Re: Trillian is nice, but gaim has cross platform
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Trillian 3.0 Released
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· Score: 3, Insightful
I switched to Win32 gAIM simply because I found everything about Trillian annoying as Hell. The interface felt too clunky and bloated with visuals (this was really a problem with multiple protocols). My situation is such that the network admin on campus has denied access to AIM and has provided no alternative. Initially, I would just install Trillian/Miranda/gAIM each time I logged in, but I found the installation process for each a bit tedious after logging in 2-3 times a day at different workstations.
When I bough a USB thumbdrive, I started putting all my essential apps such as FireFox on it so I could avoid reinstallation with each login. Trillian gave me some trouble with installation on a USB key (it wouldn't keep my profile data on the USB key nor would it make it apart of my Windows roaming profile), so I just finally completely migrated over to gAIM. It installed on my USB key without a hitch, has a cleaner interface, keeps logs of everything in my roaming profile and is easy to update. Even file transfer works for me now.
I personally use Dillo when memory is tight (I've only got 512 MB of RAM). It's got tabs, is very speedy, generally renders fine and small footprint (~400KB). I use FireFox and Konqueror for my primary browsing, but Dillo is quite handy when I have applications compliling or I'm burning a CD.
I recall several months (possibly a couple years) back in Zaurus dev newsgroup a thread about porting Mozilla to the Qtopia/ARM platform and it was determined that it just simply couldn't be done and maintain efficient memory usage. The specs of PDAs have not changed drastically in the lsat 2 years, so I'm eager to find out if some sort of "breakthrough" was accomplished that allowed Mozilla to have a reasonable footprint on low-memory devices. Opera for Qtopia/ARM will be hard to beat. The only thing I miss is tabs, but it does have its own windowing system of sorts that assists in pop-up blocking and keeping track of opened links. It's also worth noting that Konqueror has been ported to Qtopia/ARM as well.
Either way, I'm excited about the prospect of being able to use Mozilla on my Pocket PC or Zaurus (PocketIE is atrocious)
From those numbers, it seems like Linux is having its main growth because of it's price, rather than the OS itself. Numbers were ~50% of blades, ~20% of rack-mounts, and ~10% of free standing
This raises an interesting point. If pricepoint is genuinely what is the deciding factor for these predictions, what will happen when OpenSolaris is release?
From the article -
Sales of servers using Linux will grow faster than the overall market at least through 2008, when customers will spend $9.1 billion for machines using the open-source operating system, market researcher IDC forecast Monday
The results highlight the spread of the operating system, a relatively new competitor to Unix versions such as Sun Microsystems' Solaris and to Microsoft Windows. The top four server sellers--IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems and Dell--all support Linux, though Sun steers customers to Solaris.
This is not a troll, but I have never understood the wide-spread embracing of Linux to be a direct result of anything but price-point and community support. I hate near everything about the way Linux is structured when compared to other flavors of UNIX, and I am not a fan of the kernel internals, yet I keep going back to it because of the aforementioned reasons. To be fair, I was introduced to UNIX with SunOS and the BSD family before being introduced to Linux, and lately I've been sharpening my skills with AIX and some of their enterprise solutions, so I may be totally missing the point of Linux.
Let's talk hypothetical here - Let's say Sun releases Solaris under a nice license that satisfies everybody - the BSD nuts, the Stallman-worshipers, and the corporate players [bear with me here; I realize I'm treading fairytale water], and let's say the community loves it and starts hacking away at it like a hillbilly with a hatchet. Right there, the Linux pricepoint and community support is matched.
I predict in the future we will see some more UNIX versions opened up, specifically, AIX. This is based entirely on speculation and the late-night readings of IBM papers, but I wholeheartedly believe in the next 10 years, IBM will either completely open the source or share a great portion of it (barring a SCO victory).
I myself have always preferred commercial UNIX to community efforts (although the *BSDs are near and dear to my heart) and have used Linux out of necessity, not out of direct superiority to commercial UNIX. My point is that if (or when) commercial versions of UNIX (such as Solaris and AIX) match the benefits of Linux, Linux may be the kid without a gimmick. But again, this is based entirely on the premise that Linux's gimmick is limited to the two previously mentioned, so if I am totally missing something, would some more-informed Linux guru clarify:-)?
