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User: Steveftoth

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  1. Java and the operator overloading.. on What I Hate About Your Programming Language · · Score: 2, Insightful

    He complains that the Java philosophy says 'Operator Overloading is bad,' and still overloads strings. However I think that its the wrong way to look at the concept of operator overloading. Because adding operator overloading to a language is like giving the programmer the ability to change and mutate the language to her desires. In other words, giving a programmer the ability to overload operators, gives them the ability to create their own subset of a language. Similar to macros, operator overloading adds a whole new layer of complexity to what was supposed to be a simpler, easier to understand way of programming.

  2. Don't sounds like a big fanboy to me on AMD Athlon XP 3200+ Released · · Score: 1

    if you're willing to switch sides if intel had the better price/performance ratio and faster chips overall. A real fanboy would stick with AMD chips even if they got half the frames on Doom 3 and blamed it on Carmack optimizing for intel instead of 3-d now! ;)

    I agree with you but real fanboys stick with their horse long after it has lost the race. Just look at anyone in the Apple camp who says the Altivec is the bomb.

  3. Translation on Microsoft Bites Apple, Apple Bites Back · · Score: 1

    [Quote]
    Microsoft executives declined to take the bait. "We only showed glimpses of the future of Longhorn," said a Microsoft spokesman. "Wait until the fall when we'll go into more detail at the Professional Developers Conference."
    [/Quote]

    Translation.
    Apple is going to show off Panther in June and the Apple Developers Conference. We need time to copy them, it should be ready in the fall.

  4. Point Releases.... on Microsoft Bites Apple, Apple Bites Back · · Score: 1

    So you're saying that Windows XP is not just a point release of Windows 2k?

    Well if you go by name then it's not, but really it is. Most win2k drivers work in XP and also most XP drivers work in 2k.

    Really all they did was add a few graphical enhancements and improve DirectX speed. It's still the same thing. It's about the same with 10.1 to 10.2 in OSX land.

  5. Re:The heart of the debate? on Xbox Hacking Book Prepares to Fly Off Shelves · · Score: 1

    Ummmm...

    Those are all PC games, dude. I was talking about Console games. You know, PS2, GC, X-Box.

    PCs are cheap so of course everyone can have their own box. And no, not every programmer needs their own private console testing box. You can easily have a test bed of boxes for testing. Or just one. There are emulation enviroments if you can't just test your code. Say for the PS2's EE code since you have to write assembly to get the most performance out of it.

  6. Re:The heart of the debate? on Xbox Hacking Book Prepares to Fly Off Shelves · · Score: 1

    What the hell are you talking about? How big is your game that you need ten dev systems? I mean at most you only need one per programmer and one for the art group. Even that might be overkill as probably you only need two at most for the programmers.

    Maybe I'm just not reading the credits right ,but it seems that MOST games don't have a team of ten programmers. Most games have like ten artists or more, but they don't spend all day modeling their stuff on PS2s (or xboxes or GCs). They work on normal computers, PC, Mac or whatever. Usually, the dev team writes special tools that take their art and turn it into art for the game.

    Regardless, everyone on the team doesn't need their own dev box.

  7. Re:The heart of the debate? on Xbox Hacking Book Prepares to Fly Off Shelves · · Score: 1

    The reasons that Sega lost the console market are long and debatable, but it is sure that they lost not because of the red ink from console sales. Rather they lost because of Sony's Hype machine of the PS2, too many revolutionary game projects that didn't sell as well as they should (Shemune anyone?).

    BTW, who makes money fron SDKs? They are wicked cheap, and generally are probably sold at cost to the developers. Don't forget that with a SDK you also get a ton of supported library code that comes with it. It's only like 20 grand or so. That's nothing compared to the millions they stand to make from even one AAA quality title.

  8. Re:Waiting for PPC 970 on Build Your Own Mac With CoreCrib Kit · · Score: 1

    ADC does more then that.

    The Apple Display Connector for the flat panels provides signal, power and USB to the monitor. The monitor then has a USB hub in it to plug your usb keyboard and mouse into, or just keyboard then you plug the mouse into the keyboard. So one cable to monitor. instead of 2 for the monitor, and 1 each for mouse and keyboard.

    That said, I do wish that all usb keyboards had hubs in them as many times the keyboards I like for form factor, do not have USB ports in them.

  9. Apple HW still runs linux. on Microsoft's Athens PC · · Score: 2, Informative

    Or whatever you want on it. You can easily take any recent mac and install Linux on it. Why don't most people? Probably cause the default OS is better.

    x86 wouldn't cease to exist, but without Microsoft producing windows for it the market will shrink.

