I don't speak for RMS, ESR, FSF, or any of the other talking heads in the open source/free software movement, but based on the idealogy as I understand it, this is a good thing.
Why?
Well, if by providing C# on Linux removes the barrier to exit from Linux to Windows, then the converse ought to be largely true as well. That is, having C# on Linux removes the barrier to exit from Windows to Linux.
Is that bad? Doesn't it provide more freedom?
(Keep in mind that this also isn't completely true. C# is only one tiny (yes, TINY) piece of.NET. A port of the most important.NET libraries will also be needed to really crumble that barrier to exit from Windows.NET.)
Yup, you're a mathematician alright!:) I see nothing wrong with your idea, but it amuses me that you didn't also recommend literature, anthropology, interpersonal relations, public speaking, etc.
I've met and know a lot of great programmers. The ones who are still employed right now are the one who have paid attention to their soft skills.
So, there's this idea of "correct background/complete knowledge" and there's this idea of "valuable to businesses". They do play off each other, but they aren't the same and you have to decide which one is more valuable to you.
ARR0, I am curious though. Having the background in mathematics that you have, you've inevitably suffered through the best and worst ways to learn math. If you could do it over again and had the opportunity to select the fashion in which you would be educated mathematically, what would you select? I'm only curious because I'm someone who likes the ideas of math and the ways in which it contributes to analytic thought, but I've always been put off by a variety of factors. TIA!
...as I understand it is that you have a bunch of code in VB already that you need to leverage from other languages which don't support ActiveX (or do they?). Some of this may be redundant to what's been suggested already, but here's my list of ideas:
1. Just use the VB ActiveX DLL from the other languages using those languages' COM abilities. This makes the most sense, but can it be done in your situation? This has the disadvantage of complicating all the other components of your system that have to talk to the VB components.
2. Build a wrapper around the VB components (probably in C++) such that the other programs/DLLs access the wrapper via straight DLL calls and the wrapper itself talks COM to the VB component. This is not elegant and rates a big "yuck" from me, but it is possible. I don't have any examples for you, but you might find one out on MSDN. Related to the above disadvantage, any component that uses the VB component(s) via this method won't really be complicated by that relationship anymore. On the other hand, you now own a DLL which will contain some very gross code (IMO anyway) because of memory management and COM.
3. Port the VB code to another language that can compile to straight DLLs. IIRC, you can easily port VB to PowerBasic and compile PB down to straight DLLs, which are then accessible to anything. I've never tried this, but my understanding is that it is possible and not too esoteric either. Once you've done this, you can use the PB compiled DLL from VB with the use of the VB Declare statement. Another option along this line would be to port the VB to C/C++. Obviously, that's much more costly, but you could give yourself a nice performance boost and maybe even platform portability to boot.
4. You probably can't do this for several reasons, but I would examine if the languages in question are covered by.NET. Language interoperability is real strength there. However, adopting.NET in your project may be untenable, so YMMV big time on that one. On the other hand, VS.NET and.NET are still in RC status, so considered yourself warned.
That's all I can think of right now. I hope it helps.
But my point isn't that C# is superior to Java or vice versa. To make that point, I would need to argue that point more effectively. My main point in that posting was that I would not be selecting Java over C# or vice versa based on one language feature. In fact, I think that the language features between the two are going to be largely irrelevant going forward. I do think that corporate culture will be VERY relevant going forward though. If your company is a "Microsoft shop" then C# or another.NET language will be the ticket. If your company is an "IBM shop" or "Java shop" or "multivendor", you'll probably use Java for those big projects. I may preach to use the "right tool for the job", but the reality is that decision is usually not made on technical grounds.
As far as my real opinion on Java vs. C#: I don't even care. I'll let other people obsess over that; and I'll eat their lunch while they're doing it.
Anyway, none of this really matters. My original and most important point was that having a non-MS implementation of.NET is a good thing and I stick by that.