As if that weren't enough, now they'll most certainly feel some variant of the Slashdot effect
No linky in the blerb. Most of slashdot has adopted the custom of simply middle-clicking a link to a new tab and then avoiding all forms of digesting information from that opened link (it's what's fashionable now). I seriously doubt the average Slashdot reader will take the time to resort to the arcane practice of TYPING URLs simply to simulate the view of smoldering server ashes. They'll wait until IBM releases the their next voice-to-text software program ("UNCLE SPEAK & SPELL, ENTERPRISE EDITION") for that.
Although I was hoping for a link in the blerb. Maybe that would induct "Best Gang-Raping of a Server" into the awards section.
I think if you chop out the CGI, chop out the voices (if any, I haven't played it yet), downsample the textures and models for a smaller screen, and wait for the cart size to grow, you might just be able to jam VII onto the DS. It'll be close, though, and I think it might not happen until 2006-ish; even cut down I'd guestimate at least ~200-300 MB at a minimum, and we're about two doublings away from that, from what I can see.
I would not be quick to predict whether or not the DS' media platform will be able to support a multi-disc PS1 games' size. While Nintendo says 1 gigabit (128 megabytes) is the limit, keep in mind that this is a early-launch quote. I recall early in the N64's lifespan Nintendo touting that the N64 cart format could hold up to 128 megabits of data, yet games like Zelda : OoT, Perfect Dark, Resident Evil 2 and Conker's Bad Fur Day were well over that limit. The DS uses flash memory cards. You can now buy 4 gigabyte compact flash cards, which uses the same technology as the DS' as far as EEPROM goes, anyways. When technology grows and production costs go down, I predict we'll see 512MB-1GB games on the DS. Also keep in mind that professional game development crews have quite a few tricks to employ for compression of textures, sound and FMV. For a long time, people thought that the N64 was incapable of handling FMV, just due to the sheer size of a 3-4 minute cutscene, relative to the size of the game. However, a game like Resident Evil 2 demonstrates that developers can be pretty clever with compression, as RE2-64 had all the levels, higher quality textures and all the FMVs.
But as far as FMV goes, I don't think the DS will have a problem with that. the MP demo that ships with the DS has FMV in it, and because of this, I see no reason to believe why space or hardware would be an issue.
This is how Microsoft has won basically every battle it faced in the 90's anyways. IE supported NS extensions, Windows supports Novell, UNIX. Word supports Corel, etc..
Don't you get the game yet? If given the option of Netscape X and IE, you'd choose Netscape X because it can do everything IE does, PLUS Firefox built-in features. If you want to start weaning ppl off IE, its better to attack with a good migration plan.
Preach it, brother! Just look at emacs - recent iterations have included not only vi, but Internet Explorer, FireFox, Mosaic and the complete AmigaOS, just to ensure extra compatbility.
Not to sound like i'm trolling... but... "Upcoming gamecube games including Mario and Zelda"
Can nintendo not innovate?, its what lost them the market to sony in consoles
It's funny you should mention that. Me and a friend were discussing that very topic over lunch last week when both of us had classes canceled. He raised the legitimate point that, from the outside looking in, Nintendo doesn't seem to be innovating that much. I mean, there's well over 40 different Mario titles to date. However, for the most part, I've found that when Nintendo licenses their characters into a new spin-off game, it's actually quite innovative. I can say with a certain amount of confidence that Mario Kart, Mario Tennis and Mario Golf are all really fun and different from any cart/tennis/golf game I've played. If they were simply cart/tennis/golf sims, then it would be a perfectly valid point to state that no innovation has been done, but that is not the case. All of the spin-off franchises brought something new to the new medium of sport, the hallmark "Nintendo quirkiness", or in the case of the Zelda series, you get a graphical overhaul/new battle system/new multiplayer features/new style of story-telling.
With that said, I'm looking forward to Mario Baseball. It will be interesting to see what spin Nintendo takes on the sport.
I really big to differ on the Sony note. Nintendo lost because Sony is just plain better at courting the consumer and the developer. While I'm a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series, there's not a tremendous amount of innovation between 7 and 10, aside from battle system improvements and new characters and story, it's pretty much more of the same. And I wouldn't have it any other way for FF, that's how I like it, but it's not innovative. Generic cookie-cutter sports titles, Yet Another Animated 2-D Generic Marvel vs. Capcom vs. KOF vs. SNK vs. SF games, Yet Another 'I Wish I Was Final Fantasy II So Bad' Sprite-Based RPG, all found a home on the PSX. Sony won because they knew which buttons to press while Nintendo was asleep on the job, not because they were innovative.
