No, it's not available for free download in book form.
Even the review restates a paragraph that explicitly says you can charge for a product. To grossly oversimplify, the *only* requirement the GPL makes is that the source code accompany any binaries, and that the buyer has the right to modify and/or redistribute the binaries or source code under the terms of the GPL.
The *real* question is, can you OCR the text and post it on the net yourself?
Microsoft hasn't concerned itself with software titled "Windows Foo" since the beginning. It's been over a decade since MS-Windows became popular, and nobody has confused Spinnaker software for Microsoft software; why the sudden interest in curtailing the "Windows Foo" titles?
Considering the companies that are being attacked are those listed on the Lindows site, this is a blatant tactic on Microsoft's part to reassert control over the word "Windows." This is yet another (admittedly mild) example of Microsoft's bullying tactics.
Microsoft is not evil, no more than the bully on the schoolground is evil. They are just big and stupid and incredibly fucking selfish, and they realize they must push everyone around if they are to have any power at all.
They are willing to hurt their supporters (makers of MS-Windows software) to get at a little enemy (Lindows). This doesn't make them evil. It just makes them untrustworthy, and there's nothing evil about an untrustworthy hippopatomus.
You are correct; I am incorrect. My mistake was in not paying attention. In all cases I could find in which the B&MGF provided funding for technology infrastructure, MS provided the software gratis.
I did not mean to suggest the B&MGF put strings on the money donated; my point was based on an incorrect recollection of an article in Salon about the way BG counted software donations at face value, though it cost him essentially nothing.
In reality, it was Microsoft, and not BG, who does that. So, since they take tax writeoffs on "donated" software, they are able to increase profits while increasing market penetration in organisations who would otherwise have to pirate their copies of the software.
Sorry about that. Shooting from the hip can sometimes cause you to shoot yourself in the foot.
In truth, a very large portion of that "charity" is written off in software licenses for MS-Windows, MS-Office, and other MS products. Since these are given to "charity," he can write off the entire market-worth of these donations, though they cost him nothing at all.
Gates has not given 46% of his net worth. He has given "value" equivelent to 46% of his net worth, though that "value" does not entirely subtract from his net worth.
His generous giving of software not only puts a nice spin on things, but also allows him to push his and Microsoft's hegemony further into places most likely to adopt non-MS products: schools and libraries and other non-profit (meaning "under-funded") ventures.
Granted, some of what he has donated is pure money, and has no goal above providing money to worthy causes. But, c'mon! You can't ignore his ulterior motives and shady PR-based accounting.
First, this sounds like a turnkey system, once installed. Your estimate of 1/10th of an fte seems a little high; once installed, the search engine shouldn't take 45 minutes a day to maintain.
But, in any case, if they have an employee who can shoulder the burden of maintaining this product without adversely impacting that employee's performance, then internal support costs nothing at all. Plus, there are very few commercial products that are guaranteed support for even a few years, let alone 10. Sure, support this year is available at a reasonable cost; but there's a good possibility any random company will go out of business within the next ten years, or they may drop support for that product.
With open/free software, you have the chance to maintain the product yourself, long after the original producer has dropped support.
When was the last time you upgrade the operating software of your television?
When was the last time your television was connected to the internet, or balanced your checkbook?
There will always be a need for "transluscent" operating system, at any rate. Kinda like Tivo. Sure, you won't necessarilly see the distinction between the OS and the applications, but there will always be a need for upgrades (if for no other reason that hardening the system against recently-discovered exploits).
This is true for the forseeable future, at any rate. Perhaps someday, say in thirty years, we won't need operating systems. But that is so far in the future, we'd be fools to try to predict what will be visible, what will be hidden, and what is even important.
I predict in sixty years we'll need upgrades to our brains' wetware to protect against newly-discovered exploits.
Seems like the obvious thing to do is check out. But where to go?
Wherever you want?
Seriously, take this time to do the things you wanted to do all along, especially if you don't have kids. (Children bring a certain level of responsibilty that inhibits risk-taking.)
Me, I am thinking about leaving the tech sector, after 20 years of work. I am the mid-thirties receding-hairline guy you will eventually become. I am considering opening a brewpub one day soon.
