset of nerds, (myself included) politics is a vital and useful part of my existence and philosophy. As a philosophical nerd, i think it's relevant, but I realise that I don't fit the standard nerd stereotypes. It's an interesting point, thanks for bringing it up!
> One of these days a gnaa crap-post is gonna get moderated +5 informative.
I guess they are informative, in a way, just not about the sort of things most people want to be informed about. *You* know the things I mean.
Agreed. I was just thinking that Spiderman is no more and no less relevant to /. than Mike Moore's films. Next topic, please!
Fair enough. I can see that you are thinking for yourself. Keep it up.
That's EXACTLY what I'm trying to say - I think I phrased it very poorly. It is obviously OT and should have been modded as such, NOT as a troll. I don't really care about the political content one way or the other; I just want the 'troll' mod to be reserved for real trolls.
I see your point. I have been around here long enough to not feed trolls, but it still bugs me that people apparently moderate with about 2 seconds of thought sometimes. I think that the 'troll' mod needs to be used a little more sparingly.
and yes, it is technically correct (the best *kind* of correct!) that this is all OT, but it's the best way to bring modding 'issues' to people's attention.
Thanks for the info. I couldn't be bother causing the browser any more pain trying to render it, or even to download the wretched evil source to my machine via wget. I figured it would be some nasty IE exploit, it's the same old crap, if you'll pardon the pun. It's about time we got some new, interesting trolls... what's happened to innovation? Sigh.
Look, mods, how many times can it be spelt out to you: 'troll' is NOT a synonym for 'I disagree'. Explain to me how the parent is a troll, exactly?
Damn right. And with the Moore film, people couldn't wait to come out and complain about it not being relevant to Slashdot... not today tho. You're the first, though it's already crossed my mind!
c'mon, if you are going to be an AC you might as well at least insult me...
I looked at the last link, and I have to say that I don't remember that bit in the film? Did I go out to the toilet at a bad time?
People, do *NOT* click on the last link. Mods, take note - browser breaker, standard pr0n and probable IE exploit (just crashes out the firefox tab, thankfully)
Calm down, my friend. No-one is saying that Mike Moore is some kind of truth-oozing prophet who can never tell a lie. I certainly don't accept everything he says at face value, and I'm sure most right-thinking people don't. But nore do I take Fox News at face value. Get the picture? You can't let anyone else do the thinking for you. That's what has gotten us so far up shit creek without our paddles.
pfffft, flamebait... what a copout! I don't see why I should expend more words than necessary to deal with this unpleasant, stinking turd of a film(industry), and I won't beat around the bush. If that makes what I have to say flamebait, then so be it.
and as for the reviewer, many people have already said what I would like to say, so I'll leave it at that.
I suspect he is trying to make up for the general dislike he has built up by spewing mindless teenage trolling into the mix. 'YHBT. YHL. HAND'
I think we need some new acronyms...
YATR - You *are* thirteen, right?
MSCYR - Mom Says Clean Your Room!
NIOTS - Nothing Interesting or Original To Say
Any more suggestions?