Honestly, I would expect this. I don't think Nintendo is really out to piss off their consumers. I think what they're after is quality. Think about it - Nintendo is frequently the last console company to implement something, but it's almost always a high-quality implementation. Remember the SNES' dying days where it was fighting off both SEGA's and Sony's CD-based 32-bit consoles? I remember frustration as my friends played games like Tomb Raider and Virtua Fighter in full 3D while I was left with Donkey Kong Country and its 2D, side-scrolling action. But then came the N64, and while it didn't even scratch the surface of the PSone's success, it definitely blew it away in quality. Games like Super Mario 64 and Legend of Zelda : OoT were rendered in full 3D without load times and pixelated graphics and still maintained the Nintendo quality of gameplay from the 16-bit days. It set a new standard for console 3D games and gameplay.
When Nintendo finally moved to disc-based media with the GCN, they moved because load-times were far less of an issue with the current technology. They waited for it so they wouldn't rub their consumers the wrong way. While I loved the PSone, looking back, the load times were atrocious. Piracy of GCN games is near impossible and they're still able to keep up with the pack in most areas (with only the biggest games suffering from the proprietary media size limit).
The DS is another fine example waiting to unfold. Nintendo is just now doing 3D pocket gaming. There have been plenty of technologically superior portable game consoles capable of 3D, yet Nintendo's gameboy series has always done better in the market. There's no question that the DS is less powerful than the PSP, but I think Nintendo is more concerned with the quality of the game rather than the graphical superiority.
This is not to say that Nintendo made the right choice in waiting to advance their technologies, but I am saying that when Nintendo does enter the online arena, it will be a high-quality entrance, as history has proved. They might lose some sales because online console capabilities is a selling point for some people, but I think Nintendo has sent the message time and time again that they're not after the gamers who want bleeding edge technology; they're after the gamers who want high-quality, rich gaming experiences.
(and yes, I'm aware of Nintendo's forays into the online and CD-based markets)
passe != "once popular". when i was a kid i recall getting things like "mcdonalds bucks" from cheap relatives that kids would get for afterschool participation. cost nothing to the giver. that might have passed then, but not now. hence, passe. out of fashion. no longer acceptable.
It is in poor and dated fashion to give things which can be obtained for free, at least in the circles I'm in. Perhaps you're too young to remember the days of scrapbooking or the giving of bootlegged radio songs as legit gifts? Or passing off gift certificates which giver obtained for free at an event (such as a blood drive)?
Might want to think twice before your question other's choice of words, kid;-)
This is not a jab at Linux or anything, but the only things my peers know about Linux is that it's free and it's a Unix clone. Frankly, they would be pissed if I gave them a CD with a free operating system on it and tried to pass that off as a gift. Giving a CD full of free data is rather passe, IMHO. Why not offer to install and give support for a distro or download SuSE/Mandrake/Fedora Core and include a copy of CrossoverOffice (something that, coupled with help in installation and support, might actually move some to migrate). I know this will probably get modded as a troll, but this works. I actually did migrate my father to SuSE Linux on his tablet PC for a time. It was not an easy task to get the pen input working and to get CrossoverOffice working, but he did use it as his primary desktop for a while.
As far as LiveCDs go, I've found SuSE's LiveCD and the Knoppix LiveCD to be pretty good, but the best I've found for out-of-the-box support is the Slackware run-off live distro, Slax. This is what I used for the workstations at my university for the longest time. It comes bundled with X, KDE, a ton of office-oriented applications and has great hardware compatibility. It also fits on a mini CD-R, so it can be kept in a pocket. Might want to consider sending a card with one of those inside it.
I do. Maybe I'm different, but I certainly prefer ink and paper documentation and books to the e-version. I generally try to read through a book before I begin the "searching", so maybe that's why. When I go to a project, I don't always have an electronic form avalaible. With PDF, Microsoft eReader, Palm Reader and many other formats, it's just easier and more worthwhile to buy a text version. I can't imagine trying to read through the Camel Book or the Sendmail book with an e-version; my eyes would just start burning from looking at a screen that long.
Oh yeah, and I like to support publishers like O'Reilly, who consistently deliver top-notch books that are almost always worth my money.
