Look, the problem we have today for survival and in years to come is pollution. Global warming is a nice thing to prevent, but we still do not have the capacity to predict the future of a planet that been around what, 4 billion years? Do we really know that the Earth has never been hotter from the other 3.6billion yrs?
If anything about our real intellect, global warming can only be possible though the butterfly effect on a grand scale (thousands of years), and guess what, looking at 400 yrs of data is not going to draw any conclusion. And yes, who knows, a warm 'spike' could cause a asteroid to change trajectory towards our planet--so much of worrying about global warming!
"MIT's Tech Review is running an interview with Boston University Bioengineer Tim Gardner about the possibility of using bacteria to produce electricity. If fuel cells running off sugar are nearly here, alcohol-powered robots cannot be far."
.... And within ten years, food-powered humans?
Geez, is it that humans are the only thing that shouldn't produce electricity to benefit? Walking, using a bicycle-generator, bio-energy from humans could be useful... Then again, being overweight sounds a lot more productive.
I dunno, but it took less than a day to get 98% of my laptop with special hardware running on Linux. Yes, Linux drivers are a mess, but that was expected w/Linux, so the FAQs are widely available on the internet (if you can get to it of course!). The only critical thing is the ethernet card driver--that *is* critical nowadays. And if a vendor can't provide generic ethernet compatibility, then someone wrote some poor driver software! (ATI, you hear?)
As for Vista, with such a closed system and a lack of any support info (unless you have an MSDN subscription and an internet connection too), and finger-pointing attitudes common with device driver vendors and MS, I can see why it took 4 days. From our experiences with Linux, Microsoft MUST fix this issue for all supported hardware or it will be the death of Vista. That's been the only advantage of Win2K (XP to some extent) systems--the nearly 99% of all generic drivers worked.
That's interesting, considering the type of machines sold from 1995-2003. I bet there's not one system has meets these requirements [b]exactly[/b]:
A majority of folks either have desktops 2Ghz machine. There are plenty of 1Ghz laptops, but not with those video requirements. Then again, most built in video has 64Mb memory (desk/lap). Also, who really has 1GB system memory?--everyone I know has around 512MB (especially laptops). DVDROM? I think most have CDROMs... the list goes on.
In the end, you either are way above the requirements or [i]slightly under[/i]. You either have the bling P4-2Ghz+ $1500 system or laptop already...or there's a 99% chance you'll need to upgrade something (RAM, DVD, Video, HD, or processor).
The only reason why Apple is successful nowadays is just cost:
Apple products are more affordable today than 5 yrs ago.
Sure an 60GB iPod can cost $300, but I can get a mini for $99, my entry costs into the brand are much lower than years ago. Of course, PC's are even lower, but the configuration/admin hassles show a cost difference of what? $50? In the old days that cost was likely $500. Hence, that's $50 becomes worth the price since most gimzo buyers can afford the extra cost nowadays compared to the old days.
Apple success is another typical tech story: being at the right place at the right time, economically. The social, coolness, technical capabilites, business thories, and such are just hype justification that some 'expert' wants to author.
In the end, IMO, Apple's reminds me of Sony, and unless Apple evolves, guess what, in 7 yrs we'll look back have wondered why we bought all these gadgets (i.e. 1G, 2G, Nano, 3G ipods) 'now' sitting in our storage boxes. That's what happnened with the Walkman (i.e. Walkman, AM/FM/Cass Walkman, CD Walkman, ESP Walkman, MP3 Walkman, etc...)--how many power supplies do you have?...
This IMO is the great experiement about free Internet and F/OSS. Basically, the creators of the Internet have looked for free and trustworthy usage such that non-abusive practices will never prevail due to the standards and protocol developed and used on the internet.
From the looks of this, myspace is really pushing the limits of 'stupid is what stupid does' and that the abuse (i.e.lack of education about usage?) is being exploited and now the other extreme (i.e. the cops) are essentially doing the same thing... to counter that usage.
Unfortunately, this could make the case for tier internet much more compelling.
