But it doesn't guarantee you can write a coherent sentence;)
Seriously, though, people underestimate the power of F/OSS. I wonder how many commercial deployments in 3D imaging could get away with using blender if they had the people. Looking at its gallery, I'd see quite a few.
If you think about it, 400-500 dollars per student is going to amount to the restriction of quite an important liberty - the liberty to learn whatever you're supposed to be learning about. That's going to cut into the universities' (presumably already stretched) budget for providing learning materials and so on.
"Actually no, on this point, you could argue that MS has gained and advantage, but it is by no means an unfair advantage"
What part of abusing a monopoly is so hard to grasp? A company, that has a consumer base as large as Microsoft, is not permitted to use that advantage to push its products in other market segments. This because the advantage this conveys to Microsoft is nothing to do with the quality of its new product (MSN search) but to do with the pervasiveness of its existing products. This is not a fairly gained advantage - whether you're using the legal or common sense version.
The difference between this and the search-from-address bar is that search-from-address-bar sucked. And still does. In firefox, I never type 'www.google.com' in the address bar, I search from the SEARCH bar because it's quicker. Anyone with some brains can see that by including only MSN as the default option, MS is going to get more people to use MSN search. It's a new feature that people A: won't realise is changeable and B: won't necessarily bother to change.
Ahem. Are you seriously suggesting the creation of a perpetual motion machine?? Something that gives out energy? Hehehe. Besides, if you'd RTFA (yes, I know, this is/.) you'd realise the water has to be pretty hot, in order to give the water molecules enough energy to do this.
Incidentally, this science is months out of date: http://www.newscientisttech.com/channel/tech/dn861 6.html
Having talked personally with the ATi linux team (back before I bought an nVidia) I know they do try with the resources they're given by the management. They also take into account the complaints of the users - although, being bound by NDA, I'm pretty sure they can't give out "coming soon" notices. Certainly, way back when there was this nasty problem with UT2k4 and the ATi linux drivers, they wouldn't disclose that it was fixed before they released.
If you do a search in the GPL for 'charge' this is the first sentence that comes up:
Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you wish)
And from the GPL FAQ:
Does the GPL allow me to charge a fee for downloading the program from my site?
Yes. You can charge any fee you wish for distributing a copy of the program. If you distribute binaries by download, you must provide "equivalent access" to download the source--therefore, the fee to download source may not be greater than the fee to download the binary.
What the GPL DOES mean, is that, while you can charge for distribution, this is (as I see it) intended as recompense for the expense of the act of distribution, not the act of creating the work. Anyone can distribute it for free if they wish, but people can and do make money from selling GPLd programs - with source code, and with the receiver being fully able to distribute it for free.
I think each individual 'flick' was generally underwhelming. While they all had something to offer and generally had good concepts, they tended to be poorly realized, i.e. not enough expansion of concept. Case in point: Briefcase. I loved the idea, but they skipped from point to point too quickly for the meaning to sink in. As a firefox user, I assume that this would be worse if it were shown to people that don't know about firefox.
The surfing one again had a good idea, but the voice-over and shots failed to capture me. I assume the video was supposed to look beautiful and awesome, but it didn't seem to achieve this - although that could be a result of the quality and size. I think "Give Me the Soap" was the one that will be most appealing, easiest to understand, and had professional enough shooting to qualify as an actual advert - out of the five listed. Looking through the other ones, some stand out as better, IMHO.
Simple answer: encode your name somehow. They'll have to understand the code to work out how to change it back. I guess if they do that they've earnt the right to do it.
I recently got an old fx-7500 Casio, and the first thing I did was code the quadratic equation. The second thing I did was make a mandelbrot calculator (that took a lot of work.. Eventually I translated it into python on the PC and downloaded the goto module, so I could debug it properly.) Unfortunately, the thing got reset, and I don't think you're allowed to take programs into exams; you have to wipe them. Which is irritating, since you're allowed (for certain modules) a calculator that will do quadratics.