No problems whatsoever. The search function finally works and updates are a breeze. On my Windows and Mac machines. HOWEVER, my Linux box was not quite as rosey. I upgraded my source-built FireFox 1.0PR to FireFox 1.0 binary. I unmerged the 1.0PR and downloaded the binary from the FireFox website, installed it, and rebooted. At first, things were smooth sailing, but after an hour or two of usage, FireFox would become unusable and eventually crash. Same problem under SuSE. I uninstalled the binary and emerged FireFox 1.0 from source and everything was great.
Re:From the memory hole...
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Sun-isms Debunked
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· Score: 3, Interesting
Something that's been puzzling me since I first heard about an open source Solaris is to what degree it will be actual "UNIX", in the OpenGroup sense of the word. How much SVR4 code was ripped out and replaced, and are these replacements going to break compliance with the UNIX 98 certification? Will they hinder compliance with the UNIX 03 standard? Will Sun even pursue certification after the source is opened?
It's not that I'm incredibly worried, I've just always affixed Solaris as "Sun Solaris UNIX" when speaking about it, to denote compliance and compatibility in the commercial UNIX community.
I would like to point out (as I'm sure many people already know) Netscape is also being launched as an ISP. Given Netscape's ownership, I would guess that it's simply AOL repackaged with pretty, less-offensive icons. Commercials have been all over History channel. Seems to be the same target audience as AOL. Maybe I'm being overly skeptical, but it seems that AOL is getting more desperate with each quarter. Can't we just give Netscape a proper burial and move on? Is there really a need for another Earthlink/NetZero rip-off?
Anyways, they even have one of those new-fangled web accelerator gadgets that makes one of them there internets go really fast. I also hear there are naked chicks. My cousin's got it.
Seems like they'd need to license map-reduce from google or something. (That's a distributed data correlation engine. With extremely high fault tolerence, to boot.)
I know a guy who worked for Wal-Mart for ~8 years as some sort of data analyst and architect at the main offices in Bentonville. While he didn't go into too much detail, he told me that a lot of the back-end querying is done, surprisingly, with Perl-DBI on Oracle databases. When I asked why his team didn't use something like flat C, C++ or Java, portability was cited as a principal motivation and that, after a certain point, speed gains were only marginal. He also said when he left ~1.5 years ago, that a small cluster migration to DB2 was being talked about. I have no idea if they license search and query code, but I got the distinct impression that there was a team of software engineers who custom crafted search algorithms for the data.
Yes, it is, but this brings up something that's been puzzling me for quite some time - With common sense, is IE _really_ that dangerous? Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I use FireFox for many reasons, none of which involve security. For many years I used Internet Explorer and never had a problem. No viruses, no adware, few crashes (under 2000 and XP, anyways). Now I could be completely wrong, and I'm certain I'm going against the typical Slashdot gut-instinct of "bash something for the sake of bashing it", but in my mind, the average Slashdotter should not be at risk by using IE. They know not to click "Yes" without carefully reading what ActiveX component wants to be installed, they run anti-virus and firewalls, they use pop-up blockers. They scan their attachments, they disable scripting.
Maybe I'm the exception, but not once has IE given me the problems that are complained about frequently in the media. Never had a trojan, never had a buffer-overflow exploited.
Windows has given me hassles and worries, but speed and mediocre rendering aside, IE has never been an issue for me.
Back when I actually needed to use IE to access certain websites, I would always use the free AvantBrowser mod. IIRC, AvantBrowser simply sits on top of IE, so it is actually IE at the core. Regardless, it's got lots of features - tabbed browsing, pop-up blocker, flash filter, key bindings and a bunch of other stuff. Pretty nifty if you _must_ use IE.
Uh. I don't quite get your point. If it's running Linux, sure you can add support for OGG and the likes, but then again you can't play proprietary codecs such as WMA, WMV, QuickTime and others - unless you pay for the license. All this assuming that such a device would be aimed at the mainstream markets, of course.
Not necessarily true. Projects like Mplayer have allowed the playback of media encoded with proprietary codecs for quite some time. The legality of this is something I've never investigated, but I've never purchased a formal license for QT, WM9 or RealOne and can play them all on my Gentoo and SuSE boxes.
