Hmmm, is what these guys did the work of crackers or hackers? I thought "hackers" were the "ethical", trustworth (even if at armslength) guys/girls, and "crackers" he "bad guys" who busted into your box and did nasty things or retrieved information with intent to bribe, extort, embarrass, run out of business, steal money or info, and so on...
Now, as far as people who hoard or hide information of unprecedented and interesting value, why hide it, when they already KNOW the damned source (the planet) exists?
I have not yet RTFA, but if they have had some 2 years of hard evidence, then why continue hiding it? It's almost as if they might be scientists who "found "god"" but didn't want to reopen the Galileo/Copernicus, et al story of repression, oppression, house arrests, burnings at the stakes, accusations of witchcraft/witcher/sorcery and so on.
OTOH, maybe it's not a planet. It could be an ET or even a US hidden base. THAT'S IT: Pioneer and manifest destiny at work, except they didn't want to spring the news on us until the "aliens" were nuked, knived, batoned, microwaved and locked up... and THEN put thru the "shake n' bake" and Easy-Bake oven...
Actually, I hope they finally find life (well, rather quickly a planet's beings find us) from a planet that is far more enlightened than us but which has no compunction about "whipping our asses into planetary shape". I most certainly hope Earthlings are not the founders of any Federation or UFP or such. We need the moral, ethical, and other sorts of competition or pressure, and we SURE as hell don't deserve to escapade or forage beyond the Moon until we clean up our act down here. We have far too much warfare, pestilence, famine, social malaise, and political corruption and need to be "smacked down" a number of times to simulate and eventually effect are "real, hard, lasting moral reset" button.
I realize NASA has brought back information and manufacturing processes or advances and helped us learn a lot more than we could in 1G, but, dammit, too many other things can be done with that kind of money so we don't have to keep mortgaging our and our kids' futures on mostly-hoarded knowledge, or amassing information that can't be harvested in near-term with planet-enhancing results. Enough of the nation-superiority complexes.
ET, are you listening. Come and get us... Or, just keep initiating mission-failures that confound and befuddle the "experts". Maybe we'll end up diverting boondogle budgets to diminish hunger and deliver the food and medicines directly to those who need it, and bypass corrupt regimes' administrators.
Nah, these are HYUMANS I'm talking about. It'll be another 500 years before even SOME of the vestiges of the past 400 finally are washed out of the gene pool...
Deplorable?
Hmmm anti-script-word image happens to be... "deplore", hehehhe
Suppose an employee who is effectively a trojan horse got wind of a similar idea and leaked it to the BBC's guy. He and others might either be sympathetic to Open Source (to make sure a US-led company does not hijack the world, and rightly so), which is a pain in ms' ass, side, and other parts.
Now, this should be a cautionary tale, but many will say "BAH! Paranoia!", or "NAH, ms will NEVUR catch up with Open Source's ideals"... The cautionary tale is that NO ONE in Open Source can afford to allow splintering to destabilize the resilience and independence of Linux, Open Source/FLOSS and the movements behind them.
If it were so that ms purchased Red Hat, then SO WHAT? Why would the rest of LinuxLand need to crumble. Besides, Linus owns the right to the word "Linux", and he in turn could charge ms for every single instance in which they print, utter, or somehow use the word "Linux", can't he.
If LinuxLand is in some way threatened by a potential ms acquisition of Red Hat, then every last CVS and other archive had better be tagged with Red Hat-supplied, proprietary bits ready to be removed to make the cleanest, fastest, most efficient separation of newly-acquired ms code.
This should be considered a blessing, or a strategic advantage that the BBC article has come out.
Let's get rollin'. It's time for Operation Beat Back to get underway! Even if ms ultimately never buys RH and even if ms never releases some sort of cross-integrated open source-like version of *doze, then it STILL would be a useful exercise to ensure that, just as with SCO, Red Hat is not in a position to voluntarily or contractually assist ms destroy or subsume or co-opt OpenSource or LinuxLand.
Grazing in LinuxLand is NOT to be permitted to ms, for they'll just defecate or tromp and drool all over the place just enough to discourage followers and enough to taint stalwarts/intransigents and Don Quixotes.
It is probably imperative that SOME if not MOST developers escrow away or safely archive their non-employer-related hacks, developments and such and make sure the future is not imperilled by an employer who intentionally, deviously, or accidentally assigns an employee to tasks or projects that are too close to the hobby or alternate/freelance/self-employment/consultation work an employee does.
It very well could be that an employer hires an employee to exploit their talent, but then goes and gets greedy by trying to lay hands on his/her personal portfolio by assigning work at work that poisons or taints work done at home. Refuse to cooperate, or do too much sanitation documentation, you might get fired.
It might be best to use tools, methods, and implementations as different as possibly than your employer's past or roadmapped projects and products.
No need to be adversarial, just be safe and smart. In Invention Disclosures/Prior Inventions, make sure that you don't over-explain your thing, but do make sure what you describe is truthful and verifiable by external parties.
I would say if your employer tries to take you to court later, demand before being hired, or demand in court that the employer not have direct access. Ask the judge for a middle party who will be enjoined from telling ANYthing to the accusers. Demand the inspectors relate information to the judge. That is, if your hobby works are THAT important. Chances are, if your employer is that hard-up to get your hobby or force you to extend to work the practices you do at home, then maybe your onto something and ought to renegotiate your employment contract into terms suitable and equitable to all concerned. If they play hardball, then maybe you need to quit and find an investor after you get a judge to let your use some obscure law that is effectively your "preemptive strike" that says, basically, you broke no laws and are not at the mercy of your employer or some other company or individual out to get your works you never stole. If you later on are found to have perjured, then your ass should fry.
Maybe the way to deal with this is to make sure that on EVERY project on which you work, you keep tabs on how much is college-taught, how much is readily apparent from How-To's and WIN* magazines, and what comes from conferences.
Sometimes, employers (via their employees, lazy or adaptive) lift examples right out of books written by Plotkin and scores of others, only to shroud the code in "proprietary code" language.
If employees were to say, point-blank, THIS piece is common knowledge, that piece is readily apparent, the other one here is not novel or unique, and the implementation of this or that is not special, (and) given the constraints of the tool we used and the fact that x number of our competitors or some college courses use this tool, a student, if diligent enough, can do maybe 80% of what we're trying to keep secret.
Now, if the $1M ex-ms employee is smart, he'll tell Google EXACTLY on what projects he did not work. When ms provides the judge with the list of taboo-for-x-number-of-years projects, he and the judge and Google will be able to carve up a nice exec-sounding title/role for him to steer or guide other projects while biding his time. After all, Google is spending a lot of money to woo him, and they can't appear to "lose" this case. It would set a bad precedent for their future hire plans.
The thing that sucks about much labor law in a number of states is that states' laws are written by ex- or pro-business people who have NO real compunction about ignoring the fact that plenty of commercial and non-commercial, professional-grade tools enable any astute and determined person or team to create show-stopping tools that traditional capture-the-flag corps cannot cope with.
NDA is one thing. Barring someone from freedom of work is another. States that stupidly or myopically discourage individuals or groups from challenging existing companies are stupid. Software tools and their flexibilities and ever-increasing feature sets mean that large, lumbering, politically-mired companies will just have to become lean, faster, and have more foresight, or they too will fall to Darwinism.
Or, am I "deluding" myself (anti-script word image)
What intrigued me and pleased me was that a sales person at Yodabashi in Shinjuku (the exit west of JR station, almost on the corner, but I forget the street name) spent an HOUR discussing with me the phone I was going to buy. I told him I wanted a "sexy" phone, one that has nice features/gizmos. He didn't at first get "sexy", so I said, "Echi". Then I pointed to various models, distinguishing between "echi", "not echi", and then in seconds he caught one, steering me to the "echi" phones. It boiled down to Sharp, and I got the one Vodafone offered, the 402SH. It has the (sharp, hehe pun intended) TV, 1.3 megapixel camcorder, ringtones that I can change the pitch/octaves of, and more.
It was one of the most informative sales transactions I've ever experienced.
Of course, I have the name card holder, and sometimes here in the states I whip it out of my Uniqlo hip pouches I usually wear on my belt.
I WISH Uniqlo would have selected SF instead of New Jersey to open their first states-side store. But, no matter. When I am back working, I can send money to my friends there and tell them what to send me.
What I really like about what I think is normal in Japan and abnormal in the US is that in Japanese stores you can shoot pic of the QR codes, and probably the bar codes, off of flyers and and maybe even in the store and find the stuff you need and order it. I didn't actually TRY to shot QR pics in Uniqlo, except maybe the one on my receipt. I do know that some stores in Japan, and probably BIGTIME in the US, shooting pics even if you plan to purchase the thing you like/need/want risks ejection or a polite "no pictures".