    What's the difference between a X-Box and a PC? Custom bootloaders, strange BIOS?

  10. Just had to look it up. on Preliminary OS X & PPC 970 Benchmarks · · Score: 2, Informative

    I went and looked it up because I was not 100% sure.


    Power point presentation
    This power point presentation in pdf form shows on page 10 that yes there are seperate 32-bit modes. It also explains the 'basic' differences.


    DeveloperWorks page


    This article explains in fairly basic manner the difference between 32 and 64 bit assembly under linux and from this you can derive that there are 2 seperate modes for the PPC 970 64-bit implementation. Also if you go and look at the PPC 64-bit ABI document at the bottom of the page you'll realize that the 64-bit mode cannot run 32-bit code.

    Note that all the length of all instructions, regardless of mode (32,64) is always 32-bit. So just because you're running in 64-bit mode doesn't mean that all your instructions are twice as long (contrary to popular opinion). Just that all your addresses are twice as long.

    Anyway, I don't want to come off as a PITA. But it bugs me that people don't understand the difference between 64 and 32 bit computing and really there isn't much difference at all in many cases.

  11. Re:Sad... on Preliminary OS X & PPC 970 Benchmarks · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They're not running in 64-bit mode.

    The 970 runs 32-bit PPC code and 64-bit PPC code. Only the kernel has to support the 64-bit mode and switching back and forth for the individual applications.

    However, these benchmarks still might be fake. It's hard to tell since I can't even download the article.

  12. Re:How is it not a parody of Shortcake? on Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings Revisited · · Score: 1

    I agree with what you are saying, but not everyone says 'I would like a strawberry shortcake' when reffering to dolls for little girls. I would say that MORE people refer to action figures as G.I. Joes. I remember playing G.I. joes as a kid and actually we play with transformers or whatever toy we had at the time.

    Xerox and Coke, and whomever else can't force people to stop saying that, but if you were to start making anti-coke ads that replicated their logo it would be a violation of trademark and possiably copyright. They could sue you. Notice that whenever you see a parody of coke in movies, video games, comics, it's always called something.
    I think Duke Nukem called it Choak or something like that.

  13. Re:How is it not a parody of Shortcake? on Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings Revisited · · Score: 2, Insightful

    (Quote)
    Referencing these characters shouldn't be trademark infringement.
    (end Quote)
    So basically you want to do away with trademark and copyrights huh? That's what you are saying. As the whole point of Trademarks and Copyright is control. Control over how a name is used in society. Control over how a name is presented, good or bad, black or white.

    Strawberry shortcake, GI Joe, etc.. are not part of the american lexicon, they are a small part of pop culture.

  14. Re:Opposite feeling on Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings Revisited · · Score: 1, Flamebait

    Maybe because "Pizza the Hut" is not the the same as "Pizza Hut"??? Maybe also because Mel Brooks got the permission of Pepsi before making the movie? Unlike Penny Arcade, who think that they can just go ahead and make a comic with anything in it without worrying about copyright or trademark infringment, A big movie studio has lawyers who's job it is to clear these things up.

  15. Re:Who was the target? on Penny Arcade vs. American Greetings Revisited · · Score: 1

    How again did they make fun of strawberry shortcake?
    I liked the comic, but after hearing about the C&D letter, I have to agree with AG.

  16. iPod iPod iPod on Apple Introduces iTunes Music Store, iTunes 4, new iPod · · Score: 1

    Now they have Solitaire, semi-pda applications, and a dock in the iPod. That is the mp3 player to get. Amazingly it's also smaller then the old one.

    Now the semi-pda apps, are neat but no replacement for a REAL pda if you need that. All it has is a simple calendar, phone book, and text notes. (sarcasm on)And an alarm oooooo wow, alarm!(end sarcasm)

    Though you can make playlists on the fly which is nice. Though probably very slow. Do they have smart playlists for the iPod?

    The only bad thing is that the USB 2.0 cable will not be out until June, you have to buy a special (not included) cable to use USB.

    Time to start saving those pennys. mmmmm iPod

  17. Re:If they wont let you fix it... on Calling Software Reliability Into Question · · Score: 2, Interesting

    no, but you could at least get a second opinion from a better educated source.

    Right now, with CSS (Closed Source Software) all you have is second opinions based on ancidotial evidence. The evidence that software X will work for you is only as good as what other people have done with it. At least with OSS, you can pay an expert to help you get an educated second opinion, and see if the software can work for you.