I would agree with you for the most part. However, I think she genuinely harbors some sort of grudge against IBM outside of the IBM vs. SCO theatrics. Take an article about Itanium from August - "Itanium-Armed Start-up To Menace IBM's Precious Mainframe Monopoly". The article itself is not particularly venomous towards IBM, but it certainly isn't an unbiased report on future competition for IBM. It just seems kind of absurd to go out of your way to prepare an article about a start-up company 'menacing' IBM's 'monopoly' when IBM already has plenty of morenoteworthycompetition.
But, as you said in another post, one has to wonder if she's doing this purely for the troll-value of it all.
Who is behind LinuxWorld? Why the ridiculous pro-SCO equivocation and anti-IBM attacks? Regardless of how you feel about IBM, how can anybody else associated with the software industry support a company that has made IP-lawsuits its first and only business priority?
I don't think it's so much pro-SCO as it is anti-IBM. It seems Ms. O'Gara has a historyofbitterness against IBM, or so I gathered from her articles.
They may have the best drivers for their card in two years, but I don't see how they can compete with Nvidia/ATI even with opensource drivers
I imagine it comes down to niche-market success rather than direct competition with ATI or Nvidia. I can't imagine any startup business scratching the surface of either companies' market dominance. However, they certainly have potential to be quite successful among the Linux/*BSD crowd if they are this open about their hardware and drivers. Think about it. Think about 1% of the global desktop PC market (or whatever the number is now) buying the video card because of 100% X11 compatibility and open source drivers. While it probably won't generate enough revenue to even cover to operating cost of ATI or NVIDIA, it certainly has potential to make a few people very successful and/or wealthy.
Slashdot Mirror
I switched to Win32 gAIM simply because I found everything about Trillian annoying as Hell. The interface felt too clunky and bloated with visuals (this was really a problem with multiple protocols). My situation is such that the network admin on campus has denied access to AIM and has provided no alternative. Initially, I would just install Trillian/Miranda/gAIM each time I logged in, but I found the installation process for each a bit tedious after logging in 2-3 times a day at different workstations.
When I bough a USB thumbdrive, I started putting all my essential apps such as FireFox on it so I could avoid reinstallation with each login. Trillian gave me some trouble with installation on a USB key (it wouldn't keep my profile data on the USB key nor would it make it apart of my Windows roaming profile), so I just finally completely migrated over to gAIM. It installed on my USB key without a hitch, has a cleaner interface, keeps logs of everything in my roaming profile and is easy to update. Even file transfer works for me now.
I personally use Dillo when memory is tight (I've only got 512 MB of RAM). It's got tabs, is very speedy, generally renders fine and small footprint (~400KB). I use FireFox and Konqueror for my primary browsing, but Dillo is quite handy when I have applications compliling or I'm burning a CD.
I recall several months (possibly a couple years) back in Zaurus dev newsgroup a thread about porting Mozilla to the Qtopia/ARM platform and it was determined that it just simply couldn't be done and maintain efficient memory usage. The specs of PDAs have not changed drastically in the lsat 2 years, so I'm eager to find out if some sort of "breakthrough" was accomplished that allowed Mozilla to have a reasonable footprint on low-memory devices. Opera for Qtopia/ARM will be hard to beat. The only thing I miss is tabs, but it does have its own windowing system of sorts that assists in pop-up blocking and keeping track of opened links. It's also worth noting that Konqueror has been ported to Qtopia/ARM as well.
Either way, I'm excited about the prospect of being able to use Mozilla on my Pocket PC or Zaurus (PocketIE is atrocious)
This raises an interesting point. If pricepoint is genuinely what is the deciding factor for these predictions, what will happen when OpenSolaris is release?
From the article - This is not a troll, but I have never understood the wide-spread embracing of Linux to be a direct result of anything but price-point and community support. I hate near everything about the way Linux is structured when compared to other flavors of UNIX, and I am not a fan of the kernel internals, yet I keep going back to it because of the aforementioned reasons. To be fair, I was introduced to UNIX with SunOS and the BSD family before being introduced to Linux, and lately I've been sharpening my skills with AIX and some of their enterprise solutions, so I may be totally missing the point of Linux.
Let's talk hypothetical here - Let's say Sun releases Solaris under a nice license that satisfies everybody - the BSD nuts, the Stallman-worshipers, and the corporate players [bear with me here; I realize I'm treading fairytale water], and let's say the community loves it and starts hacking away at it like a hillbilly with a hatchet. Right there, the Linux pricepoint and community support is matched.