I do understand, however the the Azabu-juban police do take a keen interest in watching African/Nigerian guys who hang out on corners. Funny thing is is that some of them are legit, and only retrieving friends or guests, the the JCops will shadow them up and down the street, snap pics and such. I don't PERSONALLY know if I myself were being shadowed, but I a habit of abruptly stopping and beaming in a direction I think someone is using as a vantage point. Sometimes, I (in Japan or in the US) would whip out my camera and mock shoot or actually shoot a pic, but I never got haggled.
People everywhere I went seemed pleasant, even at an Onsen in Nikko.
What I find interesting is that parents and their kids seem to have a better bond and flair for wild dressups than here. I've seen little kids as young as maybe 5 walking alone to and from school, despite Gov. Ishihara Shintaro's exhortations that most crime in Tokyo is due to foreign elements from China and elsewhere. If that were true, I suspect the parents would never let their kids walk around alone in Azabu-juban, or expat land, especially with all the soul-like clubs and sailorly spots 'merkun expats frequent. (I'm not a cop, and I don't have access to crime states for Tokyo proper, but somehow, I don't think ALL the crime, not even 50% is done by foreigners. Crime is everywhere, and race or gender and citizenship status probably pale compared to just having no food, no shelter, no job, and the like. I DO know that some westerners abuse the immigration/visitor status, and they pisse me off because I was trying to stay there legitimately, and these jerks are part of the problem forcing Japan to tighten up her immigration laws and labor policies. I sure wish they'd officially allow "unskilled, but imminently useful, unrestricted" labor for people like me who just want to long-term live and work there without deriving, expecting, or scheming any undeserved or unauthorized benefits. I'm not a criminal, not on any warrants lists that I know of, don't belong to any whacko, fringe or extremist groups, never been cuffed, even. Yet, governments see so many criminals who appeared clean before they finally were caught, and so they operate or make policies that treat persons as guilty until they show creds or skill that can be "appropriately" absorbed, and even then, there are time limits imposed.)
I am of a dark variety ethnicity. I spent 3 months in Japan, from Dec 1 to Feb 24. I didn't experience ANY racisim that I could discern.
I have been interested in Japan since childhood (from a naval perspective) and off-and-on tried to study Nihongo since 1992 (but am always distracted by other activities).
In Kibuki-Cho, a kid on a bike turned round the corner of a 100 yen store too fast. The handlebars struck me in the waist or pelvis, and he immediately profusely pleaded, "Gomen Nasai. Gomen. Gomen." I was thrilled. I was not even fazed by being hit by the bike. I was amazed and impressed and happy that my first "crash" was funny to me, and informative. If racism were so rampant, he could have just shrugged and moved on.
I met many new Japanese friends in Rappongi (of course, in expat-land), male and female, who enjoyed conversing with me, engaging in banter, and one of my favorite new friends is Atsumi, at one of the StarBux, who, when she saw some of my art and my databases on my laptop and my plans as I explained them to her, would say (in typical girl-response), "Nehhhh, neehhhh, nehhhhh..." while waving her finger and smiling. That was cool, exciting, funny, to me.
I was at Shibuya, switching from Namboku out of Azabu-juban, to Ebisu to Shibuya. I walked off the train, staring up at the digital directions. A well-dressed senior gentleman presumed I was lost. I wasn't quite lost, as I'd been on that route only once before, having visited a friend in Miyamaedaira. He offered me directions to the proper track, and when I failed to understand the city name he referred to, he apologized and said, "Oh, in the old days, that's what we used to call it. I used to work with the US Army, as a civilian..."
Another time, during stay, I heard and then heard more and more expats and Asians from the region professing warm feelings toward young and older Japanese who would go out of their way to assist foreigners.
Another time, when a Singaporean and I were going on a long train ride, we stopped at KFC I think in Asakusa (for you readers who don't know, pron it is as "ahsah-k'sah or maybe ahsahk-sah). Earlier, we realized we'd better get the directions down pat before eating, so we stopped into the ticket office for the old-style train upstairs. Not ONE, but FOUR employees, android-and-Borg like (hive-worker that is, not malevolence, hehe) double-checked information we gave, by repeating back to us. Then, #1 looked at #2 and nodded in agreement, then #1 & #2 worked with us, then referred to #3 then #4, and #4 and #3 nodded back, though seemingly junior in status, then #1, #2, #3 and #4 all stood professionally, giving us directions with #1 doing most of the info-feed-delivery. It was a bit touching, and somewhat amusing (maybe because my brain and soul like those special nuances that go beyond "do the minimum/go back to doin' my thing before I was interrupted"), and will be etched indelibly in my mind.
I made a number of friends in Japan, some of whom approached me out of the blue. I had no problems with homeless kids or adults, no problems on the train (yeh, I could doze off and my stuff would be right next to me when I woke up). I dropped my cell once, and dropped other things at times, and people would tug me and apologize and hand the things to me. (Well, I did lose my cheapo MetroPCS phone at BART in either SFO or Burlingame the day I returned, and it took about 1.5 to 2 weeks to retrieve it, fortunately.)
I find Japan (I can't speak too much to other place that I've not seen or not seen in a while) colorful, fun, party-animal-like (OK, Tokyo and Yokohama areas, at least), and more. (And, it's nice to know that Red Hat has an office in Roppongi, across from the ABC (Aoyama Book Center) store. )
Now, I am not for one second going try to "poo-poo" the condition of racism by saying it doesn't exist. I have read about Burakumin, and I even made Korean friends, Chinese friends, and others who actually LIVE IN Japan as residents or students. As f
But, can she mix the right amounts of cream and sugar? Will the she-model talk in a hi-pitched squeal? What will the he-model sound like? (Please, no Hello-Kitty jokes...)
They'd probably save a lot of time if they just wire up a RealDoll and install some miniaturized SpaceShip 1 gimballing motors in various parts, like the throat, pelvis, heartbeat area, and maybe up and down the spinal column.
So, she flutters her eyelids? Can she shoot darts like in "Fudoh" (See Takashi Miike's film), and pop balloons 25 feet away?
Imagine if the Yaks open up a whole street of love-making, washable-skin dolls in Kabuki-Cho and other areas in Shinjuku. Hell, for that matter, why not put them all over the country. They'd avoid the US railing them over the sex trade industry.
They could then inspire a revival of disco balls and a slew of renditions on the '60's/'70's "Sex Machine", tho I image the godfather of soul would want some "royalties" off the back- (and front-) end...
I tried it, and liked it. But, as I'm doing some more esoteric stuff along these lines, I cannot fully use theirs. Besides, since 1994 or so, I'd been compiling my blueprints and paper information and along came Lotus Approach and Lotus WordPro, so I have something for myself and my future fanbase.
But, for those of you not aiming for my level of esoterica, Storylines may be right up your alley.
It used to be called StoryLines, then they apparently branched out the Writer's Cafe bit, and now I'm still searching/looking to see if StoryLines still exists as a separate, other-features-featured product.
Here is a description of StoryLines & Writer's Cafe...
"Writer's Café is a software toolkit for all fiction writers, whether experienced or just starting out. The heart of Writer's Café is StoryLines, a powerful but simple to use story development tool that dramatically accelerates the creation and structuring of your novel or screenplay. Designed by published novelist Harriet Smart, it also includes a notebook, journal, research organiser, inspirational quotations, writing exercises, and a 60-page e-book, "Fiction: The Facts", distilling 20 years of writing experience. Writer's Café is designed to be a playground for the imagination, making writing fiction fun and fulfilling."
this start the crack in the dam that will flood out and erode the BlueRay, copy protection, and DVDCSS debacles we're suffering as non-windoze users?
I mean it this way: The studios currently put up with the DVD consortium and pay fees to encode DVD and use the DVD logo. Well, what if they decide, "Hell, we're hypocrites if we encode using Linux and Open Source/FLOSS tools, yet continue marketing and selling the DVDs in Warehouse, Blockbuster, and numerous other outlets, all the while forcing people who are using to go and find hacks, break the law, and patch their crippled distros when we are MAKING the problems for them and others.
I guess that's too much an enlightened perspective for them to intellectually accept and act on.
I guess mshaft and the cohorts will be up in arms.
Also, in another thread in this topic/discussion, someone asked what reasons they may have for switching to Linux. Well, I have an idea:
Consolidation Preparation: The sooner or earlier the various studios and indies get themselves on open formats, the easier it will be for one or more houses to absorb each other and each others' work. In the future, it may pay to be able to edit the video as well as the audio, much like Lucas rehashes his SW flicks. (IANASWF= I am not a Star Wars Fan.)