First of all, C# *is* (IMO anyway) elegant. I like it. Elegance is a matter of opinion anyway. I don't like LISP, I never did, and yes, I have used it. Is its syntax more elegant than Java or C#? Yes; sort of. But do I care about LISP? Not really. I may take an interest in it one day, but not today.
Now that aside... you used one language feature as an example to promote Java's superiority. ONE feature! Look at http://www.25hoursaday.com/CsharpVsJava.html for a more complete comparison. There's about 20 features in C# that Java doesn't have, so is C# immediately superior because of that? Maybe so, maybe not but I won't be making that decision based on ONE language feature.
Now all *that* aside: Use the right tool for the job. I assert that C# and Java will be used for essentially different types of jobs for the immediate future. Sun/IBM did indeed get a jump on Microsoft with Java, but that won't mean much over the long haul.
Last point: Have the proverbial balls to post as something other than AC when you decide to flame. If you'd thought your opinion was worth sh*t, you might have taken the effort to express yourself more effectively; as it was you did it half-assed, and it shows.
just took 'Best of Show' for laptops at COMDEX for their Crusue based laptop. For about $1500 you can have Crusue based laptop today. If I were in the market for a laptop, I might just buy one.
And not because OS again copies a big industry player. It's good because it will help keep Microsoft honest about the open-ness of.NET.
It will make the ever so elegant C# language portable, which I'm really looking forward to as I never fell in love with Java as a language.
Furthermore, at least in the Microsoft IT world, C# is it. If you're not learning C#, you're so much refuse in the new paradigm. Giving the burgeoning C# pool of programmers portability options will definitely help keep Microsoft in their place.
Oh, and keep your eye on the likes of IBM and Sun: Odds are good that they'll support an independent implementation of.NET. They'd be stupid not to do so.
...is the Portable.NET project really measuring their progress in SLOC? I doubt it. So, if you're not measuring your progress that way, then you're in little danger of creating code just to augment the SLOC, which is the primary drawback of using SLOC to measure progress. I see little harm in pointing out the SLOC just to make the project a bit more visible. The visibility ought to be good for their egos, and by extension, the project.
I agree that function points could be a good measure of progress, but I would like to see a graphical chart of API progress instead. I'm more curious about how much full.NET CLR coverage they're going to provide.
...if you want to be any good at it. In fact, it's harder, because it tries to do so much for you. How many times have you heard of insecure, instable, piece of sh** web sites tipping over because of Windows? A lot, right? Want to guess at the skill levels of the administrators in question? That's what I thought too.
The bottom line is that good system engineering (in the admin sense of course) is hard no matter which platform you use. Administration of Windows *is* easy, if you're only talking about a LAN with say, 10 machines. Get beyond a single segment and go into complex services though, and you had better know what the hell you're doing.
This is a perfect example of how the mindsets between the users of the platforms differ.
Technology isn't just technical; it's cultural. Ask any real perl monger.
Now let's ask ourselves which set of technologies better matches the societies in which they typically resides?
What can you do to change that? By porting open source tools to Windows. Bring them around to your way of thinking in a more subtle way, and you won't have to convince them anymore. They'll be in the choir beside you.
If you're constantly following the gaming scene (PC or console), then all the improvements in games seem kind of boring, because you know the immediate predecessor to the game in question was almost just as good.
But if you're away for a while, then it all seems fresh again, and it's a lot of fun that way.
My plan is to just play through the batch of stuff I have right now, then not bother with new games again for a good long while.
...for the saboteur to insert something into a product other than the kernel. Say, apache, or maybe samba. Or maybe mozilla. Or maybe even in a development product which is modified to turn a blind eye to certain types of defects, like buffer overruns.
Hell, just knowing the general class of vulnerability that one can expect to find is a big leg up for an attacker.
The point is that it could happen in any product. Really, how do you know that the spanky new game you're playing didn't open your system to attacks? It really isn't complicated and getting someone into a game company to do that sort of thing wouldn't be difficult.
But the real question is, what then? The contaminated code in question would need to execute in some sort of proximity to a resource that matters (think banks here).
(I know I'm late to the table on this discussion, but hey, I've got a life to live.)