I predict in the future we will see some more UNIX versions opened up, specifically, AIX. This is based entirely on speculation and the late-night readings of IBM papers, but I wholeheartedly believe in the next 10 years, IBM will either completely open the source or share a great portion of it (barring a SCO victory).
I myself have always preferred commercial UNIX to community efforts (although the *BSDs are near and dear to my heart) and have used Linux out of necessity, not out of direct superiority to commercial UNIX. My point is that if (or when) commercial versions of UNIX (such as Solaris and AIX) match the benefits of Linux, Linux may be the kid without a gimmick. But again, this is based entirely on the premise that Linux's gimmick is limited to the two previously mentioned, so if I am totally missing something, would some more-informed Linux guru clarify
Eh, it's late. Too much RPG IV.
No linky in the blerb. Most of slashdot has adopted the custom of simply middle-clicking a link to a new tab and then avoiding all forms of digesting information from that opened link (it's what's fashionable now). I seriously doubt the average Slashdot reader will take the time to resort to the arcane practice of TYPING URLs simply to simulate the view of smoldering server ashes. They'll wait until IBM releases the their next voice-to-text software program ("UNCLE SPEAK & SPELL, ENTERPRISE EDITION") for that.
Although I was hoping for a link in the blerb. Maybe that would induct "Best Gang-Raping of a Server" into the awards section.
I would not be quick to predict whether or not the DS' media platform will be able to support a multi-disc PS1 games' size. While Nintendo says 1 gigabit (128 megabytes) is the limit, keep in mind that this is a early-launch quote. I recall early in the N64's lifespan Nintendo touting that the N64 cart format could hold up to 128 megabits of data, yet games like Zelda : OoT, Perfect Dark, Resident Evil 2 and Conker's Bad Fur Day were well over that limit. The DS uses flash memory cards. You can now buy 4 gigabyte compact flash cards, which uses the same technology as the DS' as far as EEPROM goes, anyways. When technology grows and production costs go down, I predict we'll see 512MB-1GB games on the DS. Also keep in mind that professional game development crews have quite a few tricks to employ for compression of textures, sound and FMV. For a long time, people thought that the N64 was incapable of handling FMV, just due to the sheer size of a 3-4 minute cutscene, relative to the size of the game. However, a game like Resident Evil 2 demonstrates that developers can be pretty clever with compression, as RE2-64 had all the levels, higher quality textures and all the FMVs.
But as far as FMV goes, I don't think the DS will have a problem with that. the MP demo that ships with the DS has FMV in it, and because of this, I see no reason to believe why space or hardware would be an issue.
Preach it, brother! Just look at emacs - recent iterations have included not only vi, but Internet Explorer, FireFox, Mosaic and the complete AmigaOS, just to ensure extra compatbility.
*ducks*
It's funny you should mention that. Me and a friend were discussing that very topic over lunch last week when both of us had classes canceled. He raised the legitimate point that, from the outside looking in, Nintendo doesn't seem to be innovating that much. I mean, there's well over 40 different Mario titles to date. However, for the most part, I've found that when Nintendo licenses their characters into a new spin-off game, it's actually quite innovative. I can say with a certain amount of confidence that Mario Kart, Mario Tennis and Mario Golf are all really fun and different from any cart/tennis/golf game I've played. If they were simply cart/tennis/golf sims, then it would be a perfectly valid point to state that no innovation has been done, but that is not the case. All of the spin-off franchises brought something new to the new medium of sport, the hallmark "Nintendo quirkiness", or in the case of the Zelda series, you get a graphical overhaul/new battle system/new multiplayer features/new style of story-telling.
With that said, I'm looking forward to Mario Baseball. It will be interesting to see what spin Nintendo takes on the sport.
I really big to differ on the Sony note. Nintendo lost because Sony is just plain better at courting the consumer and the developer. While I'm a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series, there's not a tremendous amount of innovation between 7 and 10, aside from battle system improvements and new characters and story, it's pretty much more of the same. And I wouldn't have it any other way for FF, that's how I like it, but it's not innovative. Generic cookie-cutter sports titles, Yet Another Animated 2-D Generic Marvel vs. Capcom vs. KOF vs. SNK vs. SF games, Yet Another 'I Wish I Was Final Fantasy II So Bad' Sprite-Based RPG, all found a home on the PSX. Sony won because they knew which buttons to press while Nintendo was asleep on the job, not because they were innovative.