So, this could be some "rational" decisionmaking, especially when they will not be able to count on mshaft to be forthright and timely about some things such as file formatting. If ms changes something, or demands royalties for ms' "upgraded, special, proprietary bits for film industry..." file formatting, they'd have the movie industry by not just the balls, but the frenulum the vas defrens, the urethra, the cossix, sphincter, that deeper valve, and even the entrails. Such a grip would MORE than hurt.
Wise move, if this is the agenda...Now they can "shaft" ms by taking back control over their own entrails...
You have to assume that one or more of those cash register, ceiling-mounted ball cameras is tied to the barcode scanner. Scan a specific class/capability printer and one or more balls snap and video your mug, your height, and maybe more (maybe one day they'll do IR/thermal and even microwave to get your bone structure in case you dress up as a woman in pumps and a wig).
Now, so much for buying certain merchandise/goods with cash. They could even motion-track you all the way to the car or bus you depart in.
Also, when you sign even a fake name at the register, your palm's side might be on the paper, or your prints on the pen, or your skin oil on one or both. Not that they are taking this from these transactions, but years ago I wondered just how many Capital Hill "restaurants" were really just spy fronts used to micro-record and oil/fingerprint sample all the diplomats, spies, politicians, and reporters dining. Can you IMAGINE the huge database there must be.
It brings to mind "Get Smart", but I don't recall any Control or Kaos (sp?) dining halls set up in DC. I imagine if the scriptwriters DID think of it, someone on the inside or outside probably warned them not to mention in, or to remove it from/sanitize the script. Heck, even in DS9 and B5 and other shows, we almost never, if at all, see body oils, DNA, prints, hair, etc being taken. For example, serve a glass, take the glass to the kitchen, then mail it off to Mother Russia, or some quick-analysis & recording lab. This way even if a "spy" or operative alters his/her physical characteristics, it's highly unlikely the saliva, sweat, or oils will be changed.
As many bionic or robotic eyes as they can buy and surround with silicon skin, I suppose.
Imagine if "merkuh permanently grounds the shuttle. Other nations might collaboratively surpass the US.
Remember, 'dubyah already uttered those "fightin' words" to the USAF graduating cadets back round 2002, when he said (paraphrasing here): "NO ONE will be allowed to surpass the United States/America militarily, technologically, or scientifically..."
Speakin' that kind of SHIT just sets one up for bad Karma. We 'mekun's need to learn to die with dignity when we (as taxpayers) fork over umpteen BEELYONS for programs in the name of preeminence.
Won't matter for long anyway. If China duplicates a shuttle, but rockets it from astern instead of astride, NASA might find itself taking pre-orbit and mission control contracts to assist China's own orbiter/rocket/launch vehicle. OTOH, if China's smarter, they'll share the burden with other nations tired of or wary of NASA's recent shuttle debacles.
(No, don't ask where China'll get the moneh... Hey have enough cash to give $18 BILLION to Unocal shareholders as opposed to Chevron only offering $16 B, but in share swaps and other stuff that is not an economic orgasm such as cold, hard cash. But, if China (one way or another, purchasing Unocal or not) gets her hands on deep-drilling technology, they might find themselves in the oil export business, maybe even selling some to Japan, and raking in enough cash or other equivalents to ramp up funding to their own space programs. I think, now, that that is probably one of the items on the Daily Intel Assessments/Daily Briefs (or whatever they call them when they summarize them to the sitting prez...), and maybe "national security" is the excuse to delay or block the purchase. It ain't about "national security" or about us going to war with China in the next 5, 10, or 25 years: no, rather, it's about the US' loss of "'merikun (substitute another euphemism if you like) supremacy'.
Just think: do you think that if China actually DOES find domestic oil, and more than they could use on a daily basis, that they WON'T sell some to the best bidder, just below OPEC prices and not care about destabilizing OPEC for even only a few years, long enough to rake in some serious cash? If such a scenario came about (finding "excess domestic oil to be sold off"), don't you think China would spend at least **some** of that cash flow on playing "catch up" with/to the United States? I don't think China'll build more than nuke subs and larger destroyers/cruisers if they suddenly had money to show they can launch to the Moon, Mars and beyond (even if they have to "procure" advanced rocketry via theft, begging, borrowring, or collaborating), just to show they can.)
Aside from sending cos/J-astro-nauts up to the ISS, aren't they doing other things, too, such as secret missions?
Maybe they have a bird or two up there than needs human hands on it, and maybe the tile/foam falling off (real or digitally contrived) is an excuse to delay the shuttle so some secret repairs or bird releases can occur.
Why is almost everyone in here biting the foam video bit. We already know that over 10,000 foam strikes have happened since the shuttles first launched, and only TWO losses, one to faulty seal, and one to an unfortunately-located set of missing tiles. Hell, for all we know, other missions were probably near-fatals once inspectors went to work doing their near-rebuilds.
On the other hand, if it's not special bird ops, then some payload experiments that got backed up but not launched on rocket missions might have sued to get their projects on-line. Maybe they threatened NASA that if they don't meet such and such deadline, they'd divert funding efforts to non-shuttle alternatives that might prove a hastening fatal for NASA.
Could be other things going on here, boys/girls.
Hah!!! Anti-Script word image: PROTON...
I AM CAPTAIN PROTON!
Re:Desktop icons aligning properly yet?
on
Preview of KDE 3.5
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· Score: 1
Maybe Melissa Nguyen of EZ-Desk wouldn't mind doing for KDE what she did for Win95?
With win95, *doze kept "forgetting" the placement of icons. It so infuriated people that Melissa wrote code to snapshot the location of icons and put them in a file, a file which I think might have been separate from the registry.
Now, she has come to my mind a few time over the years when I've been regularly running KDE/Mandrake because *some*times, but very rarely, my icons just "jiggle" into a new positioning, and maybe the only way to put back my dozens of screen-filling shortcuts and such would be to either manually back up to a separate path my.kde settings for the desktop, or I would have to pull a copy from another disk I archived, if it was recent, as in hours or days within a system upgrade.
Now, I realize that it is possible (I think I saw this before) to NOT have automount icons go to the desktop, but...
What I wish would be rectified is the placement of automount icons. These should be SPECIAL icons that take less space when multiple partitions are being mounted. As it is, they take up too much space and can sometimes "hide" beneath Kicker. Sometimes, they don't refresh and show up on-screen for a little while later, though in Mandriva 10.2/2005 LE I seem to not endure that too often.
By making the icons smaller, and then by "grouping" them, say, more screen real estate is preserved.
Better yet, the KwikDisk applet might be the better way to handle these things. Just have Kwikdisk flash to the desktop or bubble-notify the user. The use then could refer to KwikDisk and manage the mounts from there. Taking up the desktop seems inefficient when the desktop that is cluttered just becomes even MORE cluttered.
Another possibility is that AutoMount could take a "snapshot" or "screenshot" of the desktop, scan the underlying app names, then assess or "rationalize" the placement of the AutoMount icons to a more open or clean area, but still doing so in a KwikDisk-like interface, or by giving the user the option to automagically activate KwikDisk if it's not running, and by defaulting to NO icons to desktop upon medium or device connection/insertion.
Re:Konq gets adblock, yay! Well, duh?
on
Preview of KDE 3.5
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· Score: 1
I took care of that double-click shit by going to Settings, Configure Konqueror, Cookies, Policy: Default Policy: Ask for Confirmation
Site Policy: Add to Domain any and every IP range and domain name variation for double-shit and/ads/ and other stuff.
(If you want to be REALLY "malevolent", just set the cookies as "session cookies" so they stay in memory and never get written any disk medium. But, Yahoo! and other sites might complain or stall, or never let you get past a notification window. I wonder, sometimes if they're whoring themselves out to marketing cookie meisters.)
Then, I use Etherape to SEE where traffic is going to and coming from regarding MY BOX. Use of a website, in my mind, does not grant double-click and cookie monsters rights to TRESPASS on my machine. Track whatever the hell you want on the visitED SITE, not the visitING machine.
Then, I go to firestarter and add the same stuff, domain names and domian IP ranges.
I hate double-click with a PASSION. They're just the digital version of and a combination of all those 70's paper catalog customer info files. I don't want them or any entity for which they act as a front being an affront to me by tracking and selling my surfing habits.
Finally, I periodically scour my cache and delete their junk, sometimes locking down my own cache under ROOT, even if I have a slower surfing experience.
Note: I am not against ALL cookies, just some of the more pernicious, insidious, and infuriating issuers of cookies. When I cannot block cookies, such as logging in with Yahoo!, I make sure to block the ads. I don't care to see most of them, and even if I let them run, I might click on maybe 1 out of 1000, and I tend to make sure I log out after copying and and pasting the URL, then I run the URL. I AM aware there might be a "web beacon" in the URL's page anyway, but that's something to quash on another day.