Anyway, XP is for toddlers? Says who? XP is far and away the best PC OS I have used for gaming. Why? Because the damn games aren't crashing my machine. The only real caveat is that many DOS games won't run under XP. Other than that, I've had no problems. Also, your toddler observation might be based on the new GUI features. Just turn them off if you don't like them. None of them are required fare.
None.
Zilch.
And it performs well.
Try it; you might like it *gasp*.
Oh.. and MS's strategy *is* risky. In recent history though, they have a tendency to "bet the farm" on their next step. Each step is calculated to be somewhat risky to allow real progress, but not so risky that it would be "game over" for them. Really, it's quite well thought out and effective I think.
Now, if they would just dump the stupid product activation in XP, Office, and everything else going forward. I really hate it because it doesn't do what they say it will do (limit piracy), but it does/could do some things they won't ever own up to (like invade my privacy, create a pain in the butt situation for my customers, etc.).
If I were affected by this system, I would also be concerned about folks being able to get to data about me that would allow social engineering attacks to occur outside the context of the physical system. This was one of the major types of attacks that Mitnick favored after all. A physical system attack is often only possible after a critical door somewhere has been opened.
I never said that you aren't still personally responsible for your behaviour. Even if one can successfully argue that "once Johnny starts playing CivII he won't be able to stop until he's passed out", you've still got to acknowledge that Johnny can make sure he doesn't start playing in the first place.
Secondly, I never said that *you* (and by definition, everyone) will become addicted someday. My statement meant something more like this: "Good luck hiding from the problem because it's likely that you, or someone you know, will be affected adversely by this in some way". I probably wasn't clear enough on that point.
You know - maybe we *are* all automatons who ultimately aren't responsible for our actions. From a scientific point of view, that may never be disproven (assuming you can somehow quantify responsibility in a scenario). But a pragmatic viewpoint is that we can not afford to think like that. Ultimately, your own point of view will guide your to an opinion on this much more than external evidence. The hard core atheist science types will see what they want, the religious types will see what they want, and I'll see it my own way. But that's a rant for another day...
I maintain that root reason is the fact that random rewards systems in general are the most effective among all reward systems. It was certainly on my psychology test in college.
Anyway, competition can provide semi-random rewards (assuming that chance plays some part in the game in question), so in a sense, I agree completely with you.
As far as the competition in the forums, I wouldn't go there. It's called 'trolling' and 'elitist bullshitting'.:)
This is all so true. I have found myself regularly addicted to various pursuits since I was a kid. I have found that the games to avoid are the ones with more long-term goals/payoffs. For instance, I'm not really addicted to UT or Q3. On some particular night, I may find it hard to tear myself away from "just one more" deathmatch, but that's it. Eventually I go to bed and I may not play again for 2 months.
But then there are games where that's not possible. We all know the examples (usually RPGs, quest style, or puzzle games in general).
Basically, here's what to avoid (I'm not a shrink, but this works!): Any game or activity with a non-determinate payoff pattern. In other words, avoid random (or semi-random) reward systems. UT doesn't fit in this category because I generally know how long a match will play and I usually have a good idea of who's going to school who. Zelda? Forget it. You never know when you're going to find the very next quest item.
This is basically the same problem as an addiction to gambling. Don't subject yourself to the overall patterns, and you should be ok.
Oh, and to everyone who thinks this isn't a real problem, good for you. It just means you haven't been bit yet. Good luck ignoring the problem though.
In contrast, I haven't been able to stand CivIII, which strikes me as tepid and shallow. Yeah, I know actually winning at CivIII is complex, but the depth of the surrounding story just isn't there. I think with Alpha Centauri, there was no actual history to leverage; you can't just "look it up" like you can with the (more or less) historically accurate civilizations in CivIII. Therefore, AC needed a lot more story and background development. In my book, they did a great job too! I've said this before, but one of AC's unique qualities was forcing the player to explore ideologies, not just unit strategy.