I want to do this not because I can't find work, but because I'm fucking tired of the industry. I'm tired of monied interests setting the computer industry back 12 years, and personal rights back 100 years. I'm tired of an industry in which space-time is warped by a single black hole, from which neither light nor innovation ever escapes.
I imagine this is why most big companies go for younger, less-jaded programmers.
Go back to school, get that physics degree for which you've been hankering. Learn a new trade; carpentry is nice (especially finish carpentry). Open a freakin' brewpub.
Seems the manufacturer wants to advertise on Slashdot. Okay, fine, whatever. Even sneaking it in as a real submission is fine. I don't own slashdot.
But, what the hell do they mean, "next generation way of computing?" First, what does that even mean? And secondly, what have they done to back it up?
The answers: nothing, and nothing. In that order.
Seems they think the next generation of computers are merely smaller than the current generation. They don't do anything truly useful, like digitize you and put you on the game grid; they are the same as the bigger, current generation, only more restricted.
First, it uses 2.5" hard drives, which are slow and expensive, making it a bad choice for software development. Second, you can't simply use the latest video cards, rendering it useless for high-end gaming.
So, if the hard drive is too slow for development, and the video is too slow for high-end gaming, what use is it?
If it's merely small, I will use an ITX mobo and case, or a uATX if I want the latest processor.
I don't know why I just spent so much time responding to blatant advertising; I guess it's just a slow day.
I agree it wasn't a great NeXT program; but WP was so much nicer on the NeXT than on other platforms, I felt. It isn't that it was a great NeXT program; it's that WP was better on the NeXT.
Word Perfect was once the de-facto standard. That didn't stop MS-Word from taking over the market... which it did not by dint of being a superior product, but because of Microsoft's strong-arming PC vendors into supplying only MS-Office on MS-Windows machines.
Word Perfect 5.1 was the best word processor out there, bar none. (Especially on the NeXT.) Novell purchased Word Perfect Corp, though, and screwed it up with 5.2 and 6.0. 7.0 wasn't much better; I haven't used it since, as I've discovered LyX (and fuck compatible file formats; if I want to share a document, I'll send a PDF), but I've heard the recent versions are really quite nice.
However, though Microsoft is finally starting to catch up to WP 5.1 in usability and functionality, they *still* haven't provided anything as important as the "Reveal Codes" option. So, in many ways, Word still lags behind Word Perfect.
Mostly, your "de-facto standard" thesis is a straw man. As we've seen, only real standards survive; de-facto standards may fall at any time. And it's about bloody time the MS-Office hegomony was broken.
It's not an article about a publisher being stupid and wasting paper; it's about the glacial creeping of an intellectual property mindset that is slowly eroding our rights.
In society, things change slowly. Early in any major change, there are harbingers; this is one. Years ago we would never have given serious thought to shrink-wrap agreements in software, since they did not hold any real legal weight; now, because of UCITA, they do have legal backing in some states.
Just because it seems ridiculous now doesn't mean it will remain ridiculous. Obvously, *some*one is taking it seriously enough to attempt it. Our only hope it to nip this in the bud, and maybe roll back UCITA at the same time.
Otherwise, we will only take it seriously after it is too late.
Mr. McKown acknowledges the existence of chording keyboards. His patent covers the physical configuration, not the idea of a chording keyboard. His design allows the typing fingers freedom; they do not need to support the keybard at all, providing a more comfortable experience.
Also, the design is unobtrusive. He refers to it as a "stealthy" keyboard. I don't know if that's such a big fat hairy deal, but the comfort aspect is.
Right now I'm out of work and while I'm generally looking at programming positions, at times it's a temptation to tighten my belt, accept a 50% drop in salary, and go do something completely different.
Dude, if you're out of work, any job is an advance in salary, not a drop. Face it, your current salary is $0/year, no matter what your more most recent job paid.
Me, I plan on leaving IT and starting a brewery. Fuck, at least you can profit from your failures... get drunk off your ass and forget you are unhappy.
Plus, Even though Microsoft is the Budwieser of the software company, at least it's only Budwieser that's the Budwieser of the brewing industry.
