They went to the hassle of changing the boot loader, and code a brand spanking new less-hassle installer. Why not go that extra mile and please a few geeks?
I noticed the Vista beta installer hoses your boot sector with absolutely no regard for anything but other Windows partitions...nothing new but annoying none the less.
The IE7 installer has already been already cracked and genuine advantage bypassed when a XP build of IE7 was 'leaked'. Essentially the method was to decompress the installer with something like WinRAR, replace a dll and away you went.
Actually after watching a few videos from the MS developers on MSDN Channel 9 i'm beginning to get the feeling it's great technical and user improvements 'warmed over' with a hot turd of a default theme. Hopefully the Aero theme engine will be developer friendly and we'll see alot of really nice third party themes that we can install without patching some dll somewhere...
What are their UI people smoking? Or did they hire some Opera UI people?
If they had hired Opera UI developers then IE7 would have the most powerful and customizable browser UI to be found on any platform.
Back on the topic of IE7, I found I adjusted to the UI given 10 minutes of use.... but it's hopelessly lacking in features. My first reaction after closing a tab my accident was to goto Edit -> Undo. Well they've naffed that up that possibility haven't they.
My concern isn't that the UI will be a mess at release but rather as 3rd party addons and such become available, and MS themselves incorporate new features and functionality, that IE will become increasingly cluttered and chaotic. Hopefully they will only be bathing in their own stew dinner.
Microsoft seem to have gone a notch past crazy and started throwing random and drastic UI changes into all their software. I've tried Vista (build 5365) and prefer Luna, i've looked at the new Office screenshots and have my doubts, and i've tried IE7 and, with the exception of a few 'neat' features, prefer IE6.
Fortunately I have almost a year to get used to alternatives to MS products...
Grey listing works quite effectively, but requires implementation at your mail server, but I guess those of us who are sufficiently important can't risk delayed mail.
While Opera's CSS implementation is rather golden in my opinion (*see rant below*) the Acid2 test doesn't test for compliance of CSS standards. This has been said many many many times.
I sure wish the webstandards.org guys would place a notice atop the test page, in big red letters, "THIS IS NOT A COMPREHENSIVE STANDARDS COMPLIANCE TEST"
*RANT* I personally suspect alot of supposed Opera breakage is just legend from old versions and poor understanding, or testing of, standards by web designers. It's annoying to read posts that imply that because a CSS webpage doesn't work quite right in Opera but does in Firefox that it is all Opera's fault. Do people not realise it is possible to have a page that utilises CSS2 (and validates) but is still incorrect?
You know what..i like the fucking flicker. i want ajax with flicker substitute. How else am i going to enjoy bashing the refresh button when a website is so god damn infuriating?
1. The only way to stimulate a solution to that problem is to whinge to the developers/vendor. I imagine that you're perceived vulnerability to that vulnerability is indeed less than you imagine. Which DLL's were these? Why would any software bundle Window's DLL's? I would hazard a guess that the only reason these problems don't occur in the Linux world is the package maintainers act as filters for mess and crap like that.
2. 'msvcr60.dll' and 'msvcr70.dll' is almost as elegant, not to mention DLL's have the capability to host embedded version information just like exe's (no idea if.so's do) so if you find an incompatible version your application can always keep on chugging until you find a suitable one. Failing that extravagence, it occurs to me that if DLL's are both backward and forward compatible why not simply overwrite the old version and keep the filename the same?
The administrator priveleges dilemma is a good point. I'm absolutely infuriated with the way Windows forces me to have TWO administrator accounts on my machine because you need another in addition to the 'hidden' default 'Administrator' account. You cannot downgrade your user account to Limited User if it is the only account bar 'Administrator'.
There are advantages and disadvanages to both the repository and proprietary installer methods. With repositories I know atleast I will get updates eventually during a sync. On Windows I always know I can have upto date versions NOW straight from the vendor as long as I remember to check for updates myself... or use the applications build in update checker (which doesn't require administrator priveleges).
Perhaps Microsoft should implement a 'check for updates' API that proprietary vendors can use to deliver update *notifications* as a sort of plugin to add/remove programs and Windows Update. Call it Application Update or something. That would certainly solve alot of problems with updating on Windows.
For the most part most Window's apps bundle all the DLL's they need to run with the installer. This is inefficient when it comes to bandwidth, but it isn't necessarily the mess you suggest it is if the developer has done their job correctly.
For a start, these DLL's should be installed into shared location (Common Files, or the System folder). Secondly, most installers now warn and ask you that you are about to overwrite a file of newer version than is currently being installed, and all is well.
I don't see how you can claim Linux distributions are any better with the likes of "library.so.5" and "library.so.6" and related symlink mess that often entails. I can't even count how many times i've seen people have library issues on linux community forums and the like and the solution was to move a library here or add a symlink there.
But it isn't like "emerge -uD firefox" is so fucking hard to type.
