Well as another poster stated, the performance gains are negligible. On the one hand you can theoretically accomplish some tasks using fewer CPU clock cycles by taking advantage of wider, richer 64-bit instructions compared to 32-bit instructions. Countering this is the fact that overall code size is increased, meaning it takes longer to load from disk, puts more pressure on the memory manager (more page faults), requires bigger caches, etc. There may be some applications or classes of applications that do see an increase in performance, while some others see no increase or even a decrease. It's a wash.
HOWEVER, let me tell you the one big problem that 64-bit solves: access to huge amounts of memory. A 32-bit app has, well, 32-bit pointers, which can only theoretically address 4GB of virtual memory. In practice, the address space of a Win32 app is only 2GB, with the upper 2GB reserved for kernel addresses. (You can actually adjust this to a 3GB for apps and 1GB for the kernel using the/3GB boot option, but still this only buys you a bit of extra room.) Enter 64-bit apps, which using 64-bit pointers can now address a huge amount of virtual memory. Now, Windows still probably reserves some upper range for kernel addresses (I'm too lazy to do a web search for the specifics), but assuming a 50/50 app/kernel split, that's 2^63 bits of virtual address space for each app. Already, some big server apps (e.g. databases) easily demand more than 2GB of memory. We are NOT FAR from the point where some of the more demanding desktop apps, perhaps photo editing or games, will be able to reasonably use more than 2GB of memory. This is what will drive desktop adoption of 64-bit OSes.
*I* know where an Earth-sized planet is. The suspense is killing me, but I'm not tellin'. I'm just going to let everybody wrack their brains for a while. Seriously, you're all going to kick yourselves when you find out... *chuckle*
This isn't very difficult to understand. This is going to benefit users of OO.o, by giving them support for a file format that they don't currently have support for. You don't have hordes of people complaining of lack of support for OpenXML right now, because it's a new format just coming out with Office 2007. However, OpenXML files (files with.docx extension) are going to start appearing as Office 2007 adoption grows, and OO.o users are going to want to be able to read those documents, don't you think? As for.doc versions.docx, keep in mind that both formats were created by Microsoft, however.docx has some technical advantages and also it's been published as an open standard, whereas.doc remains proprietary. Therefore, supporting OpenXML seems like a no-brainer, and I would think the open source community would be wholeheartedly in favour of it.
95 on a 386 is nothing. For a while, I ran NT 4.0 on a 386/33 with 8MB of RAM. It's probably surprising to some people that it would run at all on this configuration. Well, it did. It wasn't a barn-burner, but I wasn't tearing my hair out either.
Pac-Man, because of its sheer iconic status. There were games before Pac-Man, and games after Pac-Man. But anyone can look at any game and immediately be able to say with certainty which group it belongs in. No other game of its time can say that.
There were games before Duke Nukem Forever, and there will be games after Duke Nukem Forever. Anyone can look at any game and immediately be able to tell with certainty which group it belongs in.
Um, hello, that very link that you provided showed that the cheapest *standalone* version of Vista is $259 Cdn; however the cheapest *upgrade* version will be $129 Cdn. And the American prices will be $199 and $99 respectively (no, you can't just apply a monetary conversion to guess what the American prices will be; Canadians always get gauged for a little more, after the conversion). These $199 and $99 prices are identical to the corresponding XP Upgrades (XP Pro and XP Home, respectively), and that $99 upgrade price for Vista Home Basic is in fact less than the $120 upgrade price that Apple charges. For that $99, you will also get a lot more new features than Apple gives you. Vista is a massive upgrade from XP, and even more massive from earlier Windows.
There are several useless keys that could be removed; print screen, and pause and the other two "lock" keys: scroll lock and num lock.
How are these keys useless? Sure, not every application makes use of them, but not every application makes use of the F11 key or the } key either. But there are uses. It's different for different systems, but let's just take Windows for example. PrintScrn is used all the time for taking screen shots. How do you do this? Well, Alt-PrintScrn copies an image of the active window to the clipboard; you can then paste this into MS Paint. Ctrl-PrintScrn functions similarly but for the entire screen. Pause is used to *gasp* pause scrolling output in your console window (try dir/s C:\ as an experiment). Window-Pause is a little known shortcut key for opening up the system properties dialog (the same as if you right-click My Computer and choose properties from the context menu). NumLock is self-explanatory, very useful when inputting lots of numbers into a spreadsheet for example. And Scroll Lock is used in Excel to *gasp* lock scrolling! That is to say, when scroll lock is turned on and you use the up and down arrow keys, it does not move the cursor but rather scrolls the window, much like using the mouse's scroll wheel.