The reason I'm irritated by some of these cookies is that they coordinate banners based on what I might be doing, and I don't like that unless I OPT IN. I'm in the minority, I suppose, so what I'm doing won't run the sites out of business. Besides, the cookie baker has to pay for impressions, not responses, I think. So, whether or not I block the cookie and banner, if I am required to CLICK the banner but don't, then the site gets no click-through stream revenue ANYway. So much for some of the arguments of cookie and banner proponents. By blocking the cookies and banners, I cut down on distracting twilight-zone swirls and dancing junk. And, since I dart in and dart out of my email, I don't credibly spend enough time leaving the cookie or banner ad visible for the site to legitimately claim revenue anyway. It's not like I'm Gary Mitchell, reading 400 pages in 1 minute.
Am I being an ingrate? Making noise? Deserve my system being sabotaged or forced to endure 1-minute-crawling page loads (which has seemed to happen when I turn off cookies, or it's a bad KDE base at work in the 3.3x version...)
(anti-script word image: audacity (which is what I am full of in this posting...heheh))
Two ways so modify the size of your Kicker are to right-click on it and adjust the size.
If you haven't INITIALLY done it that way, another way is to go through KControl (KDE Control Center) and then under "LookNFeel" click on "Panels"
There, you have two nice options to try in the "Arrangement" tab, subsection "Length":
click the box for "Expand as required to fit contents" and THEN set the slider to say, 50% or whatever you want. You'll still have blank space to the left or right if you've centered the bar, but it might shrink icon and things on the Kicker for you.
And, in the "Size" subsection, you can set the "Custom" option.
Now, when you go back to right-clicking on the Kicker, and you then click on the "Size" arrow, you'll see:
Tiny Small Normal Large
Custom Resizable
Resizable is nice because once you enable it, you will be able to float your cursor over the upper edge of the Kicker then when it has double-ended arrows, just resize the height of the Kicker and watch the icons increase or decrease in size. -----------
HIDING/HIDE-MODE
Under the "Hiding" tab, you can set the "Hide Mode" and the "Hiding Animation" settings, so you can set the panel to be covered by apps or other windows you expand, and you can set the delay in milliseconds, as well as whether the covering of the Kicker should be with or without animation.
---------- Don't forget, if you've seen but not used, Kasbar.
To use it, and to fiddle with it via KControl, first right-click on Kicker and click on "Add", then "Panel", then "Kasbar".
You can resize Kasbar, but not as granularly as Kicker. BUT, what Kasbar has that Kicker doesn't (as of yet) is that you can enable and resize the icon thumbnail/preview so you can select which of multiple instances of, say, Konqueror, you have open. That is, if you have multiple instances of Konqueror Kwrite or Kate open, and you don't want to tab through them, adjust the thumbnail so you can see the actual image or text flow of that instance you want to switch to.
Right-click on Kasbar, then click on "Kasbar", then move your pointer to the bottom of the floating palette and click on "Kasbar", then click on "Configure". Yo can adjust the "Size" to small, medium or large.
On "Thumbnails", you can enable or deselect the option, but if you enable, try the slider for "Thumbnail size" and adjust to your liking. You can update the thumbnail image in increments of seconds. (You can go up to 999 seconds, but I set mine for 10.)
You can also-- as with Kicker-- enable or disable the left/right/top/bottom hide/unhide arrows.
Don't forget that you can also increase the number of virtual desktops in KControl. Spread out your apps across the desktop. As with Kicker, you can float your pointer over a Kasbar button or thumbnail and right-click it to send it to the current or another desktop.
Near to "Finally"... When you have either of or both of Kicker and Kasbar running, you can set the KDE desktop to respond to maximization of apps by either allowing or disallowing the app to cover, hide or expand to the screen's full size. If you need to keep a number of windows open without such that you can click on or use "focus follows mouse", then use "Atl+right-click" while your cursor is at the sides or corners and then adjust the app so you can avoid using Alt+Tab (to switch between virtual desktops) or Ctrl+Tab (to switch between ANY of the running apps, regardless of which desktop the are on).
Finally, when the IP stack or system resources get bogged, I find it faster to use Kasbar to switch between desktops and apps. There seems to be caching and thrashing going on when I float over and try to click Kicker sometimes. But, when I float to and click on Kasbar, BAM!!! A task or window is nearly instantly switched to. Must be a backend coding issue. Or, my 900-MHz Celery system AND my (former laptop which died) 800 MHz AMD system fell victim to KDE code.
I think I recall having visited zarb, and having failed at installing the RPM. Since it was about a month ago or so, I can't be sure at this point if the failure was due to a dependency issue, or if it installed without complaint, or if I was going to sites that were congested.
But, once I ran some episodes, I got nice video (aside from having selected the low-rez file version for download speed), but no audio. I'll give it a whirl, for something might have changed.
For the most part, I like Mandriva 10.2 2005 Limited Edition. However, what I DON'T like is when Mandrake/Mandriva removed or crippled or obscured certain things that worked.
For example, I cannot figure out how to make the KDE/KDM login in screen user/password dialog shrink so that my 1-minute-rotation images can be seen while the login dialog is awaiting user input. What's the point of having the option to change background images every period when the damned login stars and blue background obfuscate the feature. This is not helpful when I want to show off the eye candy to prospective converts.
Mandriva, please QUIT DOING THAT! You have a database of what you are deprecating and what you're obfuscating, so please knock that off. If something works, then just because people aren't screaming to use it doesn't mean they aren't using it. I thought you guys were using the RPM stats thing to figure out usage stats and not as a tool to remove something. If something WORKS, then the RPM stats ought to be recommending fixes of other things, not removal of things that are used and not complained about.
Another example, then I'll move on to things I DO like: on the KControl interface you took away or obfuscated or broke functionality of displaying some of the previous 13 or so levels of Information. I used to be able to see disk/partition information without having to run KwikDisk. Admittedly, I see some things I like when running KwikDisk, but the sudden and unexplained (no list showing deprecations/deferrals to the new release) is jarring, disconcerting, and irritating.
Overall, I love the ease-of-use interface. I like that now my USB and PCMCIA devices automagically (for me, for once) appear and (occasionally) disappear based on connection or removal of devices.
I like that Mandrake (and maybe others offering KDE) loads up fast from power-on, at least faster than 10.1.
What I need to figure out, though, is why on an 800/900 MHz, Celery-based FIC computer, there are intermittent pauses in the system (maybe it's the Win4Lin-enabled kernel?), things which I can't recall having experienced in a number of releases/versions. For now, I've learned to synchronize my mouse/eye-coordination to cope with it. It's intermittent, though not a show-stopper for me.
I love the DiskDrake and HardDrake tool and wish you'd find a way to promote the appearance of them. Maybe a limited functionality appearance would do, prompting people to learn some sysadmin in the process of educating them.
What would be nice is if there were a script to show not just tips, but user-scheduled "tip/training sessions" to break the monotony of or habit of users who log in, do something, then brain-lock and start getting unproductive. Rather, this tool could counter or combat softening skills. The system could be set to run mini-pseudo live training. Not cripple a working net or drive attach, but simulating them and testing the user's troubleshooting skills.
I don't suggest this for the purpose of taking away tech support calls and income, but to ensure that users are challenged, educated, and made to or coaxed to love their OS. The more educated the user, the less the negative commentary and the less the chance of them switching back to another OS.
Also, what would be nice is an MPEG-4 reader/player that I could actually USE. I want to watch some of the Trek fan films that are available for download. I imagine only *doze and Mac users can enjoy them relatively easily. I can play them back, but I get no audio. I can watch "The Savage Universe" from Exeter but I cannot watch the subsequent files, nor those from other fan-producer sites.
I like the new audio sounds, but I wish Mandrake and others would create a facility to let us go "nostalgic" once in a while by using sound files from the previous Mandrake/KDE event associations. Sure, a savvy user would carry over the audio after upgrading, then maybe write a script to copy or move things around based on some chron job, but there
Slashdot Mirror
Hmmm, is what these guys did the work of crackers or hackers? I thought "hackers" were the "ethical", trustworth (even if at armslength) guys/girls, and "crackers" he "bad guys" who busted into your box and did nasty things or retrieved information with intent to bribe, extort, embarrass, run out of business, steal money or info, and so on...
Now, as far as people who hoard or hide information of unprecedented and interesting value, why hide it, when they already KNOW the damned source (the planet) exists?
I have not yet RTFA, but if they have had some 2 years of hard evidence, then why continue hiding it? It's almost as if they might be scientists who "found "god"" but didn't want to reopen the Galileo/Copernicus, et al story of repression, oppression, house arrests, burnings at the stakes, accusations of witchcraft/witcher/sorcery and so on.