It's ironic they assign the #1 job to one that is heavily outsourced. I guess since it's such a great job, Americans don't deserve to work in these positions--better set sent to other countries. Is this saying basically the best job any company can offer (s/w engineering) should be outsourced? (or is it a conclusion that 'best jobs' cost companies too much?)
Really, this looks like a marketing ploy to get [young] people interested again in technology, specifically software, considering college interest has dropped considerably.
As for reality from TFA:
growth -- what growth? I haven't been promoted in the last 3 years aside from job changes. Also I've been working on the same tech for the last 2+ years. No tech revolution since 1999, really folks, think about it.
pay -- that's a good one, yeah right.
stress-levels -- Huh? can I say high stress from deadlines? Maybe low stress cause most s/w engineers train hard and experience matters, but it's not low stress at all.
other factors -- just read slashdot, lots of other factors.
Mining is like looking at a huge phase diagram. Constanting changing as it's very sensitive to conditions (initial ones at least), which are constantly changing too.
Patterns will be recognized, but to extract useful information other than information about nature (i.e. physical laws) will always be subjective, or in other words, chaotic.
Google will never be 'done' with indexing--just another infinite loop in the making:)
Basically this creates a job security option in the field of hacking, which definitely is not a stable employment environment currently.
Otherwise, the training could be a prelude to the rise of corporate hacking warfare: corporate to corporate hacking. Basically just because you took white hat training doesn't mean you can't use those skills in a black hat environment against other companies. White hat or black hat, the temptation to hack other systems (just not your company's) is great cause hacking is all about experiementation.
JSF with AJAX. He's saying the desktop will be just the evolution of a terminal, aka a WebBrowser. Of course we all know that's marketing...
In the end, I think Java is evolving in non-traditional web apps (aka RoR apps) and into mobile, P2P, multimedia, etc... That's looking at it compared to C/C++.
On the enterprise level, it in a way has become the new COBOL since it's so embedded in a lot of back end apps, it will take good justification and some time to port the same functionality to something like (not flaming) RoR or Python.
Also that WiFi really has a limit of about 6-8 APs. Once you get more than that connections either drop or slow to a crawl. With BT, you can setup a pretty secure piconet for your house and not worry about interferring and sustained speeds. With the scenarios of BT, imagine 15-20 [home] devices hooked up to your WiFi router... with another 5-6 neighbors doing the same, WiFi speeds would suffer. WiFi only makes sense for municipal networks and should stay that way.
It's that lower power, limited connection was a target environment. The goal of the protocol was to support power switching between idle and active states, not a protocol for low powered devices (i.e. think laptops). Not many other protocols were designed for that use case and are hacked solutions (i.e. WiFi).
What's nice is the protocol is already geared for throttling up or down on power, hence bandwidth. That is ideal for a mobile environment/devices.
I'd tell Microsoft to go for it. Crank up the patent suits. Filing a few thousand suits will likely do the following:
expose the mass-fraud in the patent industry as all the patents will be publicly reviewed
expose Microsoft trade secrets, as their propritary IP will need to be reviewed too
cause Microsoft to lose lots of money in laywer fees (as well as the wasteful use of state services, i.e. USPTO)
cause a minor delay in FOSS efforts as OSS developers have nothing to lose and only things to gain
Clean out OSS code bases. Yes, clean out poorly written code, duplicate functionality and inefficient solutions.
Yes, his statement presents some FUD. But the OSS community should call this bluff and turn this FUD into an advantage. If you think about it, outsource companies have been doing what is similar to OSS (their products are called 'knock-offs' and they're virtually being paid nothing) and has benefited everyone over time.
I wonder what versions of Windows these customers are installing on these Linspire boxes.
I've bought a few of these Linspire boxes and they are perfect for Linspire, but for XP pro, they are a bit underpowered (i.e. 256M memory). I've converted 2 so far to XP and reverted since the horsepower wasn't there. Then again my requirements never use 100% of XP's features and need 24/7 uptime.
Short life cycle means the price of the box must come down to 0 eventually (for instance, that's why it's [Free]OSS, the release dates are reasonably quick).