That's what happened to me. I started off around 8 years old with QBASIC trying to emulate nethack but with platforms... It was very 'basic,' but it got me into the whole programming spiel. Dad bought me VB 5 a little later (He's a programmer himself) and I was always doing little projects here and there. When I realised it was crap, I progressed to things like GameMaker, which allow the user a good degree of control, but I didn't have anything like the physics/maths knowledge to do anything reasonable - I hadn't even hit the upper school yet, so I didn't know trig or how to apply pythagoras.
Once I got Linux I started playing with real languages - C, C++, PHP, Python. I'm now 17 and am (IMHO) relatively competent in matters programmable. That is to say, pointers make sense, and I can get most things done with time and the online manual.
In my (somewhat limited experience) although 'spaces' tend to look equally disgusting, they are quite original in the way they burn my retinas. They do appear to have a relative amount of freedom - not approaching HTML or so, but enough to cock up web design in ways noone thought of before.
Part of the problem is first of all the "cool" factor of all the flashing gizmos and so on. It's like seeing a word processor for the very first time - you just HAVE to make every second word a different font. More importantly, there are, at least for the moment, no IT lessons based around doing your website so it doesn't injure people - unlike for word processing. So, people won't realise that there is another way.
I personally like a slick design when I see one (I'm little partial to Last.fm, although it's recently become more cluttered...) but if a web user only equates other myspace accounts with what they can do on myspace, that's probably what they'll end up using. Added to that the "because you can" element.
Of course, eventually you'll presumably get some people that bring a semblance of sanity to the latest abomination of the web.
Sorry, from the other posts I was under the impression that downloading from allofmp3 was illegal in the west. Never mind, the point stands. There is no difference, other than giving away money to some russian organisation, between downloading MP3s from allofmp3, and downloading MP3s illegally. In the latter case, there's a (small) chance of getting booked - unless you download them from another country where you're not going to be.
The GP is pointing out the difference between buying music, buying illegal music and downloading illegal music for free. In the first, the artist profits but you have to pay. In the second, the artist DOESN'T profit, and you STILL have to pay. In the last, no money changes hands. Sure, there is a middle man in both the first and second scenarios, but in the first, the artist gets a look in - is encouraged to make more music. If you're not going to pay the person that matters, why bother paying anyone, unless you get quality - bitrate, for example.
The problem with antialiasing is that it relies on there being more data than fits in the icon, and sizing it down (effectively.) It's practically impossible to anti-alias an already aliased icon other than blurring its edges.
Realistically, a little knowledge of ImageMagick or GIMP scripting would do the trick quite efficiently if all was required was some antialiased pngs. That would then pave the way for proper new icons, that could be added gradually.
In some cases, bonus features are worth watching. Few people want to sit around watching them in the cinema because the film was probably too long already, but if you found the film good, there's every chance the commentaries will be amusing, and the deleted scenes worth watching.
It's fair as long as you pull your weight. One naturally assumes that a good communist state will either proportion wealth distribution to work, or have other effective ways of ensuring fair distribution.
At its simplest level, what you're complaining about is high taxes. I'm half in-favour of a 100% tax bracket above a certain level anyway, and that's basically all this is - you don't receive a salary, because whatever you produce, you receive back again in some other useful form. The only people who really complain on this argument are those who would lose out because they've been sitting on their arses earning more than they deserve - like most of the West.
"Every fucking time," being, what, 5 times? Each time the failure has been attributable to a corruption of the ideology. If the ideology were kept to, Communism would not result in violation of human rights. You also apparently didn't read what I wrote about the means of production being owned by the people, not the state, and you should pay attention to your sibling post.
If you're going to do CS, don't even bother listening to this guy. You get out of University, and all the job offers are asking for experience. I don't think they mean experience in McDonalds. Summer of Code is a way to make a quick buck, doing something fun and challenging that will look hella good on a CV or application. I don't see any negative points except for the effort required...
Slashdot Mirror
Seriously, though, people underestimate the power of F/OSS. I wonder how many commercial deployments in 3D imaging could get away with using blender if they had the people. Looking at its gallery, I'd see quite a few.