OTOH, maybe it's not a planet. It could be an ET or even a US hidden base. THAT'S IT: Pioneer and manifest destiny at work, except they didn't want to spring the news on us until the "aliens" were nuked, knived, batoned, microwaved and locked up... and THEN put thru the "shake n' bake" and Easy-Bake oven...
Actually, I hope they finally find life (well, rather quickly a planet's beings find us) from a planet that is far more enlightened than us but which has no compunction about "whipping our asses into planetary shape". I most certainly hope Earthlings are not the founders of any Federation or UFP or such. We need the moral, ethical, and other sorts of competition or pressure, and we SURE as hell don't deserve to escapade or forage beyond the Moon until we clean up our act down here. We have far too much warfare, pestilence, famine, social malaise, and political corruption and need to be "smacked down" a number of times to simulate and eventually effect are "real, hard, lasting moral reset" button.
I realize NASA has brought back information and manufacturing processes or advances and helped us learn a lot more than we could in 1G, but, dammit, too many other things can be done with that kind of money so we don't have to keep mortgaging our and our kids' futures on mostly-hoarded knowledge, or amassing information that can't be harvested in near-term with planet-enhancing results. Enough of the nation-superiority complexes.
ET, are you listening. Come and get us... Or, just keep initiating mission-failures that confound and befuddle the "experts". Maybe we'll end up diverting boondogle budgets to diminish hunger and deliver the food and medicines directly to those who need it, and bypass corrupt regimes' administrators.
Nah, these are HYUMANS I'm talking about. It'll be another 500 years before even SOME of the vestiges of the past 400 finally are washed out of the gene pool...
Deplorable?
Hmmm anti-script-word image happens to be... "deplore", hehehhe
Suppose an employee who is effectively a trojan horse got wind of a similar idea and leaked it to the BBC's guy. He and others might either be sympathetic to Open Source (to make sure a US-led company does not hijack the world, and rightly so), which is a pain in ms' ass, side, and other parts.
Now, this should be a cautionary tale, but many will say "BAH! Paranoia!", or "NAH, ms will NEVUR catch up with Open Source's ideals"... The cautionary tale is that NO ONE in Open Source can afford to allow splintering to destabilize the resilience and independence of Linux, Open Source/FLOSS and the movements behind them.
If it were so that ms purchased Red Hat, then SO WHAT? Why would the rest of LinuxLand need to crumble. Besides, Linus owns the right to the word "Linux", and he in turn could charge ms for every single instance in which they print, utter, or somehow use the word "Linux", can't he.
If LinuxLand is in some way threatened by a potential ms acquisition of Red Hat, then every last CVS and other archive had better be tagged with Red Hat-supplied, proprietary bits ready to be removed to make the cleanest, fastest, most efficient separation of newly-acquired ms code.
This should be considered a blessing, or a strategic advantage that the BBC article has come out.
Let's get rollin'. It's time for Operation Beat Back to get underway! Even if ms ultimately never buys RH and even if ms never releases some sort of cross-integrated open source-like version of *doze, then it STILL would be a useful exercise to ensure that, just as with SCO, Red Hat is not in a position to voluntarily or contractually assist ms destroy or subsume or co-opt OpenSource or LinuxLand.
Grazing in LinuxLand is NOT to be permitted to ms, for they'll just defecate or tromp and drool all over the place just enough to discourage followers and enough to taint stalwarts/intransigents and Don Quixotes.
anti-script image word: grazing
EUpheld:
0 5/0317229&mode=thread
http://grep.law.harvard.edu/article.pl?sid=04/08/
Depending upon in what state or country you live, this might be worth reading:
"Does Your Employer Own Your Thoughts"
http://www.unixguru.com/
It is probably imperative that SOME if not MOST developers escrow away or safely archive their non-employer-related hacks, developments and such and make sure the future is not imperilled by an employer who intentionally, deviously, or accidentally assigns an employee to tasks or projects that are too close to the hobby or alternate/freelance/self-employment/consultation work an employee does.
It very well could be that an employer hires an employee to exploit their talent, but then goes and gets greedy by trying to lay hands on his/her personal portfolio by assigning work at work that poisons or taints work done at home. Refuse to cooperate, or do too much sanitation documentation, you might get fired.
It might be best to use tools, methods, and implementations as different as possibly than your employer's past or roadmapped projects and products.
No need to be adversarial, just be safe and smart. In Invention Disclosures/Prior Inventions, make sure that you don't over-explain your thing, but do make sure what you describe is truthful and verifiable by external parties.
I would say if your employer tries to take you to court later, demand before being hired, or demand in court that the employer not have direct access. Ask the judge for a middle party who will be enjoined from telling ANYthing to the accusers. Demand the inspectors relate information to the judge. That is, if your hobby works are THAT important. Chances are, if your employer is that hard-up to get your hobby or force you to extend to work the practices you do at home, then maybe your onto something and ought to renegotiate your employment contract into terms suitable and equitable to all concerned. If they play hardball, then maybe you need to quit and find an investor after you get a judge to let your use some obscure law that is effectively your "preemptive strike" that says, basically, you broke no laws and are not at the mercy of your employer or some other company or individual out to get your works you never stole. If you later on are found to have perjured, then your ass should fry.
Maybe the way to deal with this is to make sure that on EVERY project on which you work, you keep tabs on how much is college-taught, how much is readily apparent from How-To's and WIN* magazines, and what comes from conferences.
Sometimes, employers (via their employees, lazy or adaptive) lift examples right out of books written by Plotkin and scores of others, only to shroud the code in "proprietary code" language.
If employees were to say, point-blank, THIS piece is common knowledge, that piece is readily apparent, the other one here is not novel or unique, and the implementation of this or that is not special, (and) given the constraints of the tool we used and the fact that x number of our competitors or some college courses use this tool, a student, if diligent enough, can do maybe 80% of what we're trying to keep secret.
Now, if the $1M ex-ms employee is smart, he'll tell Google EXACTLY on what projects he did not work. When ms provides the judge with the list of taboo-for-x-number-of-years projects, he and the judge and Google will be able to carve up a nice exec-sounding title/role for him to steer or guide other projects while biding his time. After all, Google is spending a lot of money to woo him, and they can't appear to "lose" this case. It would set a bad precedent for their future hire plans.
The thing that sucks about much labor law in a number of states is that states' laws are written by ex- or pro-business people who have NO real compunction about ignoring the fact that plenty of commercial and non-commercial, professional-grade tools enable any astute and determined person or team to create show-stopping tools that traditional capture-the-flag corps cannot cope with.
NDA is one thing. Barring someone from freedom of work is another. States that stupidly or myopically discourage individuals or groups from challenging existing companies are stupid. Software tools and their flexibilities and ever-increasing feature sets mean that large, lumbering, politically-mired companies will just have to become lean, faster, and have more foresight, or they too will fall to Darwinism.
Or, am I "deluding" myself (anti-script word image)
sign up the "used hydrogen" futures?
"ORgasm Uses Solar E"nergy to Produce Hydrogen"
out of the corner of my eye...
(No, I am not implying that an orgasm produces hydrogen out of the corner of my eye, either...)
What intrigued me and pleased me was that a sales person at Yodabashi in Shinjuku (the exit west of JR station, almost on the corner, but I forget the street name) spent an HOUR discussing with me the phone I was going to buy. I told him I wanted a "sexy" phone, one that has nice features/gizmos. He didn't at first get "sexy", so I said, "Echi". Then I pointed to various models, distinguishing between "echi", "not echi", and then in seconds he caught one, steering me to the "echi" phones. It boiled down to Sharp, and I got the one Vodafone offered, the 402SH. It has the (sharp, hehe pun intended) TV, 1.3 megapixel camcorder, ringtones that I can change the pitch/octaves of, and more.
It was one of the most informative sales transactions I've ever experienced.
Of course, I have the name card holder, and sometimes here in the states I whip it out of my Uniqlo hip pouches I usually wear on my belt.
I WISH Uniqlo would have selected SF instead of New Jersey to open their first states-side store. But, no matter. When I am back working, I can send money to my friends there and tell them what to send me.
What I really like about what I think is normal in Japan and abnormal in the US is that in Japanese stores you can shoot pic of the QR codes, and probably the bar codes, off of flyers and and maybe even in the store and find the stuff you need and order it. I didn't actually TRY to shot QR pics in Uniqlo, except maybe the one on my receipt. I do know that some stores in Japan, and probably BIGTIME in the US, shooting pics even if you plan to purchase the thing you like/need/want risks ejection or a polite "no pictures".
I do understand, however the the Azabu-juban police do take a keen interest in watching African/Nigerian guys who hang out on corners. Funny thing is is that some of them are legit, and only retrieving friends or guests, the the JCops will shadow them up and down the street, snap pics and such. I don't PERSONALLY know if I myself were being shadowed, but I a habit of abruptly stopping and beaming in a direction I think someone is using as a vantage point. Sometimes, I (in Japan or in the US) would whip out my camera and mock shoot or actually shoot a pic, but I never got haggled.