The above are just examples. Apps can take advantage of these keys in any way that they want. Since the keys are accepted as standard and have been around for so long, you can't very well just remove them now without breaking lots of apps. I you don't use the keys, then well, don't use the keys! Pry them off of your keyboard if the offend you.
And Opera alows you to zoom html pages scaling everything including images and fonts. Great feature because the layout never breaks (unlike IE and Firefox).
IE7 also has this sort of scaling. It's sweet. I'm not sure if it's only in the Vista version of IE7; I would think it's in all versions.
Are you a frigging idiot, or a troll? If you really work at Microsoft, you're making us look bad. (Yes, I work at Microsoft too.)
Don't run command.com. Ever. Run cmd.exe instead. Then your arrow keys, F3, tab, etc. will suddenly start working, and so will cd "Program Files". You can also just say cd Program Files.
We have not declared RC1 yet. The newer builds says RC1, yes, but then the older builds for the past couple of months all said Beta 2. There's only one official Beta 2, and there will be only one official RC1. We aren't there yet.
What string theory really has going for it is the fact that it shares the same initials as Star Trek. We might be able to use it to explain the physics behind photon torpedoes, warp drive, transporter beams, and holodecks! I know, this is ambitious. If the current cast of string theorists can't accomplish this task, maybe the next generation will.
> Okay, I am getting tired of these delays.
This is NOT a delay. This is Gartner predicting, out of thin air, that there will be a delay. Vista is large, yes, but so was 2003, XP, 2000... That's not in and of itself a good reason to predict another delay. I'm pretty sure Microsoft knows that the product is large, and still they announced publicly (for the very first time) an official RTM date in October 2006. The current builds are quite stable.
Once Ada came along everyone abandoned C as too obtuse for embedded work for the DOD.
Point of clarification: Ada predates C. Your group may have switched to Ada at one point in the 80s, but Ada was very old by then.
DoD used Ada for some things over C because they perceived (correctly) that Ada was a safer language. For instance, it is impossible to have a dangling pointer in Ada. It is also impossible for variables to take on values outside of bounds that you specify.
... plans are afoot for Microsoft to co-opt RSS and rename it "web feeds"
Give me a break. That's like saying that they've co-opted HTML and renamed it "web pages". It doesn't often make sense to refer to features by their underlying protocols / file formats. I suppose you SMTP your friends rather than e-mailing them?
This especially makes sense here, since web feeds will not only use RSS but also Atom.
I've been waiting a looooong time for a PC capable of handling completely silent media. I guess until now we have not had the necessary technology. These are exciting times! Charlie Chaplin would be amazed if he were alive today.
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HOWEVER, let me tell you the one big problem that 64-bit solves: access to huge amounts of memory. A 32-bit app has, well, 32-bit pointers, which can only theoretically address 4GB of virtual memory. In practice, the address space of a Win32 app is only 2GB, with the upper 2GB reserved for kernel addresses. (You can actually adjust this to a 3GB for apps and 1GB for the kernel using the
*I* know where an Earth-sized planet is. The suspense is killing me, but I'm not tellin'. I'm just going to let everybody wrack their brains for a while. Seriously, you're all going to kick yourselves when you find out... *chuckle*
What makes this worthy of posting? Now if they used nothing newer than WinNT, that would be more interesting.
This isn't very difficult to understand. This is going to benefit users of OO.o, by giving them support for a file format that they don't currently have support for. You don't have hordes of people complaining of lack of support for OpenXML right now, because it's a new format just coming out with Office 2007. However, OpenXML files (files with .docx extension) are going to start appearing as Office 2007 adoption grows, and OO.o users are going to want to be able to read those documents, don't you think? As for .doc versions .docx, keep in mind that both formats were created by Microsoft, however .docx has some technical advantages and also it's been published as an open standard, whereas .doc remains proprietary. Therefore, supporting OpenXML seems like a no-brainer, and I would think the open source community would be wholeheartedly in favour of it.
95 on a 386 is nothing. For a while, I ran NT 4.0 on a 386/33 with 8MB of RAM. It's probably surprising to some people that it would run at all on this configuration. Well, it did. It wasn't a barn-burner, but I wasn't tearing my hair out either.
There were games before Duke Nukem Forever, and there will be games after Duke Nukem Forever. Anyone can look at any game and immediately be able to tell with certainty which group it belongs in.