If you think about it, 400-500 dollars per student is going to amount to the restriction of quite an important liberty - the liberty to learn whatever you're supposed to be learning about. That's going to cut into the universities' (presumably already stretched) budget for providing learning materials and so on.
"Actually no, on this point, you could argue that MS has gained and advantage, but it is by no means an unfair advantage"
What part of abusing a monopoly is so hard to grasp? A company, that has a consumer base as large as Microsoft, is not permitted to use that advantage to push its products in other market segments. This because the advantage this conveys to Microsoft is nothing to do with the quality of its new product (MSN search) but to do with the pervasiveness of its existing products. This is not a fairly gained advantage - whether you're using the legal or common sense version.
The difference between this and the search-from-address bar is that search-from-address-bar sucked. And still does. In firefox, I never type 'www.google.com' in the address bar, I search from the SEARCH bar because it's quicker. Anyone with some brains can see that by including only MSN as the default option, MS is going to get more people to use MSN search. It's a new feature that people A: won't realise is changeable and B: won't necessarily bother to change.
Well, I don't know about expresso, but espresso, I believe, usually has a little bit more caffiene: http://www.indwes.edu/Faculty/bcupp/things/Caffien e.htm#HowMuchCaff
Ahem. Are you seriously suggesting the creation of a perpetual motion machine?? Something that gives out energy? Hehehe. Besides, if you'd RTFA (yes, I know, this is /.) you'd realise the water has to be pretty hot, in order to give the water molecules enough energy to do this.1 6.html
Incidentally, this science is months out of date: http://www.newscientisttech.com/channel/tech/dn86
Having talked personally with the ATi linux team (back before I bought an nVidia) I know they do try with the resources they're given by the management. They also take into account the complaints of the users - although, being bound by NDA, I'm pretty sure they can't give out "coming soon" notices. Certainly, way back when there was this nasty problem with UT2k4 and the ATi linux drivers, they wouldn't disclose that it was fixed before they released.
Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you wish)
And from the GPL FAQ:
Does the GPL allow me to charge a fee for downloading the program from my site? Yes. You can charge any fee you wish for distributing a copy of the program. If you distribute binaries by download, you must provide "equivalent access" to download the source--therefore, the fee to download source may not be greater than the fee to download the binary.
What the GPL DOES mean, is that, while you can charge for distribution, this is (as I see it) intended as recompense for the expense of the act of distribution, not the act of creating the work. Anyone can distribute it for free if they wish, but people can and do make money from selling GPLd programs - with source code, and with the receiver being fully able to distribute it for free.
I think each individual 'flick' was generally underwhelming. While they all had something to offer and generally had good concepts, they tended to be poorly realized, i.e. not enough expansion of concept. Case in point: Briefcase. I loved the idea, but they skipped from point to point too quickly for the meaning to sink in. As a firefox user, I assume that this would be worse if it were shown to people that don't know about firefox.
The surfing one again had a good idea, but the voice-over and shots failed to capture me. I assume the video was supposed to look beautiful and awesome, but it didn't seem to achieve this - although that could be a result of the quality and size. I think "Give Me the Soap" was the one that will be most appealing, easiest to understand, and had professional enough shooting to qualify as an actual advert - out of the five listed. Looking through the other ones, some stand out as better, IMHO.
Simple answer: encode your name somehow. They'll have to understand the code to work out how to change it back. I guess if they do that they've earnt the right to do it.
I recently got an old fx-7500 Casio, and the first thing I did was code the quadratic equation. The second thing I did was make a mandelbrot calculator (that took a lot of work.. Eventually I translated it into python on the PC and downloaded the goto module, so I could debug it properly.) Unfortunately, the thing got reset, and I don't think you're allowed to take programs into exams; you have to wipe them. Which is irritating, since you're allowed (for certain modules) a calculator that will do quadratics.