Wouldn't it be easy to goto help -> check for updates in Firefox like on Windows? oh wait it's greyed out on Linux. What does "-uD" bit mean? Man page, manual page what's that? Why should I have to read this to understand it? Why is it called emerge? Why isn't this easier?
I'm a gentoo user too, but this isn't trivial to the n00b. The days of the 200 page MSDOS 5.0 user manual are long gone, in them days you didn't have the same joe blogg user on the computer trying to get their job done.
The fact is you shouldn't need a multi-hundred page manual for anything with a GUI.
You know sometimes I wish I could just goto Help -> Check for Updates in Firefox on Linux as easily as I can on MS Windows. It's laughable that the most well known of open source software doesn't function as seemlessly on an open source operating system as it does on a proprietary Microsoft one.
Hell, if my repository doesn't have the latest version of Opera (it doesn't) I say sod it and get it from the source, run Opera's 'install.sh' and i'm happy if it works (it does). Yet, theres no safe way to uninstall or manage that installation thereafter.
Microsoft's registry and filesystem arrangement isn't as pure as us geeks would like, everything thrown in a single 'Program Files' folder, the start menu and registry practically pissed upon, user documents stored in a subfolder of the user profile and settings folder on the same partition as the operating system ecetera ecetera.
The fact is though on Linux, you're forced to engage with the community to get what you want in the repositories, rely on using the distro flavour of the month to get the best choice, or get down and dirty with configure, make and the filesystem yourself. Some people never want to have to do *any* of that, and they shouldn't have to. How anyone can claim Linux will every make it to the average mom's desktop, without constant nannying by a geek (and yes lots of Windows users struggle by without one, and the spyware awareness situation is improving), unless they address these issues is just funny.
The HP 'drivers' for my all-in-one machine come in at 180 megabytes! The interface is sheer bloat, it installs a handful of totally unnecessary (Disabling them has little consequence) services and startup processes, and there is still no x64 driver!
The HP sponsored linux drivers (HPLIP) work well on Linux 64, and it is nice to see Linux up on Windows for once in terms of hardware support.
Slashdot Mirror
Do you think they'd notice if I submitted their old design as my own and claimed that laptop? xD
By the time they realised I could be half way through the BootCamp installation to spyware town.
They went to the hassle of changing the boot loader, and code a brand spanking new less-hassle installer. Why not go that extra mile and please a few geeks?
I noticed the Vista beta installer hoses your boot sector with absolutely no regard for anything but other Windows partitions...nothing new but annoying none the less.
No more than Apache are in violation of the DCMA because it runs a website distributing pirate software.
So how long until someone makes /. look like Digg?
/. looks now
I kid, I kid! I personally love the way
The IE7 installer has already been already cracked and genuine advantage bypassed when a XP build of IE7 was 'leaked'. Essentially the method was to decompress the installer with something like WinRAR, replace a dll and away you went.
Actually after watching a few videos from the MS developers on MSDN Channel 9 i'm beginning to get the feeling it's great technical and user improvements 'warmed over' with a hot turd of a default theme. Hopefully the Aero theme engine will be developer friendly and we'll see alot of really nice third party themes that we can install without patching some dll somewhere...
What are their UI people smoking? Or did they hire some Opera UI people?
If they had hired Opera UI developers then IE7 would have the most powerful and customizable browser UI to be found on any platform.
Back on the topic of IE7, I found I adjusted to the UI given 10 minutes of use.... but it's hopelessly lacking in features. My first reaction after closing a tab my accident was to goto Edit -> Undo. Well they've naffed that up that possibility haven't they.
My concern isn't that the UI will be a mess at release but rather as 3rd party addons and such become available, and MS themselves incorporate new features and functionality, that IE will become increasingly cluttered and chaotic. Hopefully they will only be bathing in their own stew dinner.
Microsoft seem to have gone a notch past crazy and started throwing random and drastic UI changes into all their software. I've tried Vista (build 5365) and prefer Luna, i've looked at the new Office screenshots and have my doubts, and i've tried IE7 and, with the exception of a few 'neat' features, prefer IE6.
Fortunately I have almost a year to get used to alternatives to MS products...
Good info, appreciated.
wouldn't that assume you've kept the installation files?
Grey listing works quite effectively, but requires implementation at your mail server, but I guess those of us who are sufficiently important can't risk delayed mail.
What and prove AJAX is just as slashdottable as anything else and tarnish it's smooth silky sexy little image here on Slashdot? No way!
While Opera's CSS implementation is rather golden in my opinion (*see rant below*) the Acid2 test doesn't test for compliance of CSS standards. This has been said many many many times.
I sure wish the webstandards.org guys would place a notice atop the test page, in big red letters, "THIS IS NOT A COMPREHENSIVE STANDARDS COMPLIANCE TEST"
*RANT* I personally suspect alot of supposed Opera breakage is just legend from old versions and poor understanding, or testing of, standards by web designers. It's annoying to read posts that imply that because a CSS webpage doesn't work quite right in Opera but does in Firefox that it is all Opera's fault. Do people not realise it is possible to have a page that utilises CSS2 (and validates) but is still incorrect?