Unless X360 generates a 'must have' attitude of the iPod (hasn't yet), users aren't willing to spend another 300$ on a new box every 3 yrs--considering the games will not be backwards compatible. Apple lost my vote when they switched from firewire to their proprietary connector, which is why I still have my gen 2 iPod from 2 years ago. Also Apple will hit a wall unless they come out with more features as HD space it too cheap and they've already nearing a limit (200GB?). I'm probably going with a Sony walkman phone if I get a new player since it supports more standards (Bluetooth/USB/GSM/MP3/QT).
OSX is successful since their really no bling & stable alternative on the linux side yet.
Also, Hollywood movies try to cater to all audiences at best, it's a compromise. With the new distribution channels today as well as faster communication (i.e. Ads) among people, the smaller studios/independents can create content/movies that you will like cause it was crafted for you and people of similar tastes. And smaller producers can generate the same buzz as the big studios to boot nowadays. It's a fragmentation of the market such that you'll always find a better movie out there with a small producer vs. the big studios. Why, cause those movies were made for a smaller market of tastes (i.e. Michael Moore films), hence people that goto those movies are 99% gonna enjoy it.
The small independents are like high performance or snowe tires, built for a specific purpose. The big studios are like all-season tires: the worst at everything cause they compromise everything to be the best for everyone. Hence the same big studio formula will always work, just that the market share will shift a bit.
I think you hit it on the head. People just can't get off the current comfort level with Office. I mean even with the quirks, the basics of Office just works.
OSS companies need to tell customers the truth that
it's gonna be either the hardway (cold turkey) or easy way (99% copy, then weeined off) to get away from Office. "What would you like?"
Folks, it's either the gov't, companies, or stalkers on myspace, or fanboys of any BBS site, to blog junkies. Exploiting the mechanisms and relationships of your data is a natural trait of computers and computer design: store the state, analyze the behaviors.
Until a trust mechansism is in place or the internet become fragmented, anonymity will continue to become just an illusion, privacy will become something more well defined. Those who own the data, own you. It's not 1984, but something more different.
Slashdot Mirror
Quality paper, the best backup material money can buy. Lasts like 500yrs+.
If anything about our real intellect, global warming can only be possible though the butterfly effect on a grand scale (thousands of years), and guess what, looking at 400 yrs of data is not going to draw any conclusion. And yes, who knows, a warm 'spike' could cause a asteroid to change trajectory towards our planet--so much of worrying about global warming!
Ubuntu -- Looks just like SuSE 10.1 with XGL. Nothing new here...
Geez, is it that humans are the only thing that shouldn't produce electricity to benefit? Walking, using a bicycle-generator, bio-energy from humans could be useful... Then again, being overweight sounds a lot more productive.
As for Vista, with such a closed system and a lack of any support info (unless you have an MSDN subscription and an internet connection too), and finger-pointing attitudes common with device driver vendors and MS, I can see why it took 4 days. From our experiences with Linux, Microsoft MUST fix this issue for all supported hardware or it will be the death of Vista. That's been the only advantage of Win2K (XP to some extent) systems--the nearly 99% of all generic drivers worked.
[To keep the software free,] get ready to dole out all your personal information in the [difficult] registeration process--compared to today.
A majority of folks either have desktops 2Ghz machine. There are plenty of 1Ghz laptops, but not with those video requirements. Then again, most built in video has 64Mb memory (desk/lap). Also, who really has 1GB system memory?--everyone I know has around 512MB (especially laptops). DVDROM? I think most have CDROMs... the list goes on.
In the end, you either are way above the requirements or [i]slightly under[/i]. You either have the bling P4-2Ghz+ $1500 system or laptop already...or there's a 99% chance you'll need to upgrade something (RAM, DVD, Video, HD, or processor).
Apple products are more affordable today than 5 yrs ago.
Sure an 60GB iPod can cost $300, but I can get a mini for $99, my entry costs into the brand are much lower than years ago. Of course, PC's are even lower, but the configuration/admin hassles show a cost difference of what? $50? In the old days that cost was likely $500. Hence, that's $50 becomes worth the price since most gimzo buyers can afford the extra cost nowadays compared to the old days.