That's what happened to me. I started off around 8 years old with QBASIC trying to emulate nethack but with platforms... It was very 'basic,' but it got me into the whole programming spiel. Dad bought me VB 5 a little later (He's a programmer himself) and I was always doing little projects here and there. When I realised it was crap, I progressed to things like GameMaker, which allow the user a good degree of control, but I didn't have anything like the physics/maths knowledge to do anything reasonable - I hadn't even hit the upper school yet, so I didn't know trig or how to apply pythagoras.
Once I got Linux I started playing with real languages - C, C++, PHP, Python. I'm now 17 and am (IMHO) relatively competent in matters programmable. That is to say, pointers make sense, and I can get most things done with time and the online manual.
In my (somewhat limited experience) although 'spaces' tend to look equally disgusting, they are quite original in the way they burn my retinas. They do appear to have a relative amount of freedom - not approaching HTML or so, but enough to cock up web design in ways noone thought of before.
Part of the problem is first of all the "cool" factor of all the flashing gizmos and so on. It's like seeing a word processor for the very first time - you just HAVE to make every second word a different font. More importantly, there are, at least for the moment, no IT lessons based around doing your website so it doesn't injure people - unlike for word processing. So, people won't realise that there is another way.
I personally like a slick design when I see one (I'm little partial to Last.fm, although it's recently become more cluttered...) but if a web user only equates other myspace accounts with what they can do on myspace, that's probably what they'll end up using. Added to that the "because you can" element.
Of course, eventually you'll presumably get some people that bring a semblance of sanity to the latest abomination of the web.
Sorry, from the other posts I was under the impression that downloading from allofmp3 was illegal in the west. Never mind, the point stands. There is no difference, other than giving away money to some russian organisation, between downloading MP3s from allofmp3, and downloading MP3s illegally. In the latter case, there's a (small) chance of getting booked - unless you download them from another country where you're not going to be.
The GP is pointing out the difference between buying music, buying illegal music and downloading illegal music for free. In the first, the artist profits but you have to pay. In the second, the artist DOESN'T profit, and you STILL have to pay. In the last, no money changes hands. Sure, there is a middle man in both the first and second scenarios, but in the first, the artist gets a look in - is encouraged to make more music. If you're not going to pay the person that matters, why bother paying anyone, unless you get quality - bitrate, for example.
The problem with antialiasing is that it relies on there being more data than fits in the icon, and sizing it down (effectively.) It's practically impossible to anti-alias an already aliased icon other than blurring its edges.
Realistically, a little knowledge of ImageMagick or GIMP scripting would do the trick quite efficiently if all was required was some antialiased pngs. That would then pave the way for proper new icons, that could be added gradually.
In some cases, bonus features are worth watching. Few people want to sit around watching them in the cinema because the film was probably too long already, but if you found the film good, there's every chance the commentaries will be amusing, and the deleted scenes worth watching.
It's fair as long as you pull your weight. One naturally assumes that a good communist state will either proportion wealth distribution to work, or have other effective ways of ensuring fair distribution.
At its simplest level, what you're complaining about is high taxes. I'm half in-favour of a 100% tax bracket above a certain level anyway, and that's basically all this is - you don't receive a salary, because whatever you produce, you receive back again in some other useful form. The only people who really complain on this argument are those who would lose out because they've been sitting on their arses earning more than they deserve - like most of the West.
We're discussing students here, there's a high possibility.
Legally, I'm pretty sure they have to put caps and so on in whatever you agree to when you sign up. I don't think yours is a valid complaint.
"Every fucking time," being, what, 5 times? Each time the failure has been attributable to a corruption of the ideology. If the ideology were kept to, Communism would not result in violation of human rights. You also apparently didn't read what I wrote about the means of production being owned by the people, not the state, and you should pay attention to your sibling post.
If you're going to do CS, don't even bother listening to this guy. You get out of University, and all the job offers are asking for experience. I don't think they mean experience in McDonalds. Summer of Code is a way to make a quick buck, doing something fun and challenging that will look hella good on a CV or application. I don't see any negative points except for the effort required...