You know what..i like the fucking flicker. i want ajax with flicker substitute. How else am i going to enjoy bashing the refresh button when a website is so god damn infuriating?
I don't think I can foresee a time when you shall not be special.
Shutup boy it has to be XML! />
Now write me out 100 lines of <deny action="question" subject="buzzwords"
1. The only way to stimulate a solution to that problem is to whinge to the developers/vendor. I imagine that you're perceived vulnerability to that vulnerability is indeed less than you imagine. Which DLL's were these? Why would any software bundle Window's DLL's? I would hazard a guess that the only reason these problems don't occur in the Linux world is the package maintainers act as filters for mess and crap like that.
.so's do) so if you find an incompatible version your application can always keep on chugging until you find a suitable one. Failing that extravagence, it occurs to me that if DLL's are both backward and forward compatible why not simply overwrite the old version and keep the filename the same?
2. 'msvcr60.dll' and 'msvcr70.dll' is almost as elegant, not to mention DLL's have the capability to host embedded version information just like exe's (no idea if
The administrator priveleges dilemma is a good point. I'm absolutely infuriated with the way Windows forces me to have TWO administrator accounts on my machine because you need another in addition to the 'hidden' default 'Administrator' account. You cannot downgrade your user account to Limited User if it is the only account bar 'Administrator'.
There are advantages and disadvanages to both the repository and proprietary installer methods. With repositories I know atleast I will get updates eventually during a sync. On Windows I always know I can have upto date versions NOW straight from the vendor as long as I remember to check for updates myself... or use the applications build in update checker (which doesn't require administrator priveleges).
Perhaps Microsoft should implement a 'check for updates' API that proprietary vendors can use to deliver update *notifications* as a sort of plugin to add/remove programs and Windows Update. Call it Application Update or something. That would certainly solve alot of problems with updating on Windows.
For the most part most Window's apps bundle all the DLL's they need to run with the installer. This is inefficient when it comes to bandwidth, but it isn't necessarily the mess you suggest it is if the developer has done their job correctly.
For a start, these DLL's should be installed into shared location (Common Files, or the System folder). Secondly, most installers now warn and ask you that you are about to overwrite a file of newer version than is currently being installed, and all is well.
I don't see how you can claim Linux distributions are any better with the likes of "library.so.5" and "library.so.6" and related symlink mess that often entails. I can't even count how many times i've seen people have library issues on linux community forums and the like and the solution was to move a library here or add a symlink there.
But it isn't like "emerge -uD firefox" is so fucking hard to type.
Wouldn't it be easy to goto help -> check for updates in Firefox like on Windows? oh wait it's greyed out on Linux. What does "-uD" bit mean? Man page, manual page what's that? Why should I have to read this to understand it? Why is it called emerge? Why isn't this easier?
I'm a gentoo user too, but this isn't trivial to the n00b. The days of the 200 page MSDOS 5.0 user manual are long gone, in them days you didn't have the same joe blogg user on the computer trying to get their job done.
The fact is you shouldn't need a multi-hundred page manual for anything with a GUI.
I agree.
You know sometimes I wish I could just goto Help -> Check for Updates in Firefox on Linux as easily as I can on MS Windows. It's laughable that the most well known of open source software doesn't function as seemlessly on an open source operating system as it does on a proprietary Microsoft one.
Hell, if my repository doesn't have the latest version of Opera (it doesn't) I say sod it and get it from the source, run Opera's 'install.sh' and i'm happy if it works (it does). Yet, theres no safe way to uninstall or manage that installation thereafter.
Microsoft's registry and filesystem arrangement isn't as pure as us geeks would like, everything thrown in a single 'Program Files' folder, the start menu and registry practically pissed upon, user documents stored in a subfolder of the user profile and settings folder on the same partition as the operating system ecetera ecetera.
The fact is though on Linux, you're forced to engage with the community to get what you want in the repositories, rely on using the distro flavour of the month to get the best choice, or get down and dirty with configure, make and the filesystem yourself. Some people never want to have to do *any* of that, and they shouldn't have to. How anyone can claim Linux will every make it to the average mom's desktop, without constant nannying by a geek (and yes lots of Windows users struggle by without one, and the spyware awareness situation is improving), unless they address these issues is just funny.
Oooo ooo I want to slam HP too.
The HP 'drivers' for my all-in-one machine come in at 180 megabytes! The interface is sheer bloat, it installs a handful of totally unnecessary (Disabling them has little consequence) services and startup processes, and there is still no x64 driver!
The HP sponsored linux drivers (HPLIP) work well on Linux 64, and it is nice to see Linux up on Windows for once in terms of hardware support.
That felt good.
iPod's are weapons of mass destruction too, deafening the nation since just after 9-11 (october 2001).
If anything, with the EU pressure on Microsoft. Now would be the safest time ever to rip off MS's API's (even the undocumented ones) wouldn't it?
What's wrong with implementing it both ways and letting the user/distro decide at compile time?