RMS was not comparing the Free Software movement to the civil rights movement. He was demonstrating that civil disobedience sometimes results in positive effects. That's the point of the disobedience in the first place.
Your response is very ironic, as it demonstrates the type of generalist misunderstanding to which RMS referred.
The Crystalfontz 633 may be exactly what you are looking for. I just received one in the mail a couple of days ago, and I'm using it for my car MP3 player interface. I haven't done much with it yet, but so far, it is *very* cool.
To expand on the author's analogy of chicken to beef (chicken being OSS and beef being something proprietary); sure, the chicken might be free, but in this situation, you have to butcher the chicken yourself and hire a chef to prepare it for you, whereas you can simply walk up to a the counter and order a hamburger./I.
Uhm.... Bullshit.
The secondary costs of installing and using MS-Windows is about the same (or perhaps more) than installing and using Linux. That, coupled with the primary costs of using MS-Windows (licensing and media fees) puts MS-Windows at a higher cost than Linux.
To extend *your* extension of the analogy, it's like you can walk into a diner and order a hamburger, or you can get a chicken sandwich for a couple of bucks less, because the chicken costs the restaraunt nothing.
This idea that MS-Windows has no secondary cost because it has a primary cost is stupid.
There is so much wrong with this, I don't know where to start. First, there's the elitism. Second, the assumption that people with degrees know what the hell they are doing. Third, the assumption that you should be making more money just because you have a degree.
All of that: rubbish. I've gone to college. I *know* what kind of people get CS degrees. About half are any good at all; the other half got in because they heard about the babes who can't stay away from us geeks, or thought they'd make a pile of money just because they got a degree. The final half thought CS meant chef school and wanted to learn how to "cook a hard drive."
Truth is, some of us get payed good money because we *deserve* good money. And the babes. We definitely deserve the babes. And am I *ever* glad I became a geek.
Money can influence the outcome, but it's the people and not the corporations that cast votes. If Big Money gets its way more often than not, it's only because WE let it happen.
There is a very strong correlation between the amount of money spent on a campaign, and the results of the campaign. The more you spend, the more likely you are to win.
Plus, once in power, to whom is a legislator more likely to listen, a giant corp with $40B in the bank, or some schmuck from New Jersey with a $400 bank balance?
In our society, money == power. You are more likely to influence other people if you have money. If you have a lot of money, you have a lot more influence.
The states remedies will help the consumer substantially more than the Microsoft-authored remedies. This remedy phase is designed to make us forget why Microsoft got into trouble in the first place, so we'll just be happy to swallow whatever gilded shit they decide to shove down our throats.
And *any* effective remedy is going to help Microsoft's competitors. That's what "restoring competition" is all about.
Most programming skills do not become obsolete. New "technologies" come along all the time, but they rarely ever replace an old skill.
Take XML. Hardly a new idea. It's a markup meta-language used to structure data into a tree. Tree databases have been around for years; that's all XML is, just a markup language for 40-year old "technology."
Incidently: tree-structured databases were replaced by the superior set-theory based relational databases. There were reasons for this. What is old is new again; and what was once thrown out as inferior gets a fresh coat of paint and resold as new.
What?!? Dude, you have some serious hero-worship problems.
Bill Gates sucked as a programmer. He was hardly a genius "back in the day." He used public-domain code to port BASIC to the Altair. That was about it.
Now, he ported BASIC to the Altair, a machine to which he didn't have access yet. But you know how he did it? Paul Allen wrote an Altair emulator. *Paul Allen.* This was the hard part, to write an emulator for a machine to which you only have specs, and no access. Billy G. did nothing but use Mr. Allen's genius to his benefit. This is his real strength: knowing how and when to use people.
As far as his job as chie software architect goes: that's a PR move. He did that to distance himself as the head of the company during the height of the anti-trust trial. Just a PR move, like the month they took off to "secure" their code.
Bill Gates was hardly a genius. His code was mediocre, at best. Kind of like your post.
Slashdot Mirror
No, it's not available for free download in book form.
Even the review restates a paragraph that explicitly says you can charge for a product. To grossly oversimplify, the *only* requirement the GPL makes is that the source code accompany any binaries, and that the buyer has the right to modify and/or redistribute the binaries or source code under the terms of the GPL.