I think I'll go play AC sometime soon again. In retrospect, it might have been better if I'd never played the game. It's not only addictive, but it set the bar too high for subsequent games. I personally consider AC to be Sid's masterpiece. CivIII is probably everyone else's pick I know, but bah to that I say.
:)
Also - if anyone would comment on the "sweet spot" in CivIII, I'd love to hear it. What's the draw for you? I definitely haven't found the groove yet.
(Jeez, how much more OT can I get? My karma shall surely suffer.)
Re:It doesn't look like much but...
on
This is IT?
·
· Score: 2
My understanding is that it has a top speed of less than 20 MPH. Given it's very small mass, it would stop A LOT faster than a car. All that aside, we'll just have to try it. If it is dangerous, then I doubt the device will get far. However, I doubt that it will be a problem. Kamen develops medical devices; he's quite aware of what makes a device safe vs. unsafe. I trust his reputation enough that, if I got the chance, I'd at least seriously try a Ginger out. (Assuming it is what we think it is and the broadcast tomorrow doesn't proclaim that he's invented a 'really nifty' orange peeler or something. Wouldn't Time feel silly then?!)
It doesn't look like much but...
on
This is IT?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
..you gotta admit, it could solve some real problems in big cities. Kamen's genius lies not only in his engineering, but in his realistic viewpoint. He knows that, except for the early adopter crowd, people aren't going to want these. However, that won't matter. If you read the Time article, he tells you straight up that he's going to focus on postal carriers, police, etc. first. Once Ginger is proven in those capacities, people will want one. Also note that he's seeing it as a middle ground commute vehicle. I personally would've shelled out the money to be able to be in traffic with a Ginger instead of my pig of a car that takes so much space and had a payload of exactly 1 person. (And don't even get me started on car pooling; what a frickin waste of time!)
Slashdot Mirror
I don't speak for RMS, ESR, FSF, or any of the other talking heads in the open source/free software movement, but based on the idealogy as I understand it, this is a good thing.
.NET. A port of the most important .NET libraries will also be needed to really crumble that barrier to exit from Windows .NET.)
Why?
Well, if by providing C# on Linux removes the barrier to exit from Linux to Windows, then the converse ought to be largely true as well. That is, having C# on Linux removes the barrier to exit from Windows to Linux.
Is that bad? Doesn't it provide more freedom?
(Keep in mind that this also isn't completely true. C# is only one tiny (yes, TINY) piece of
Ok... I modded up the article you point to in your sig. Now quityerbitchin. ;)
the .DOC file format is completely incompatible with Word XP
Huh? Care to quantify what you mean here?!
Yup, you're a mathematician alright! :) I see nothing wrong with your idea, but it amuses me that you didn't also recommend literature, anthropology, interpersonal relations, public speaking, etc.
I've met and know a lot of great programmers. The ones who are still employed right now are the one who have paid attention to their soft skills.
So, there's this idea of "correct background/complete knowledge" and there's this idea of "valuable to businesses". They do play off each other, but they aren't the same and you have to decide which one is more valuable to you.
ARR0, I am curious though. Having the background in mathematics that you have, you've inevitably suffered through the best and worst ways to learn math. If you could do it over again and had the opportunity to select the fashion in which you would be educated mathematically, what would you select? I'm only curious because I'm someone who likes the ideas of math and the ways in which it contributes to analytic thought, but I've always been put off by a variety of factors. TIA!
...as I understand it is that you have a bunch of code in VB already that you need to leverage from other languages which don't support ActiveX (or do they?). Some of this may be redundant to what's been suggested already, but here's my list of ideas:
.NET. Language interoperability is real strength there. However, adopting .NET in your project may be untenable, so YMMV big time on that one. On the other hand, VS.NET and .NET are still in RC status, so considered yourself warned.
1. Just use the VB ActiveX DLL from the other languages using those languages' COM abilities. This makes the most sense, but can it be done in your situation? This has the disadvantage of complicating all the other components of your system that have to talk to the VB components.