People everywhere I went seemed pleasant, even at an Onsen in Nikko.
What I find interesting is that parents and their kids seem to have a better bond and flair for wild dressups than here. I've seen little kids as young as maybe 5 walking alone to and from school, despite Gov. Ishihara Shintaro's exhortations that most crime in Tokyo is due to foreign elements from China and elsewhere. If that were true, I suspect the parents would never let their kids walk around alone in Azabu-juban, or expat land, especially with all the soul-like clubs and sailorly spots 'merkun expats frequent. (I'm not a cop, and I don't have access to crime states for Tokyo proper, but somehow, I don't think ALL the crime, not even 50% is done by foreigners. Crime is everywhere, and race or gender and citizenship status probably pale compared to just having no food, no shelter, no job, and the like. I DO know that some westerners abuse the immigration/visitor status, and they pisse me off because I was trying to stay there legitimately, and these jerks are part of the problem forcing Japan to tighten up her immigration laws and labor policies. I sure wish they'd officially allow "unskilled, but imminently useful, unrestricted" labor for people like me who just want to long-term live and work there without deriving, expecting, or scheming any undeserved or unauthorized benefits. I'm not a criminal, not on any warrants lists that I know of, don't belong to any whacko, fringe or extremist groups, never been cuffed, even. Yet, governments see so many criminals who appeared clean before they finally were caught, and so they operate or make policies that treat persons as guilty until they show creds or skill that can be "appropriately" absorbed, and even then, there are time limits imposed.)
Yeh, I hope my future
Hmmm, Nexx,
I am of a dark variety ethnicity. I spent 3 months in Japan, from Dec 1 to Feb 24. I didn't experience ANY racisim that I could discern.
I have been interested in Japan since childhood (from a naval perspective) and off-and-on tried to study Nihongo since 1992 (but am always distracted by other activities).
In Kibuki-Cho, a kid on a bike turned round the corner of a 100 yen store too fast. The handlebars struck me in the waist or pelvis, and he immediately profusely pleaded, "Gomen Nasai. Gomen. Gomen." I was thrilled. I was not even fazed by being hit by the bike. I was amazed and impressed and happy that my first "crash" was funny to me, and informative. If racism were so rampant, he could have just shrugged and moved on.
I met many new Japanese friends in Rappongi (of course, in expat-land), male and female, who enjoyed conversing with me, engaging in banter, and one of my favorite new friends is Atsumi, at one of the StarBux, who, when she saw some of my art and my databases on my laptop and my plans as I explained them to her, would say (in typical girl-response), "Nehhhh, neehhhh, nehhhhh..." while waving her finger and smiling. That was cool, exciting, funny, to me.
I was at Shibuya, switching from Namboku out of Azabu-juban, to Ebisu to Shibuya. I walked off the train, staring up at the digital directions. A well-dressed senior gentleman presumed I was lost. I wasn't quite lost, as I'd been on that route only once before, having visited a friend in Miyamaedaira. He offered me directions to the proper track, and when I failed to understand the city name he referred to, he apologized and said, "Oh, in the old days, that's what we used to call it. I used to work with the US Army, as a civilian..."
Another time, during stay, I heard and then heard more and more expats and Asians from the region professing warm feelings toward young and older Japanese who would go out of their way to assist foreigners.
Another time, when a Singaporean and I were going on a long train ride, we stopped at KFC I think in Asakusa (for you readers who don't know, pron it is as "ahsah-k'sah or maybe ahsahk-sah). Earlier, we realized we'd better get the directions down pat before eating, so we stopped into the ticket office for the old-style train upstairs. Not ONE, but FOUR employees, android-and-Borg like (hive-worker that is, not malevolence, hehe) double-checked information we gave, by repeating back to us. Then, #1 looked at #2 and nodded in agreement, then #1 & #2 worked with us, then referred to #3 then #4, and #4 and #3 nodded back, though seemingly junior in status, then #1, #2, #3 and #4 all stood professionally, giving us directions with #1 doing most of the info-feed-delivery. It was a bit touching, and somewhat amusing (maybe because my brain and soul like those special nuances that go beyond "do the minimum/go back to doin' my thing before I was interrupted"), and will be etched indelibly in my mind.
I made a number of friends in Japan, some of whom approached me out of the blue. I had no problems with homeless kids or adults, no problems on the train (yeh, I could doze off and my stuff would be right next to me when I woke up). I dropped my cell once, and dropped other things at times, and people would tug me and apologize and hand the things to me. (Well, I did lose my cheapo MetroPCS phone at BART in either SFO or Burlingame the day I returned, and it took about 1.5 to 2 weeks to retrieve it, fortunately.)
I find Japan (I can't speak too much to other place that I've not seen or not seen in a while) colorful, fun, party-animal-like (OK, Tokyo and Yokohama areas, at least), and more. (And, it's nice to know that Red Hat has an office in Roppongi, across from the ABC (Aoyama Book Center) store. )
Now, I am not for one second going try to "poo-poo" the condition of racism by saying it doesn't exist. I have read about Burakumin, and I even made Korean friends, Chinese friends, and others who actually LIVE IN Japan as residents or students. As f
Kibuki-Cho
Butt, is there enough room for "Space Balls"?
Or, Rem from Logan's Run(s)?
hah... viewable
But, can she mix the right amounts of cream and sugar? Will the she-model talk in a hi-pitched squeal? What will the he-model sound like? (Please, no Hello-Kitty jokes...)
They'd probably save a lot of time if they just wire up a RealDoll and install some miniaturized SpaceShip 1 gimballing motors in various parts, like the throat, pelvis, heartbeat area, and maybe up and down the spinal column.
So, she flutters her eyelids? Can she shoot darts like in "Fudoh" (See Takashi Miike's film), and pop balloons 25 feet away?
Imagine if the Yaks open up a whole street of love-making, washable-skin dolls in Kabuki-Cho and other areas in Shinjuku. Hell, for that matter, why not put them all over the country. They'd avoid the US railing them over the sex trade industry.
They could then inspire a revival of disco balls and a slew of renditions on the '60's/'70's "Sex Machine", tho I image the godfather of soul would want some "royalties" off the back- (and front-) end...
Hmmm, anti-script word image: envelop
Envelop me with yo' robo-love, botby...
See StoryLines:
http://www.writerscafe.co.uk/features.htm
http://www.writerscafe.co.uk/
The demo is at:
http://www.writerscafe.co.uk/download.htm
I tried it, and liked it. But, as I'm doing some more esoteric stuff along these lines, I cannot fully use theirs. Besides, since 1994 or so, I'd been compiling my blueprints and paper information and along came Lotus Approach and Lotus WordPro, so I have something for myself and my future fanbase.
But, for those of you not aiming for my level of esoterica, Storylines may be right up your alley.
It used to be called StoryLines, then they apparently branched out the Writer's Cafe bit, and now I'm still searching/looking to see if StoryLines still exists as a separate, other-features-featured product.
Ah, see them here:
http://www.anthemion.co.uk/products.htm
From Writer's Cafe. This couple has a screenplay application that works with OpenOffice.org, at least last time I checked about two years ago.
See it and more screen shots here (same as a link above):
http://www.anthemion.co.uk/products.htm
Here is a description of StoryLines & Writer's Cafe...
"Writer's Café is a software toolkit for all fiction writers, whether experienced or just starting out. The heart of Writer's Café is StoryLines, a powerful but simple to use story development tool that dramatically accelerates the creation and structuring of your novel or screenplay. Designed by published novelist Harriet Smart, it also includes a notebook, journal, research organiser, inspirational quotations, writing exercises, and a 60-page e-book, "Fiction: The Facts", distilling 20 years of writing experience. Writer's Café is designed to be a playground for the imagination, making writing fiction fun and fulfilling."
this start the crack in the dam that will flood out and erode the BlueRay, copy protection, and DVDCSS debacles we're suffering as non-windoze users?
I mean it this way: The studios currently put up with the DVD consortium and pay fees to encode DVD and use the DVD logo. Well, what if they decide, "Hell, we're hypocrites if we encode using Linux and Open Source/FLOSS tools, yet continue marketing and selling the DVDs in Warehouse, Blockbuster, and numerous other outlets, all the while forcing people who are using to go and find hacks, break the law, and patch their crippled distros when we are MAKING the problems for them and others.
I guess that's too much an enlightened perspective for them to intellectually accept and act on.
I guess mshaft and the cohorts will be up in arms.