Apple success is another typical tech story: being at the right place at the right time, economically. The social, coolness, technical capabilites, business thories, and such are just hype justification that some 'expert' wants to author.
In the end, IMO, Apple's reminds me of Sony, and unless Apple evolves, guess what, in 7 yrs we'll look back have wondered why we bought all these gadgets (i.e. 1G, 2G, Nano, 3G ipods) 'now' sitting in our storage boxes. That's what happnened with the Walkman (i.e. Walkman, AM/FM/Cass Walkman, CD Walkman, ESP Walkman, MP3 Walkman, etc...)--how many power supplies do you have?...
From the looks of this, myspace is really pushing the limits of 'stupid is what stupid does' and that the abuse (i.e.lack of education about usage?) is being exploited and now the other extreme (i.e. the cops) are essentially doing the same thing... to counter that usage.
Unfortunately, this could make the case for tier internet much more compelling.
Really, this looks like a marketing ploy to get [young] people interested again in technology, specifically software, considering college interest has dropped considerably.
As for reality from TFA:
Patterns will be recognized, but to extract useful information other than information about nature (i.e. physical laws) will always be subjective, or in other words, chaotic.
Google will never be 'done' with indexing--just another infinite loop in the making :)
McDonald's & Chaos: I'm lovin it.
Otherwise, the training could be a prelude to the rise of corporate hacking warfare: corporate to corporate hacking. Basically just because you took white hat training doesn't mean you can't use those skills in a black hat environment against other companies. White hat or black hat, the temptation to hack other systems (just not your company's) is great cause hacking is all about experiementation.
JSF with AJAX. He's saying the desktop will be just the evolution of a terminal, aka a WebBrowser. Of course we all know that's marketing...
In the end, I think Java is evolving in non-traditional web apps (aka RoR apps) and into mobile, P2P, multimedia, etc... That's looking at it compared to C/C++.
On the enterprise level, it in a way has become the new COBOL since it's so embedded in a lot of back end apps, it will take good justification and some time to port the same functionality to something like (not flaming) RoR or Python.
Yeah right, tell that to the bottled water industry. I don't see them going out of business anytime soon. Free will? Somewhat illusionary.
I too welcome our UWB-BT overloads.
What's nice is the protocol is already geared for throttling up or down on power, hence bandwidth. That is ideal for a mobile environment/devices.
Yes, his statement presents some FUD. But the OSS community should call this bluff and turn this FUD into an advantage. If you think about it, outsource companies have been doing what is similar to OSS (their products are called 'knock-offs' and they're virtually being paid nothing) and has benefited everyone over time.
I've bought a few of these Linspire boxes and they are perfect for Linspire, but for XP pro, they are a bit underpowered (i.e. 256M memory). I've converted 2 so far to XP and reverted since the horsepower wasn't there. Then again my requirements never use 100% of XP's features and need 24/7 uptime.
OSX is successful since their really no bling & stable alternative on the linux side yet.
This delay has X360 and Sony delay written all over it. Now they can go full force on X360 and HDDVD.
that there's no such thing as anonymity on the internet.
The small independents are like high performance or snowe tires, built for a specific purpose. The big studios are like all-season tires: the worst at everything cause they compromise everything to be the best for everyone. Hence the same big studio formula will always work, just that the market share will shift a bit.
At least MS (Windows ) and Apple (OSX ) got it right. And I mean the cute code name stuff in all Linux distros is starting to get out of hand.
Aside from RedHat, you guys got to admit SuSE has a lot of potential (i.e. OpenSuSE and SuperSuSE specifically).
OSS companies need to tell customers the truth that it's gonna be either the hardway (cold turkey) or easy way (99% copy, then weeined off) to get away from Office. "What would you like?"
Until a trust mechansism is in place or the internet become fragmented, anonymity will continue to become just an illusion, privacy will become something more well defined. Those who own the data, own you. It's not 1984, but something more different.