Honestly, I would expect this. I don't think Nintendo is really out to piss off their consumers. I think what they're after is quality. Think about it - Nintendo is frequently the last console company to implement something, but it's almost always a high-quality implementation. Remember the SNES' dying days where it was fighting off both SEGA's and Sony's CD-based 32-bit consoles? I remember frustration as my friends played games like Tomb Raider and Virtua Fighter in full 3D while I was left with Donkey Kong Country and its 2D, side-scrolling action. But then came the N64, and while it didn't even scratch the surface of the PSone's success, it definitely blew it away in quality. Games like Super Mario 64 and Legend of Zelda : OoT were rendered in full 3D without load times and pixelated graphics and still maintained the Nintendo quality of gameplay from the 16-bit days. It set a new standard for console 3D games and gameplay.
When Nintendo finally moved to disc-based media with the GCN, they moved because load-times were far less of an issue with the current technology. They waited for it so they wouldn't rub their consumers the wrong way. While I loved the PSone, looking back, the load times were atrocious. Piracy of GCN games is near impossible and they're still able to keep up with the pack in most areas (with only the biggest games suffering from the proprietary media size limit).
The DS is another fine example waiting to unfold. Nintendo is just now doing 3D pocket gaming. There have been plenty of technologically superior portable game consoles capable of 3D, yet Nintendo's gameboy series has always done better in the market. There's no question that the DS is less powerful than the PSP, but I think Nintendo is more concerned with the quality of the game rather than the graphical superiority.
This is not to say that Nintendo made the right choice in waiting to advance their technologies, but I am saying that when Nintendo does enter the online arena, it will be a high-quality entrance, as history has proved. They might lose some sales because online console capabilities is a selling point for some people, but I think Nintendo has sent the message time and time again that they're not after the gamers who want bleeding edge technology; they're after the gamers who want high-quality, rich gaming experiences.
(and yes, I'm aware of Nintendo's forays into the online and CD-based markets)
passe != "once popular". when i was a kid i recall getting things like "mcdonalds bucks" from cheap relatives that kids would get for afterschool participation. cost nothing to the giver. that might have passed then, but not now. hence, passe. out of fashion. no longer acceptable.
open mouth, insert foot.
It is in poor and dated fashion to give things which can be obtained for free, at least in the circles I'm in. Perhaps you're too young to remember the days of scrapbooking or the giving of bootlegged radio songs as legit gifts? Or passing off gift certificates which giver obtained for free at an event (such as a blood drive)?
;-)
Might want to think twice before your question other's choice of words, kid
This is not a jab at Linux or anything, but the only things my peers know about Linux is that it's free and it's a Unix clone. Frankly, they would be pissed if I gave them a CD with a free operating system on it and tried to pass that off as a gift. Giving a CD full of free data is rather passe, IMHO. Why not offer to install and give support for a distro or download SuSE/Mandrake/Fedora Core and include a copy of CrossoverOffice (something that, coupled with help in installation and support, might actually move some to migrate). I know this will probably get modded as a troll, but this works. I actually did migrate my father to SuSE Linux on his tablet PC for a time. It was not an easy task to get the pen input working and to get CrossoverOffice working, but he did use it as his primary desktop for a while.
As far as LiveCDs go, I've found SuSE's LiveCD and the Knoppix LiveCD to be pretty good, but the best I've found for out-of-the-box support is the Slackware run-off live distro, Slax. This is what I used for the workstations at my university for the longest time. It comes bundled with X, KDE, a ton of office-oriented applications and has great hardware compatibility. It also fits on a mini CD-R, so it can be kept in a pocket. Might want to consider sending a card with one of those inside it.
I do. Maybe I'm different, but I certainly prefer ink and paper documentation and books to the e-version. I generally try to read through a book before I begin the "searching", so maybe that's why. When I go to a project, I don't always have an electronic form avalaible. With PDF, Microsoft eReader, Palm Reader and many other formats, it's just easier and more worthwhile to buy a text version. I can't imagine trying to read through the Camel Book or the Sendmail book with an e-version; my eyes would just start burning from looking at a screen that long.
Oh yeah, and I like to support publishers like O'Reilly, who consistently deliver top-notch books that are almost always worth my money.
Seeking valid tech support from Slashdot is like going to an Adam Sandler film for some deep, subtle wit.