2. Build a wrapper around the VB components (probably in C++) such that the other programs/DLLs access the wrapper via straight DLL calls and the wrapper itself talks COM to the VB component. This is not elegant and rates a big "yuck" from me, but it is possible. I don't have any examples for you, but you might find one out on MSDN. Related to the above disadvantage, any component that uses the VB component(s) via this method won't really be complicated by that relationship anymore. On the other hand, you now own a DLL which will contain some very gross code (IMO anyway) because of memory management and COM.
3. Port the VB code to another language that can compile to straight DLLs. IIRC, you can easily port VB to PowerBasic and compile PB down to straight DLLs, which are then accessible to anything. I've never tried this, but my understanding is that it is possible and not too esoteric either. Once you've done this, you can use the PB compiled DLL from VB with the use of the VB Declare statement. Another option along this line would be to port the VB to C/C++. Obviously, that's much more costly, but you could give yourself a nice performance boost and maybe even platform portability to boot.
4. You probably can't do this for several reasons, but I would examine if the languages in question are covered by
That's all I can think of right now. I hope it helps.
But my point isn't that C# is superior to Java or vice versa. To make that point, I would need to argue that point more effectively. My main point in that posting was that I would not be selecting Java over C# or vice versa based on one language feature. In fact, I think that the language features between the two are going to be largely irrelevant going forward. I do think that corporate culture will be VERY relevant going forward though. If your company is a "Microsoft shop" then C# or another .NET language will be the ticket. If your company is an "IBM shop" or "Java shop" or "multivendor", you'll probably use Java for those big projects. I may preach to use the "right tool for the job", but the reality is that decision is usually not made on technical grounds.
.NET is a good thing and I stick by that.
As far as my real opinion on Java vs. C#: I don't even care. I'll let other people obsess over that; and I'll eat their lunch while they're doing it.
Anyway, none of this really matters. My original and most important point was that having a non-MS implementation of
First of all, C# *is* (IMO anyway) elegant. I like it. Elegance is a matter of opinion anyway. I don't like LISP, I never did, and yes, I have used it. Is its syntax more elegant than Java or C#? Yes; sort of. But do I care about LISP? Not really. I may take an interest in it one day, but not today.
Now that aside... you used one language feature as an example to promote Java's superiority. ONE feature! Look at http://www.25hoursaday.com/CsharpVsJava.html for a more complete comparison. There's about 20 features in C# that Java doesn't have, so is C# immediately superior because of that? Maybe so, maybe not but I won't be making that decision based on ONE language feature.
Now all *that* aside: Use the right tool for the job. I assert that C# and Java will be used for essentially different types of jobs for the immediate future. Sun/IBM did indeed get a jump on Microsoft with Java, but that won't mean much over the long haul.
Last point: Have the proverbial balls to post as something other than AC when you decide to flame. If you'd thought your opinion was worth sh*t, you might have taken the effort to express yourself more effectively; as it was you did it half-assed, and it shows.
Just use it.
just took 'Best of Show' for laptops at COMDEX for their Crusue based laptop. For about $1500 you can have Crusue based laptop today. If I were in the market for a laptop, I might just buy one.
And not because OS again copies a big industry player. It's good because it will help keep Microsoft honest about the open-ness of .NET.
.NET. They'd be stupid not to do so.
It will make the ever so elegant C# language portable, which I'm really looking forward to as I never fell in love with Java as a language.
Furthermore, at least in the Microsoft IT world, C# is it. If you're not learning C#, you're so much refuse in the new paradigm. Giving the burgeoning C# pool of programmers portability options will definitely help keep Microsoft in their place.
Oh, and keep your eye on the likes of IBM and Sun: Odds are good that they'll support an independent implementation of
...is the Portable.NET project really measuring their progress in SLOC? I doubt it. So, if you're not measuring your progress that way, then you're in little danger of creating code just to augment the SLOC, which is the primary drawback of using SLOC to measure progress. I see little harm in pointing out the SLOC just to make the project a bit more visible. The visibility ought to be good for their egos, and by extension, the project.
.NET CLR coverage they're going to provide.