The *real* question is, can you OCR the text and post it on the net yourself?
Microsoft hasn't concerned itself with software titled "Windows Foo" since the beginning. It's been over a decade since MS-Windows became popular, and nobody has confused Spinnaker software for Microsoft software; why the sudden interest in curtailing the "Windows Foo" titles?
Considering the companies that are being attacked are those listed on the Lindows site, this is a blatant tactic on Microsoft's part to reassert control over the word "Windows." This is yet another (admittedly mild) example of Microsoft's bullying tactics.
Microsoft is not evil, no more than the bully on the schoolground is evil. They are just big and stupid and incredibly fucking selfish, and they realize they must push everyone around if they are to have any power at all.
They are willing to hurt their supporters (makers of MS-Windows software) to get at a little enemy (Lindows). This doesn't make them evil. It just makes them untrustworthy, and there's nothing evil about an untrustworthy hippopatomus.
Not evil. Just dangerous.
You are correct; I am incorrect. My mistake was in not paying attention. In all cases I could find in which the B&MGF provided funding for technology infrastructure, MS provided the software gratis.
I did not mean to suggest the B&MGF put strings on the money donated; my point was based on an incorrect recollection of an article in Salon about the way BG counted software donations at face value, though it cost him essentially nothing.
In reality, it was Microsoft, and not BG, who does that. So, since they take tax writeoffs on "donated" software, they are able to increase profits while increasing market penetration in organisations who would otherwise have to pirate their copies of the software.
Sorry about that. Shooting from the hip can sometimes cause you to shoot yourself in the foot.
In truth, a very large portion of that "charity" is written off in software licenses for MS-Windows, MS-Office, and other MS products. Since these are given to "charity," he can write off the entire market-worth of these donations, though they cost him nothing at all.
Gates has not given 46% of his net worth. He has given "value" equivelent to 46% of his net worth, though that "value" does not entirely subtract from his net worth.
His generous giving of software not only puts a nice spin on things, but also allows him to push his and Microsoft's hegemony further into places most likely to adopt non-MS products: schools and libraries and other non-profit (meaning "under-funded") ventures.
Granted, some of what he has donated is pure money, and has no goal above providing money to worthy causes. But, c'mon! You can't ignore his ulterior motives and shady PR-based accounting.
Get your damn head out of the sand.
First, this sounds like a turnkey system, once installed. Your estimate of 1/10th of an fte seems a little high; once installed, the search engine shouldn't take 45 minutes a day to maintain.
But, in any case, if they have an employee who can shoulder the burden of maintaining this product without adversely impacting that employee's performance, then internal support costs nothing at all. Plus, there are very few commercial products that are guaranteed support for even a few years, let alone 10. Sure, support this year is available at a reasonable cost; but there's a good possibility any random company will go out of business within the next ten years, or they may drop support for that product.
With open/free software, you have the chance to maintain the product yourself, long after the original producer has dropped support.
When was the last time you upgrade the operating software of your television?
When was the last time your television was connected to the internet, or balanced your checkbook?
There will always be a need for "transluscent" operating system, at any rate. Kinda like Tivo. Sure, you won't necessarilly see the distinction between the OS and the applications, but there will always be a need for upgrades (if for no other reason that hardening the system against recently-discovered exploits).
This is true for the forseeable future, at any rate. Perhaps someday, say in thirty years, we won't need operating systems. But that is so far in the future, we'd be fools to try to predict what will be visible, what will be hidden, and what is even important.
I predict in sixty years we'll need upgrades to our brains' wetware to protect against newly-discovered exploits.
No, it's named for the city of La Grande, in the northeaast corner of Oregon. Intel codenames its processors after Oregon locations (such as Klamath).
La Grande itself is a relatively pleasant community, in spite of my ex-wife making it her home.
Seems like the obvious thing to do is check out. But where to go?
Wherever you want?
Seriously, take this time to do the things you wanted to do all along, especially if you don't have kids. (Children bring a certain level of responsibilty that inhibits risk-taking.)
Me, I am thinking about leaving the tech sector, after 20 years of work. I am the mid-thirties receding-hairline guy you will eventually become. I am considering opening a brewpub one day soon.