No problems whatsoever. The search function finally works and updates are a breeze. On my Windows and Mac machines. HOWEVER, my Linux box was not quite as rosey. I upgraded my source-built FireFox 1.0PR to FireFox 1.0 binary. I unmerged the 1.0PR and downloaded the binary from the FireFox website, installed it, and rebooted. At first, things were smooth sailing, but after an hour or two of usage, FireFox would become unusable and eventually crash. Same problem under SuSE. I uninstalled the binary and emerged FireFox 1.0 from source and everything was great.
Yes, but you have to install it from CD
Something that's been puzzling me since I first heard about an open source Solaris is to what degree it will be actual "UNIX", in the OpenGroup sense of the word. How much SVR4 code was ripped out and replaced, and are these replacements going to break compliance with the UNIX 98 certification? Will they hinder compliance with the UNIX 03 standard? Will Sun even pursue certification after the source is opened?
It's not that I'm incredibly worried, I've just always affixed Solaris as "Sun Solaris UNIX" when speaking about it, to denote compliance and compatibility in the commercial UNIX community.
I worded that wrong :-) I meant it's the existing AOL-esq people. Too much RPG IV.
I would like to point out (as I'm sure many people already know) Netscape is also being launched as an ISP. Given Netscape's ownership, I would guess that it's simply AOL repackaged with pretty, less-offensive icons. Commercials have been all over History channel. Seems to be the same target audience as AOL. Maybe I'm being overly skeptical, but it seems that AOL is getting more desperate with each quarter. Can't we just give Netscape a proper burial and move on? Is there really a need for another Earthlink/NetZero rip-off?
Anyways, they even have one of those new-fangled web accelerator gadgets that makes one of them there internets go really fast. I also hear there are naked chicks. My cousin's got it.
I know a guy who worked for Wal-Mart for ~8 years as some sort of data analyst and architect at the main offices in Bentonville. While he didn't go into too much detail, he told me that a lot of the back-end querying is done, surprisingly, with Perl-DBI on Oracle databases. When I asked why his team didn't use something like flat C, C++ or Java, portability was cited as a principal motivation and that, after a certain point, speed gains were only marginal. He also said when he left ~1.5 years ago, that a small cluster migration to DB2 was being talked about. I have no idea if they license search and query code, but I got the distinct impression that there was a team of software engineers who custom crafted search algorithms for the data.
Yes, it is, but this brings up something that's been puzzling me for quite some time - With common sense, is IE _really_ that dangerous? Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I use FireFox for many reasons, none of which involve security. For many years I used Internet Explorer and never had a problem. No viruses, no adware, few crashes (under 2000 and XP, anyways). Now I could be completely wrong, and I'm certain I'm going against the typical Slashdot gut-instinct of "bash something for the sake of bashing it", but in my mind, the average Slashdotter should not be at risk by using IE. They know not to click "Yes" without carefully reading what ActiveX component wants to be installed, they run anti-virus and firewalls, they use pop-up blockers. They scan their attachments, they disable scripting.
Maybe I'm the exception, but not once has IE given me the problems that are complained about frequently in the media. Never had a trojan, never had a buffer-overflow exploited.
Windows has given me hassles and worries, but speed and mediocre rendering aside, IE has never been an issue for me.
Back when I actually needed to use IE to access certain websites, I would always use the free AvantBrowser mod. IIRC, AvantBrowser simply sits on top of IE, so it is actually IE at the core. Regardless, it's got lots of features - tabbed browsing, pop-up blocker, flash filter, key bindings and a bunch of other stuff. Pretty nifty if you _must_ use IE.
Not necessarily true. Projects like Mplayer have allowed the playback of media encoded with proprietary codecs for quite some time. The legality of this is something I've never investigated, but I've never purchased a formal license for QT, WM9 or RealOne and can play them all on my Gentoo and SuSE boxes.
I would agree with you for the most part. However, I think she genuinely harbors some sort of grudge against IBM outside of the IBM vs. SCO theatrics. Take an article about Itanium from August - "Itanium-Armed Start-up To Menace IBM's Precious Mainframe Monopoly". The article itself is not particularly venomous towards IBM, but it certainly isn't an unbiased report on future competition for IBM. It just seems kind of absurd to go out of your way to prepare an article about a start-up company 'menacing' IBM's 'monopoly' when IBM already has plenty of more noteworthy competition.
But, as you said in another post, one has to wonder if she's doing this purely for the troll-value of it all.