I agree that function points could be a good measure of progress, but I would like to see a graphical chart of API progress instead. I'm more curious about how much full
...when they put Internet enabled games on the Start menu? IIRC, those games connect you to the Zone, and IIRC the Zone now requires Passport.
Like let up on the guy... you're just jealous anyway. One geek out of the horde figures out how to enjoy life, and you're pissed at him?
My guess is that, if any one of us could lead the life we *imagine* him to be living with no strings attached or ill effects, we'd do it.
But I bet you enjoy cleaning the gutters on the house more, right? Yeah, well get back to work you gimp.
...if you want to be any good at it. In fact, it's harder, because it tries to do so much for you. How many times have you heard of insecure, instable, piece of sh** web sites tipping over because of Windows? A lot, right? Want to guess at the skill levels of the administrators in question? That's what I thought too.
The bottom line is that good system engineering (in the admin sense of course) is hard no matter which platform you use. Administration of Windows *is* easy, if you're only talking about a LAN with say, 10 machines. Get beyond a single segment and go into complex services though, and you had better know what the hell you're doing.
This is a perfect example of how the mindsets between the users of the platforms differ.
Technology isn't just technical; it's cultural. Ask any real perl monger.
Now let's ask ourselves which set of technologies better matches the societies in which they typically resides?
What can you do to change that? By porting open source tools to Windows. Bring them around to your way of thinking in a more subtle way, and you won't have to convince them anymore. They'll be in the choir beside you.
If you're constantly following the gaming scene (PC or console), then all the improvements in games seem kind of boring, because you know the immediate predecessor to the game in question was almost just as good.
But if you're away for a while, then it all seems fresh again, and it's a lot of fun that way.
My plan is to just play through the batch of stuff I have right now, then not bother with new games again for a good long while.
Have fun!
...for the saboteur to insert something into a product other than the kernel. Say, apache, or maybe samba. Or maybe mozilla. Or maybe even in a development product which is modified to turn a blind eye to certain types of defects, like buffer overruns.
Hell, just knowing the general class of vulnerability that one can expect to find is a big leg up for an attacker.
The point is that it could happen in any product. Really, how do you know that the spanky new game you're playing didn't open your system to attacks? It really isn't complicated and getting someone into a game company to do that sort of thing wouldn't be difficult.
But the real question is, what then? The contaminated code in question would need to execute in some sort of proximity to a resource that matters (think banks here).
(I know I'm late to the table on this discussion, but hey, I've got a life to live.)
Anyway, XP is for toddlers? Says who? XP is far and away the best PC OS I have used for gaming. Why? Because the damn games aren't crashing my machine. The only real caveat is that many DOS games won't run under XP. Other than that, I've had no problems. Also, your toddler observation might be based on the new GUI features. Just turn them off if you don't like them. None of them are required fare.
None.
Zilch.
And it performs well.
Try it; you might like it *gasp*.
Oh.. and MS's strategy *is* risky. In recent history though, they have a tendency to "bet the farm" on their next step. Each step is calculated to be somewhat risky to allow real progress, but not so risky that it would be "game over" for them. Really, it's quite well thought out and effective I think.
Now, if they would just dump the stupid product activation in XP, Office, and everything else going forward. I really hate it because it doesn't do what they say it will do (limit piracy), but it does/could do some things they won't ever own up to (like invade my privacy, create a pain in the butt situation for my customers, etc.).
If I were affected by this system, I would also be concerned about folks being able to get to data about me that would allow social engineering attacks to occur outside the context of the physical system. This was one of the major types of attacks that Mitnick favored after all. A physical system attack is often only possible after a critical door somewhere has been opened.
I never said that you aren't still personally responsible for your behaviour. Even if one can successfully argue that "once Johnny starts playing CivII he won't be able to stop until he's passed out", you've still got to acknowledge that Johnny can make sure he doesn't start playing in the first place.
Secondly, I never said that *you* (and by definition, everyone) will become addicted someday. My statement meant something more like this: "Good luck hiding from the problem because it's likely that you, or someone you know, will be affected adversely by this in some way". I probably wasn't clear enough on that point.