Um, hello, that very link that you provided showed that the cheapest *standalone* version of Vista is $259 Cdn; however the cheapest *upgrade* version will be $129 Cdn. And the American prices will be $199 and $99 respectively (no, you can't just apply a monetary conversion to guess what the American prices will be; Canadians always get gauged for a little more, after the conversion). These $199 and $99 prices are identical to the corresponding XP Upgrades (XP Pro and XP Home, respectively), and that $99 upgrade price for Vista Home Basic is in fact less than the $120 upgrade price that Apple charges. For that $99, you will also get a lot more new features than Apple gives you. Vista is a massive upgrade from XP, and even more massive from earlier Windows.
There are several useless keys that could be removed; print screen, and pause and the other two "lock" keys: scroll lock and num lock.
/s C:\ as an experiment). Window-Pause is a little known shortcut key for opening up the system properties dialog (the same as if you right-click My Computer and choose properties from the context menu). NumLock is self-explanatory, very useful when inputting lots of numbers into a spreadsheet for example. And Scroll Lock is used in Excel to *gasp* lock scrolling! That is to say, when scroll lock is turned on and you use the up and down arrow keys, it does not move the cursor but rather scrolls the window, much like using the mouse's scroll wheel.
How are these keys useless? Sure, not every application makes use of them, but not every application makes use of the F11 key or the } key either. But there are uses. It's different for different systems, but let's just take Windows for example. PrintScrn is used all the time for taking screen shots. How do you do this? Well, Alt-PrintScrn copies an image of the active window to the clipboard; you can then paste this into MS Paint. Ctrl-PrintScrn functions similarly but for the entire screen. Pause is used to *gasp* pause scrolling output in your console window (try dir
The above are just examples. Apps can take advantage of these keys in any way that they want. Since the keys are accepted as standard and have been around for so long, you can't very well just remove them now without breaking lots of apps. I you don't use the keys, then well, don't use the keys! Pry them off of your keyboard if the offend you.
IE7 also has this sort of scaling. It's sweet. I'm not sure if it's only in the Vista version of IE7; I would think it's in all versions.
Well, that doesn't exactly narrow it down. Most companies are competitors of ours. Just be aware: We're going to fucking kill (your company)!!! :)
Are you a frigging idiot, or a troll? If you really work at Microsoft, you're making us look bad. (Yes, I work at Microsoft too.) Don't run command.com. Ever. Run cmd.exe instead. Then your arrow keys, F3, tab, etc. will suddenly start working, and so will cd "Program Files". You can also just say cd Program Files. We have not declared RC1 yet. The newer builds says RC1, yes, but then the older builds for the past couple of months all said Beta 2. There's only one official Beta 2, and there will be only one official RC1. We aren't there yet.
Will this be sufficient to run Duke Nukem Forever?
What string theory really has going for it is the fact that it shares the same initials as Star Trek. We might be able to use it to explain the physics behind photon torpedoes, warp drive, transporter beams, and holodecks! I know, this is ambitious. If the current cast of string theorists can't accomplish this task, maybe the next generation will.
Does this mean even cheaper macs are forthcoming?
No, it means that even larger Mac profit margins are forthcoming.
Mod parent up!
You're new to this planet, aren't you?
You missed his sarcasm, didn't you? It was a joke.
I'm impressed. He sold two copies of the PC version as well as one copy of the 286/386 version.
> Okay, I am getting tired of these delays. This is NOT a delay. This is Gartner predicting, out of thin air, that there will be a delay. Vista is large, yes, but so was 2003, XP, 2000... That's not in and of itself a good reason to predict another delay. I'm pretty sure Microsoft knows that the product is large, and still they announced publicly (for the very first time) an official RTM date in October 2006. The current builds are quite stable.
FFS, somebody mod the parent up! You have no idea how funny this post is unless you've been there yourself.
Once Ada came along everyone abandoned C as too obtuse for embedded work for the DOD. Point of clarification: Ada predates C. Your group may have switched to Ada at one point in the 80s, but Ada was very old by then. DoD used Ada for some things over C because they perceived (correctly) that Ada was a safer language. For instance, it is impossible to have a dangling pointer in Ada. It is also impossible for variables to take on values outside of bounds that you specify.
Give me a break. That's like saying that they've co-opted HTML and renamed it "web pages". It doesn't often make sense to refer to features by their underlying protocols / file formats. I suppose you SMTP your friends rather than e-mailing them?
This especially makes sense here, since web feeds will not only use RSS but also Atom.
Longhorn won't ship for some time, but that doesn't have much relevance. IE 7 will ship by year's end.
Familiar to what? Your analogy and/or joke is not at all obvious, at least to me.
I've been waiting a looooong time for a PC capable of handling completely silent media. I guess until now we have not had the necessary technology. These are exciting times! Charlie Chaplin would be amazed if he were alive today.
What the heck is an RPL calculator? Do you mean RPN?