No - it's not one or the other. The Intel/AMD switch remains highly likely IMHO; Apple needs to reduce low-end h/w costs to effectively compete, while keeping performance. I believe Apple is contemplating segmentation of its product range into low-end consumer on Intel/AMD, and high-end 64-bit for the multimedia production markets (they have to go 64-bit sooner or later, but POWER is way too fancy for the [ie]Mac market).
While Darwin (and OS X no doubt) already run on Intel (it was designed to be portable like NEXTSTEP, which runs on PPC, Intel, SPARC, PA-RISC and M68K at least), Apple will not support generic hardware IMHO. It will be limited to drivers for Apple's own Intel-based hardware lines so you won't be able to buy retail OS X for your random PC (unlike Linux and that other O/S).
Essentially, applications would merely need to be recompiled; NetBSD, Debian et al have proven that architecture can be transparent.
This under-appreciated text (Kernighan & Plauger) taught me more about writing comprehensible (and minimally buggy) code than any other work I can name. (Thanks, Peter, for lending me your copy. Thanks, bibliofind, for furnishing my very own.)
Moderation doesn't seem to work very well for lists like this. Maybe each poster should have equal weight, votes for specific texts are added together, and the highest scoring texts bubble to the top. Moderation seems to be a bit orthogonal to this, in that whole "groups" of recommendations are rated. Tough job for a moderator!
And I think it's HIGH TIME for the allowed HTML to be reviewed in line with recent W3C standards. For instance, most semantic/accessible markup is disallowed (<CITE>, please?) This is wrong (IMHO).
You CANNOT tell me it does not cost more to develop multiple versions of scripts to do interactive content.
Yes I can: Write once, test everywhere. How hard is that? Learn what (JavaScript, CSS) features are common to the popular browsers and shun the rest. None of the web sites I maintain contain browser-specific code; that would be a maintenance nightmare. But they successfully test with many different browsers.
... It takes more development hours ($) to develop multiple versions of scripts, and more QA test machines and personnel
See above. By definition the web should be browser-agnostic. Writing portable code is no more difficult; aucontraire, it just takes a light touch and the exercising of some of your touted intelligence.
($) to test those pages on multiple platforms and more support personnel ($) to support those multiple platforms.
For public web sites, mere professionalism dictates you should be doing such testing already - or at the very least, responding to user problem reports.
I guess you could call me immoral for working for such "heavens", but I don't consider browser/computer/OS/hardware platform choice a moral issue. Sue me.
It is a moral issue. So is Free Software. I would sue you if I could - apparently you're among those people I curse daily for helping build an unnavigable web.
No, a 10 is when businesses murder to protect their profits. As Shell has in Nigeria; as American oil interests are currently doing in Afghanistan, and the list goes on. (Recommended reading: John Pilger's Hidden Agendas.)
I strongly support any anti-bloat initiative. An insidious effect of rapid technological improvement is a commensurate laziness on the part of programmers, who increasingly overlook fundamentals such the importance of the choice of algorithm.
I get a lot of useful work done with Linux and NetBSD on old hardware. My intranet server (Apache/PHP/MySQL, DNS, netatalk etc) is a SPARCstation 1+ (25MHz; processes typically total around 6MB resident!) I've also run NetBSD on 16MHz sun 3 and 11MHz VAX. All very happily.
In the Linux side, one production file server where I work is a P233 with only 48MB RAM. It's being upgraded as I write - to an AMD K6-2/500 with 256MB, not a cutting edge machine either, but probably overpowered for the job. The 850MHz Celeron machine we use as a colocated web server is sitting at 0.1% load according to Apache (better build that traffic). I might as well use a SPARC 1 (I've successfully tested the biggest database driven site we operate under Linux/Apache/PHP/MySQL on a 66MHz '486).
Apart from other 486s and 586s, I've also run Linux on a 25MHz Mac IIci... including X.
My current project is, of course, getting 2.9BSD on to a PDP-11/34.
If Telstra is forced to charge ridiculous rates (end user A$0.18/MB) to make a profit, then they must be overcharged by upstream carriers for overseas data. I doubt you can convince me that Telstra's domestic data costs are high - they own the domestic infrastructure, they set the rates!
In any case, broadband in Australia is dead until prices get realistic. If Telstra's bloated profiteering hulk has to sink to achieve that, then I won't shed a tear. Certainly the prohibitive costs of corporate and residential take-up will plug sales and hasten their end.
ADSL Price rises in Australia
on
Broadband Obstacles
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I had to cancel my "unlimited" ADSL 1.5Mbit with iPrimus, in Melbourne, Australia, because I believe Telstra forces impossibly high data charges on the other carriers...
The effective price of the service jumped 400-800%, making it impossible for me, a programmer and web designer earning higher than average wage, to afford. Between Telstra and the Aust Govt, broadband is being prevented here.
Scientific American also had an article about the technique, and successfully duplicating it, during the 1970s. Sorry, no reference handy. (It's probably cited in the more recent article.)
Funny you should mention bursting into flames... the Multia has several overheating/component death issues: see My Multia doubles as a space heater.