You know - maybe we *are* all automatons who ultimately aren't responsible for our actions. From a scientific point of view, that may never be disproven (assuming you can somehow quantify responsibility in a scenario). But a pragmatic viewpoint is that we can not afford to think like that. Ultimately, your own point of view will guide your to an opinion on this much more than external evidence. The hard core atheist science types will see what they want, the religious types will see what they want, and I'll see it my own way. But that's a rant for another day...
I maintain that root reason is the fact that random rewards systems in general are the most effective among all reward systems. It was certainly on my psychology test in college.
:)
Anyway, competition can provide semi-random rewards (assuming that chance plays some part in the game in question), so in a sense, I agree completely with you.
As far as the competition in the forums, I wouldn't go there. It's called 'trolling' and 'elitist bullshitting'.
This is all so true. I have found myself regularly addicted to various pursuits since I was a kid. I have found that the games to avoid are the ones with more long-term goals/payoffs. For instance, I'm not really addicted to UT or Q3. On some particular night, I may find it hard to tear myself away from "just one more" deathmatch, but that's it. Eventually I go to bed and I may not play again for 2 months.
But then there are games where that's not possible. We all know the examples (usually RPGs, quest style, or puzzle games in general).
Basically, here's what to avoid (I'm not a shrink, but this works!): Any game or activity with a non-determinate payoff pattern. In other words, avoid random (or semi-random) reward systems. UT doesn't fit in this category because I generally know how long a match will play and I usually have a good idea of who's going to school who. Zelda? Forget it. You never know when you're going to find the very next quest item.
This is basically the same problem as an addiction to gambling. Don't subject yourself to the overall patterns, and you should be ok.
Oh, and to everyone who thinks this isn't a real problem, good for you. It just means you haven't been bit yet. Good luck ignoring the problem though.
OT, but god I loved that game!
Kalabajoui - Thanks for the quote!
In contrast, I haven't been able to stand CivIII, which strikes me as tepid and shallow. Yeah, I know actually winning at CivIII is complex, but the depth of the surrounding story just isn't there. I think with Alpha Centauri, there was no actual history to leverage; you can't just "look it up" like you can with the (more or less) historically accurate civilizations in CivIII. Therefore, AC needed a lot more story and background development. In my book, they did a great job too! I've said this before, but one of AC's unique qualities was forcing the player to explore ideologies, not just unit strategy.
I think I'll go play AC sometime soon again. In retrospect, it might have been better if I'd never played the game. It's not only addictive, but it set the bar too high for subsequent games. I personally consider AC to be Sid's masterpiece. CivIII is probably everyone else's pick I know, but bah to that I say.
:)
Also - if anyone would comment on the "sweet spot" in CivIII, I'd love to hear it. What's the draw for you? I definitely haven't found the groove yet.
(Jeez, how much more OT can I get? My karma shall surely suffer.)
My understanding is that it has a top speed of less than 20 MPH. Given it's very small mass, it would stop A LOT faster than a car. All that aside, we'll just have to try it. If it is dangerous, then I doubt the device will get far. However, I doubt that it will be a problem. Kamen develops medical devices; he's quite aware of what makes a device safe vs. unsafe. I trust his reputation enough that, if I got the chance, I'd at least seriously try a Ginger out. (Assuming it is what we think it is and the broadcast tomorrow doesn't proclaim that he's invented a 'really nifty' orange peeler or something. Wouldn't Time feel silly then?!)
..you gotta admit, it could solve some real problems in big cities. Kamen's genius lies not only in his engineering, but in his realistic viewpoint. He knows that, except for the early adopter crowd, people aren't going to want these. However, that won't matter. If you read the Time article, he tells you straight up that he's going to focus on postal carriers, police, etc. first. Once Ginger is proven in those capacities, people will want one. Also note that he's seeing it as a middle ground commute vehicle. I personally would've shelled out the money to be able to be in traffic with a Ginger instead of my pig of a car that takes so much space and had a payload of exactly 1 person. (And don't even get me started on car pooling; what a frickin waste of time!)