Also, in another thread in this topic/discussion, someone asked what reasons they may have for switching to Linux. Well, I have an idea:
Consolidation Preparation: The sooner or earlier the various studios and indies get themselves on open formats, the easier it will be for one or more houses to absorb each other and each others' work. In the future, it may pay to be able to edit the video as well as the audio, much like Lucas rehashes his SW flicks. (IANASWF= I am not a Star Wars Fan.)
So, this could be some "rational" decisionmaking, especially when they will not be able to count on mshaft to be forthright and timely about some things such as file formatting. If ms changes something, or demands royalties for ms' "upgraded, special, proprietary bits for film industry..." file formatting, they'd have the movie industry by not just the balls, but the frenulum the vas defrens, the urethra, the cossix, sphincter, that deeper valve, and even the entrails. Such a grip would MORE than hurt.
Wise move, if this is the agenda...Now they can "shaft" ms by taking back control over their own entrails...
is not enough.
You have to assume that one or more of those cash register, ceiling-mounted ball cameras is tied to the barcode scanner. Scan a specific class/capability printer and one or more balls snap and video your mug, your height, and maybe more (maybe one day they'll do IR/thermal and even microwave to get your bone structure in case you dress up as a woman in pumps and a wig).
Now, so much for buying certain merchandise/goods with cash. They could even motion-track you all the way to the car or bus you depart in.
Also, when you sign even a fake name at the register, your palm's side might be on the paper, or your prints on the pen, or your skin oil on one or both. Not that they are taking this from these transactions, but years ago I wondered just how many Capital Hill "restaurants" were really just spy fronts used to micro-record and oil/fingerprint sample all the diplomats, spies, politicians, and reporters dining. Can you IMAGINE the huge database there must be.
It brings to mind "Get Smart", but I don't recall any Control or Kaos (sp?) dining halls set up in DC. I imagine if the scriptwriters DID think of it, someone on the inside or outside probably warned them not to mention in, or to remove it from/sanitize the script. Heck, even in DS9 and B5 and other shows, we almost never, if at all, see body oils, DNA, prints, hair, etc being taken. For example, serve a glass, take the glass to the kitchen, then mail it off to Mother Russia, or some quick-analysis & recording lab. This way even if a "spy" or operative alters his/her physical characteristics, it's highly unlikely the saliva, sweat, or oils will be changed.
Just an over-active imagination here...
As many bionic or robotic eyes as they can buy and surround with silicon skin, I suppose.
Imagine if "merkuh permanently grounds the shuttle. Other nations might collaboratively surpass the US.
Remember, 'dubyah already uttered those "fightin' words" to the USAF graduating cadets back round 2002, when he said (paraphrasing here): "NO ONE will be allowed to surpass the United States/America militarily, technologically, or scientifically..."
Speakin' that kind of SHIT just sets one up for bad Karma. We 'mekun's need to learn to die with dignity when we (as taxpayers) fork over umpteen BEELYONS for programs in the name of preeminence.
Won't matter for long anyway. If China duplicates a shuttle, but rockets it from astern instead of astride, NASA might find itself taking pre-orbit and mission control contracts to assist China's own orbiter/rocket/launch vehicle. OTOH, if China's smarter, they'll share the burden with other nations tired of or wary of NASA's recent shuttle debacles.
(No, don't ask where China'll get the moneh... Hey have enough cash to give $18 BILLION to Unocal shareholders as opposed to Chevron only offering $16 B, but in share swaps and other stuff that is not an economic orgasm such as cold, hard cash. But, if China (one way or another, purchasing Unocal or not) gets her hands on deep-drilling technology, they might find themselves in the oil export business, maybe even selling some to Japan, and raking in enough cash or other equivalents to ramp up funding to their own space programs. I think, now, that that is probably one of the items on the Daily Intel Assessments/Daily Briefs (or whatever they call them when they summarize them to the sitting prez...), and maybe "national security" is the excuse to delay or block the purchase. It ain't about "national security" or about us going to war with China in the next 5, 10, or 25 years: no, rather, it's about the US' loss of "'merikun (substitute another euphemism if you like) supremacy'.
Just think: do you think that if China actually DOES find domestic oil, and more than they could use on a daily basis, that they WON'T sell some to the best bidder, just below OPEC prices and not care about destabilizing OPEC for even only a few years, long enough to rake in some serious cash? If such a scenario came about (finding "excess domestic oil to be sold off"), don't you think China would spend at least **some** of that cash flow on playing "catch up" with/to the United States? I don't think China'll build more than nuke subs and larger destroyers/cruisers if they suddenly had money to show they can launch to the Moon, Mars and beyond (even if they have to "procure" advanced rocketry via theft, begging, borrowring, or collaborating), just to show they can.)
Aside from sending cos/J-astro-nauts up to the ISS, aren't they doing other things, too, such as secret missions?
Maybe they have a bird or two up there than needs human hands on it, and maybe the tile/foam falling off (real or digitally contrived) is an excuse to delay the shuttle so some secret repairs or bird releases can occur.
Why is almost everyone in here biting the foam video bit. We already know that over 10,000 foam strikes have happened since the shuttles first launched, and only TWO losses, one to faulty seal, and one to an unfortunately-located set of missing tiles. Hell, for all we know, other missions were probably near-fatals once inspectors went to work doing their near-rebuilds.
On the other hand, if it's not special bird ops, then some payload experiments that got backed up but not launched on rocket missions might have sued to get their projects on-line. Maybe they threatened NASA that if they don't meet such and such deadline, they'd divert funding efforts to non-shuttle alternatives that might prove a hastening fatal for NASA.
Could be other things going on here, boys/girls.
Hah!!! Anti-Script word image: PROTON...
I AM CAPTAIN PROTON!
Maybe Melissa Nguyen of EZ-Desk wouldn't mind doing for KDE what she did for Win95?
.kde settings for the desktop, or I would have to pull a copy from another disk I archived, if it was recent, as in hours or days within a system upgrade.
With win95, *doze kept "forgetting" the placement of icons. It so infuriated people that Melissa wrote code to snapshot the location of icons and put them in a file, a file which I think might have been separate from the registry.
Now, she has come to my mind a few time over the years when I've been regularly running KDE/Mandrake because *some*times, but very rarely, my icons just "jiggle" into a new positioning, and maybe the only way to put back my dozens of screen-filling shortcuts and such would be to either manually back up to a separate path my
Now, I realize that it is possible (I think I saw this before) to NOT have automount icons go to the desktop, but...
What I wish would be rectified is the placement of automount icons. These should be SPECIAL icons that take less space when multiple partitions are being mounted. As it is, they take up too much space and can sometimes "hide" beneath Kicker. Sometimes, they don't refresh and show up on-screen for a little while later, though in Mandriva 10.2/2005 LE I seem to not endure that too often.
By making the icons smaller, and then by "grouping" them, say, more screen real estate is preserved.
Better yet, the KwikDisk applet might be the better way to handle these things. Just have Kwikdisk flash to the desktop or bubble-notify the user. The use then could refer to KwikDisk and manage the mounts from there. Taking up the desktop seems inefficient when the desktop that is cluttered just becomes even MORE cluttered.
Another possibility is that AutoMount could take a "snapshot" or "screenshot" of the desktop, scan the underlying app names, then assess or "rationalize" the placement of the AutoMount icons to a more open or clean area, but still doing so in a KwikDisk-like interface, or by giving the user the option to automagically activate KwikDisk if it's not running, and by defaulting to NO icons to desktop upon medium or device connection/insertion.
I took care of that double-click shit by going to Settings, Configure Konqueror, Cookies,
/ads/ and other stuff.
Policy:
Default Policy: Ask for Confirmation
Site Policy: Add to Domain any and every IP range and domain name variation for double-shit and
(If you want to be REALLY "malevolent", just set the cookies as "session cookies" so they stay in memory and never get written any disk medium. But, Yahoo! and other sites might complain or stall, or never let you get past a notification window. I wonder, sometimes if they're whoring themselves out to marketing cookie meisters.)
Then, I use Etherape to SEE where traffic is going to and coming from regarding MY BOX. Use of a website, in my mind, does not grant double-click and cookie monsters rights to TRESPASS on my machine. Track whatever the hell you want on the visitED SITE, not the visitING machine.
Then, I go to firestarter and add the same stuff, domain names and domian IP ranges.
I hate double-click with a PASSION. They're just the digital version of and a combination of all those 70's paper catalog customer info files. I don't want them or any entity for which they act as a front being an affront to me by tracking and selling my surfing habits.
Finally, I periodically scour my cache and delete their junk, sometimes locking down my own cache under ROOT, even if I have a slower surfing experience.
Note: I am not against ALL cookies, just some of the more pernicious, insidious, and infuriating issuers of cookies. When I cannot block cookies, such as logging in with Yahoo!, I make sure to block the ads. I don't care to see most of them, and even if I let them run, I might click on maybe 1 out of 1000, and I tend to make sure I log out after copying and and pasting the URL, then I run the URL. I AM aware there might be a "web beacon" in the URL's page anyway, but that's something to quash on another day.