I want to do this not because I can't find work, but because I'm fucking tired of the industry. I'm tired of monied interests setting the computer industry back 12 years, and personal rights back 100 years. I'm tired of an industry in which space-time is warped by a single black hole, from which neither light nor innovation ever escapes.
I imagine this is why most big companies go for younger, less-jaded programmers.
Go back to school, get that physics degree for which you've been hankering. Learn a new trade; carpentry is nice (especially finish carpentry). Open a freakin' brewpub.
The world always needs more beer.
Seems the manufacturer wants to advertise on Slashdot. Okay, fine, whatever. Even sneaking it in as a real submission is fine. I don't own slashdot.
But, what the hell do they mean, "next generation way of computing?" First, what does that even mean? And secondly, what have they done to back it up?
The answers: nothing, and nothing. In that order.
Seems they think the next generation of computers are merely smaller than the current generation. They don't do anything truly useful, like digitize you and put you on the game grid; they are the same as the bigger, current generation, only more restricted.
First, it uses 2.5" hard drives, which are slow and expensive, making it a bad choice for software development. Second, you can't simply use the latest video cards, rendering it useless for high-end gaming.
So, if the hard drive is too slow for development, and the video is too slow for high-end gaming, what use is it?
If it's merely small, I will use an ITX mobo and case, or a uATX if I want the latest processor.
I don't know why I just spent so much time responding to blatant advertising; I guess it's just a slow day.
I agree it wasn't a great NeXT program; but WP was so much nicer on the NeXT than on other platforms, I felt. It isn't that it was a great NeXT program; it's that WP was better on the NeXT.
Word Perfect was once the de-facto standard. That didn't stop MS-Word from taking over the market... which it did not by dint of being a superior product, but because of Microsoft's strong-arming PC vendors into supplying only MS-Office on MS-Windows machines.
Word Perfect 5.1 was the best word processor out there, bar none. (Especially on the NeXT.) Novell purchased Word Perfect Corp, though, and screwed it up with 5.2 and 6.0. 7.0 wasn't much better; I haven't used it since, as I've discovered LyX (and fuck compatible file formats; if I want to share a document, I'll send a PDF), but I've heard the recent versions are really quite nice.
However, though Microsoft is finally starting to catch up to WP 5.1 in usability and functionality, they *still* haven't provided anything as important as the "Reveal Codes" option. So, in many ways, Word still lags behind Word Perfect.
Mostly, your "de-facto standard" thesis is a straw man. As we've seen, only real standards survive; de-facto standards may fall at any time. And it's about bloody time the MS-Office hegomony was broken.
At least, that's my opinion. I could be wrong.
It's not an article about a publisher being stupid and wasting paper; it's about the glacial creeping of an intellectual property mindset that is slowly eroding our rights.
In society, things change slowly. Early in any major change, there are harbingers; this is one. Years ago we would never have given serious thought to shrink-wrap agreements in software, since they did not hold any real legal weight; now, because of UCITA, they do have legal backing in some states.
Just because it seems ridiculous now doesn't mean it will remain ridiculous. Obvously, *some*one is taking it seriously enough to attempt it. Our only hope it to nip this in the bud, and maybe roll back UCITA at the same time.
Otherwise, we will only take it seriously after it is too late.
Mr. McKown acknowledges the existence of chording keyboards. His patent covers the physical configuration, not the idea of a chording keyboard. His design allows the typing fingers freedom; they do not need to support the keybard at all, providing a more comfortable experience.
Also, the design is unobtrusive. He refers to it as a "stealthy" keyboard. I don't know if that's such a big fat hairy deal, but the comfort aspect is.
Right now I'm out of work and while I'm generally looking at programming positions, at times it's a temptation to tighten my belt, accept a 50% drop in salary, and go do something completely different.
Dude, if you're out of work, any job is an advance in salary, not a drop. Face it, your current salary is $0/year, no matter what your more most recent job paid.
Me, I plan on leaving IT and starting a brewery. Fuck, at least you can profit from your failures... get drunk off your ass and forget you are unhappy.
Plus, Even though Microsoft is the Budwieser of the software company, at least it's only Budwieser that's the Budwieser of the brewing industry.
apt-get update
apt-get install gnucash
Easy enough for me.