I wouldn't know though, as I haven't turned mine on yet. It has no RAM, has not had the fan/heatsink mods, and is too clean to spoil by actually working:)
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No - it's not one or the other. The Intel/AMD switch remains highly likely IMHO; Apple needs to reduce low-end h/w costs to effectively compete, while keeping performance. I believe Apple is contemplating segmentation of its product range into low-end consumer on Intel/AMD, and high-end 64-bit for the multimedia production markets (they have to go 64-bit sooner or later, but POWER is way too fancy for the [ie]Mac market).
While Darwin (and OS X no doubt) already run on Intel (it was designed to be portable like NEXTSTEP, which runs on PPC, Intel, SPARC, PA-RISC and M68K at least), Apple will not support generic hardware IMHO. It will be limited to drivers for Apple's own Intel-based hardware lines so you won't be able to buy retail OS X for your random PC (unlike Linux and that other O/S).
Essentially, applications would merely need to be recompiled; NetBSD, Debian et al have proven that architecture can be transparent.
Moderation doesn't seem to work very well for lists like this. Maybe each poster should have equal weight, votes for specific texts are added together, and the highest scoring texts bubble to the top. Moderation seems to be a bit orthogonal to this, in that whole "groups" of recommendations are rated. Tough job for a moderator!
And I think it's HIGH TIME for the allowed HTML to be reviewed in line with recent W3C standards. For instance, most semantic/accessible markup is disallowed (<CITE>, please?) This is wrong (IMHO).
Yes I can: Write once, test everywhere. How hard is that? Learn what (JavaScript, CSS) features are common to the popular browsers and shun the rest. None of the web sites I maintain contain browser-specific code; that would be a maintenance nightmare. But they successfully test with many different browsers.
See above. By definition the web should be browser-agnostic. Writing portable code is no more difficult; aucontraire, it just takes a light touch and the exercising of some of your touted intelligence.
For public web sites, mere professionalism dictates you should be doing such testing already - or at the very least, responding to user problem reports.
It is a moral issue. So is Free Software. I would sue you if I could - apparently you're among those people I curse daily for helping build an unnavigable web.
Personally, I just want M$ off the planet. Period. They are an insult to all right-thinking people. Blatant lies and greed disgust me.
No, a 10 is when businesses murder to protect their profits. As Shell has in Nigeria; as American oil interests are currently doing in Afghanistan, and the list goes on. (Recommended reading: John Pilger's Hidden Agendas.)
I strongly support any anti-bloat initiative. An insidious effect of rapid technological improvement is a commensurate laziness on the part of programmers, who increasingly overlook fundamentals such the importance of the choice of algorithm.
I get a lot of useful work done with Linux and NetBSD on old hardware. My intranet server (Apache/PHP/MySQL, DNS, netatalk etc) is a SPARCstation 1+ (25MHz; processes typically total around 6MB resident!) I've also run NetBSD on 16MHz sun 3 and 11MHz VAX. All very happily.
In the Linux side, one production file server where I work is a P233 with only 48MB RAM. It's being upgraded as I write - to an AMD K6-2/500 with 256MB, not a cutting edge machine either, but probably overpowered for the job. The 850MHz Celeron machine we use as a colocated web server is sitting at 0.1% load according to Apache (better build that traffic). I might as well use a SPARC 1 (I've successfully tested the biggest database driven site we operate under Linux/Apache/PHP/MySQL on a 66MHz '486).
Apart from other 486s and 586s, I've also run Linux on a 25MHz Mac IIci... including X.
My current project is, of course, getting 2.9BSD on to a PDP-11/34.
If Telstra is forced to charge ridiculous rates (end user A$0.18/MB) to make a profit, then they must be overcharged by upstream carriers for overseas data. I doubt you can convince me that Telstra's domestic data costs are high - they own the domestic infrastructure, they set the rates!
In any case, broadband in Australia is dead until prices get realistic. If Telstra's bloated profiteering hulk has to sink to achieve that, then I won't shed a tear. Certainly the prohibitive costs of corporate and residential take-up will plug sales and hasten their end.
I had to cancel my "unlimited" ADSL 1.5Mbit with iPrimus, in Melbourne, Australia, because I believe Telstra forces impossibly high data charges on the other carriers...
The effective price of the service jumped 400-800%, making it impossible for me, a programmer and web designer earning higher than average wage, to afford. Between Telstra and the Aust Govt, broadband is being prevented here.
"I suppose *you'd* rather have terrorists."
--Sam Lowry in "Brazil"
(That is, if "terrorism" was not just a threat fabricated and exploited in order to eliminate the rights of US citizens.)
[OT] Gotta be better than NO moderation at all, surely? Remember what that's like??
Scientific American also had an article about the technique, and successfully duplicating it, during the 1970s. Sorry, no reference handy. (It's probably cited in the more recent article.)
I wouldn't know though, as I haven't turned mine on yet. It has no RAM, has not had the fan/heatsink mods, and is too clean to spoil by actually working :)
nobrainer