The reason I'm irritated by some of these cookies is that they coordinate banners based on what I might be doing, and I don't like that unless I OPT IN. I'm in the minority, I suppose, so what I'm doing won't run the sites out of business. Besides, the cookie baker has to pay for impressions, not responses, I think. So, whether or not I block the cookie and banner, if I am required to CLICK the banner but don't, then the site gets no click-through stream revenue ANYway. So much for some of the arguments of cookie and banner proponents. By blocking the cookies and banners, I cut down on distracting twilight-zone swirls and dancing junk. And, since I dart in and dart out of my email, I don't credibly spend enough time leaving the cookie or banner ad visible for the site to legitimately claim revenue anyway. It's not like I'm Gary Mitchell, reading 400 pages in 1 minute.
Am I being an ingrate? Making noise? Deserve my system being sabotaged or forced to endure 1-minute-crawling page loads (which has seemed to happen when I turn off cookies, or it's a bad KDE base at work in the 3.3x version...)
(anti-script word image: audacity (which is what I am full of in this posting...heheh))
Two ways so modify the size of your Kicker are to right-click on it and adjust the size.
If you haven't INITIALLY done it that way, another way is to go through KControl (KDE Control Center) and then under "LookNFeel" click on "Panels"
There, you have two nice options to try in the "Arrangement" tab, subsection "Length":
click the box for "Expand as required to fit contents" and THEN set the slider to say, 50% or whatever you want. You'll still have blank space to the left or right if you've centered the bar, but it might shrink icon and things on the Kicker for you.
And, in the "Size" subsection, you can set the "Custom" option.
Now, when you go back to right-clicking on the Kicker, and you then click on the "Size" arrow, you'll see:
Tiny
Small
Normal
Large
Custom
Resizable
Resizable is nice because once you enable it, you will be able to float your cursor over the upper edge of the Kicker then when it has double-ended arrows, just resize the height of the Kicker and watch the icons increase or decrease in size.
-----------
HIDING/HIDE-MODE
Under the "Hiding" tab, you can set the "Hide Mode" and the "Hiding Animation" settings, so you can set the panel to be covered by apps or other windows you expand, and you can set the delay in milliseconds, as well as whether the covering of the Kicker should be with or without animation.
----------
Don't forget, if you've seen but not used, Kasbar.
To use it, and to fiddle with it via KControl, first right-click on Kicker and click on "Add", then "Panel", then "Kasbar".
You can resize Kasbar, but not as granularly as Kicker. BUT, what Kasbar has that Kicker doesn't (as of yet) is that you can enable and resize the icon thumbnail/preview so you can select which of multiple instances of, say, Konqueror, you have open. That is, if you have multiple instances of Konqueror Kwrite or Kate open, and you don't want to tab through them, adjust the thumbnail so you can see the actual image or text flow of that instance you want to switch to.
Right-click on Kasbar, then click on "Kasbar", then move your pointer to the bottom of the floating palette and click on "Kasbar", then click on "Configure". Yo can adjust the "Size" to small, medium or large.
On "Thumbnails", you can enable or deselect the option, but if you enable, try the slider for "Thumbnail size" and adjust to your liking. You can update the thumbnail image in increments of seconds. (You can go up to 999 seconds, but I set mine for 10.)
You can also-- as with Kicker-- enable or disable the left/right/top/bottom hide/unhide arrows.
Don't forget that you can also increase the number of virtual desktops in KControl. Spread out your apps across the desktop. As with Kicker, you can float your pointer over a Kasbar button or thumbnail and right-click it to send it to the current or another desktop.
Near to "Finally"... When you have either of or both of Kicker and Kasbar running, you can set the KDE desktop to respond to maximization of apps by either allowing or disallowing the app to cover, hide or expand to the screen's full size. If you need to keep a number of windows open without such that you can click on or use "focus follows mouse", then use "Atl+right-click" while your cursor is at the sides or corners and then adjust the app so you can avoid using Alt+Tab (to switch between virtual desktops) or Ctrl+Tab (to switch between ANY of the running apps, regardless of which desktop the are on).
Finally, when the IP stack or system resources get bogged, I find it faster to use Kasbar to switch between desktops and apps. There seems to be caching and thrashing going on when I float over and try to click Kicker sometimes. But, when I float to and click on Kasbar, BAM!!! A task or window is nearly instantly switched to. Must be a backend coding issue. Or, my 900-MHz Celery system AND my (former laptop which died) 800 MHz AMD system fell victim to KDE code.
David Syes
Anybody working on turning HexedBox into pyroclast? Or an autoclave?
Then, it could be modded into an autoclast or a pyroclave...
Failing that, just open it up and insert some RRMs (Raid Roach Motels) boxes, so roaches "check in but they don't check out...".
jsut wrod slection, or a tpyo...
/. admins changed the word images to dictionary words possibly due to typo-complaints?)
(anti-script word image: harmony)
(I guess the
Thanks, Mark.
I think I recall having visited zarb, and having failed at installing the RPM. Since it was about a month ago or so, I can't be sure at this point if the failure was due to a dependency issue, or if it installed without complaint, or if I was going to sites that were congested.
But, once I ran some episodes, I got nice video (aside from having selected the low-rez file version for download speed), but no audio. I'll give it a whirl, for something might have changed.
I've been thinking the same of myself...
hmmmm anti-script image word: starfish
Don't worry. You won't get killed-- but you might be tranqued... or put in an employment shit-list database...
For the most part, I like Mandriva 10.2 2005 Limited Edition. However, what I DON'T like is when Mandrake/Mandriva removed or crippled or obscured certain things that worked.
For example, I cannot figure out how to make the KDE/KDM login in screen user/password dialog shrink so that my 1-minute-rotation images can be seen while the login dialog is awaiting user input. What's the point of having the option to change background images every period when the damned login stars and blue background obfuscate the feature. This is not helpful when I want to show off the eye candy to prospective converts.
Mandriva, please QUIT DOING THAT! You have a database of what you are deprecating and what you're obfuscating, so please knock that off. If something works, then just because people aren't screaming to use it doesn't mean they aren't using it. I thought you guys were using the RPM stats thing to figure out usage stats and not as a tool to remove something. If something WORKS, then the RPM stats ought to be recommending fixes of other things, not removal of things that are used and not complained about.
Another example, then I'll move on to things I DO like: on the KControl interface you took away or obfuscated or broke functionality of displaying some of the previous 13 or so levels of Information. I used to be able to see disk/partition information without having to run KwikDisk. Admittedly, I see some things I like when running KwikDisk, but the sudden and unexplained (no list showing deprecations/deferrals to the new release) is jarring, disconcerting, and irritating.
Overall, I love the ease-of-use interface. I like that now my USB and PCMCIA devices automagically (for me, for once) appear and (occasionally) disappear based on connection or removal of devices.
I like that Mandrake (and maybe others offering KDE) loads up fast from power-on, at least faster than 10.1.
What I need to figure out, though, is why on an 800/900 MHz, Celery-based FIC computer, there are intermittent pauses in the system (maybe it's the Win4Lin-enabled kernel?), things which I can't recall having experienced in a number of releases/versions. For now, I've learned to synchronize my mouse/eye-coordination to cope with it. It's intermittent, though not a show-stopper for me.
I love the DiskDrake and HardDrake tool and wish you'd find a way to promote the appearance of them. Maybe a limited functionality appearance would do, prompting people to learn some sysadmin in the process of educating them.
What would be nice is if there were a script to show not just tips, but user-scheduled "tip/training sessions" to break the monotony of or habit of users who log in, do something, then brain-lock and start getting unproductive. Rather, this tool could counter or combat softening skills. The system could be set to run mini-pseudo live training. Not cripple a working net or drive attach, but simulating them and testing the user's troubleshooting skills.
I don't suggest this for the purpose of taking away tech support calls and income, but to ensure that users are challenged, educated, and made to or coaxed to love their OS. The more educated the user, the less the negative commentary and the less the chance of them switching back to another OS.
Also, what would be nice is an MPEG-4 reader/player that I could actually USE. I want to watch some of the Trek fan films that are available for download. I imagine only *doze and Mac users can enjoy them relatively easily. I can play them back, but I get no audio. I can watch "The Savage Universe" from Exeter but I cannot watch the subsequent files, nor those from other fan-producer sites.
I like the new audio sounds, but I wish Mandrake and others would create a facility to let us go "nostalgic" once in a while by using sound files from the previous Mandrake/KDE event associations. Sure, a savvy user would carry over the audio after upgrading, then maybe write a script to copy or move things around based on some chron job, but there