RMS was not comparing the Free Software movement to the civil rights movement. He was demonstrating that civil disobedience sometimes results in positive effects. That's the point of the disobedience in the first place.
Your response is very ironic, as it demonstrates the type of generalist misunderstanding to which RMS referred.
The Crystalfontz 633 may be exactly what you are looking for. I just received one in the mail a couple of days ago, and I'm using it for my car MP3 player interface. I haven't done much with it yet, but so far, it is *very* cool.
Have fun, and play safe.
To expand on the author's analogy of chicken to beef (chicken being OSS and beef being something proprietary); sure, the chicken might be free, but in this situation, you have to butcher the chicken yourself and hire a chef to prepare it for you, whereas you can simply walk up to a the counter and order a hamburger./I.
Uhm.... Bullshit.
The secondary costs of installing and using MS-Windows is about the same (or perhaps more) than installing and using Linux. That, coupled with the primary costs of using MS-Windows (licensing and media fees) puts MS-Windows at a higher cost than Linux.
To extend *your* extension of the analogy, it's like you can walk into a diner and order a hamburger, or you can get a chicken sandwich for a couple of bucks less, because the chicken costs the restaraunt nothing.
This idea that MS-Windows has no secondary cost because it has a primary cost is stupid.
Just beat the bejeezus out of them. That sucker's made from an aircraft-grade aluminum pipe.
There is so much wrong with this, I don't know where to start. First, there's the elitism. Second, the assumption that people with degrees know what the hell they are doing. Third, the assumption that you should be making more money just because you have a degree.
All of that: rubbish. I've gone to college. I *know* what kind of people get CS degrees. About half are any good at all; the other half got in because they heard about the babes who can't stay away from us geeks, or thought they'd make a pile of money just because they got a degree. The final half thought CS meant chef school and wanted to learn how to "cook a hard drive."
Truth is, some of us get payed good money because we *deserve* good money. And the babes. We definitely deserve the babes. And am I *ever* glad I became a geek.
Money can influence the outcome, but it's the people and not the corporations that cast votes. If Big Money gets its way more often than not, it's only because WE let it happen.
There is a very strong correlation between the amount of money spent on a campaign, and the results of the campaign. The more you spend, the more likely you are to win.
Plus, once in power, to whom is a legislator more likely to listen, a giant corp with $40B in the bank, or some schmuck from New Jersey with a $400 bank balance?
In our society, money == power. You are more likely to influence other people if you have money. If you have a lot of money, you have a lot more influence.
The states remedies will help the consumer substantially more than the Microsoft-authored remedies. This remedy phase is designed to make us forget why Microsoft got into trouble in the first place, so we'll just be happy to swallow whatever gilded shit they decide to shove down our throats.
And *any* effective remedy is going to help Microsoft's competitors. That's what "restoring competition" is all about.
Most programming skills do not become obsolete. New "technologies" come along all the time, but they rarely ever replace an old skill.
Take XML. Hardly a new idea. It's a markup meta-language used to structure data into a tree. Tree databases have been around for years; that's all XML is, just a markup language for 40-year old "technology."
Incidently: tree-structured databases were replaced by the superior set-theory based relational databases. There were reasons for this. What is old is new again; and what was once thrown out as inferior gets a fresh coat of paint and resold as new.
Obsolete my ass.
What?!? Dude, you have some serious hero-worship problems.
Bill Gates sucked as a programmer. He was hardly a genius "back in the day." He used public-domain code to port BASIC to the Altair. That was about it.
Now, he ported BASIC to the Altair, a machine to which he didn't have access yet. But you know how he did it? Paul Allen wrote an Altair emulator. *Paul Allen.* This was the hard part, to write an emulator for a machine to which you only have specs, and no access. Billy G. did nothing but use Mr. Allen's genius to his benefit. This is his real strength: knowing how and when to use people.
As far as his job as chie software architect goes: that's a PR move. He did that to distance himself as the head of the company during the height of the anti-trust trial. Just a PR move, like the month they took off to "secure" their code.
Bill Gates was hardly a genius. His code was mediocre, at best. Kind of like your post.