    OSS is not the solution to the problem but rather it can help you decide if software can work for you. And probably for the general case, most people can trust the MS verdict on what their software can and can not do. But if you are doing something strange and experimental with say MSSQL, you can't rely on what they say. In that case it might be a better choice to use an OSS product that you can see the source and have a better indicator for predicting what the software will do.

  18. Re:This is a manufactured problem on Analysis of Netflix's DVD Allocation System · · Score: 1

    Hollywood video still gives it to you if they don't have it in, glad that I go there.

    Divx had other problems like the fact that you had to call in to the servers. They could monitor your movie viewing habits. Also the real kicker about Divx was that if you bought a movie that you 'rented' paying 20 dollars or whatever they cost, you could then only play it on the machine that you bought it on. So say that you've got 2 machines in the same house, you couldn't play the same disc on both machines.

    Also you could hack divx which didn't make the studios want to release as many movies in that format.

    I don't know if a degradable DVD format that stopped working after a week would work, but it would be interesting. It would probably result in many people freezing their rented DVDs when not using them. So the discs would last longer!

  19. Re:This is a manufactured problem on Analysis of Netflix's DVD Allocation System · · Score: 1

    But think about how much different the experience would be for a blockbuster that burned all it's movies.

    Ok, first of all the store would be tiny compared to the size they are now. Since you don't need to have a huge inventory of movies sitting around, just the movies that you want to promote with shelf space.

    Since all movies are burned on demand, you never have to give people free rentals because it's not in stock.

    A customer never has to worry about a rental being checked out.

    This also means that when they open a new store a customer doesn't have to wait for the store to aquire an inventory of old movies to view, they can just get what they want.

    Of course the only way I can see this being an option, is if someone were to invent a burnable dvd that degraded after 48 hours or whatever length of time. That way you'd never even have to return the DVD which would make inventory mangement much easier.

  20. Re:The question I can't find an answer to anywhere on Mac OS X 'Panther': User at the Center · · Score: 2, Interesting

    You are basically subscribing to it. Just they don't take your money every month.
    Why can't people just save their money instead of blowing it on every DVD that comes out?
    How about I offer a subscription and you pay me $10 a month, then 18 months later when they release the new OS for a hundred (or 129 like they did last time), I'll buy you a copy and ship it to you.

  21. Re:Nintendo has been a pioneer in the field on Genderplay in Videogames · · Score: 1

    Also thinking about it, I know there was a strawberry shortcake video game for the 2600. So I know that the 2600 had female lead characters. Even if you couldn't tell they were female other then because they were a pinkish color. ;) But I would say that Samus was the first female character of real strength.

  22. I know that it doesn't beat it... on Genderplay in Videogames · · Score: 1

    but Phantasy Star for the Sega Master System was released in 1998 and the main character was a Girl. Alis. If you've never played Phantasy Star. It is without a doubt the best RPG for any 8-bit system.

    She was another of the 'strong' woman types that people should look to when talking about the influence of women gaming.

  23. Lack of acquisition is bad.... on Corporations Suffer Microsoft Activation Bug · · Score: 1

    at least if you're a salesman or a purchasing agent. If everyone used open source, then why would you need so many salesmen to push product? I mean yeah, there are apache salesmen, but the people selling apache are also the people writing the code and deploying the websites. I doubt there are as many people selling apache full time as MS has pushing IIS.

    And if you don't have to buy licenses then why to you need a guy to handle that? In a small company you always need at least one requisition manager, but in a large company, not having to have as many people to do that job is a big plus. :)

    OSS is scary to people because it changes so many parts of the business in ways that are non-obvious.

  24. Re:Graphics Engines on Carmack On Doom III And The Evolution Of Graphics · · Score: 1

    AI is when you do something, what the computer does back, like in Zelda when you try to attack a baddie, does the baddie try to defend by blocking, moving or attacking back?

    Most FPSes have 'really good AI' because the AI can, shoot accurately, and run the circuits around the map, and dodge bullets/attacks. The more advanced AI even knows when to run away of they are losing the fight. However most FPSes also have a small map to work with. Quake 3 doesn't have miles and miles of map to work with.

  25. Re:Graphics Engines on Carmack On Doom III And The Evolution Of Graphics · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I think that we've already reached that point. I mean quake III is more then enough to build a killer game. The real problem is the lack of good AI engines. That allow you to build interactive worlds of beings who behave to a certain set of rules.

    How do you build AI? I don't know but there has to be a better way then the current way we have now. Most games don't have good AI.

    For example, look at Zelda:WW, one of the coolest games out this year. Very good graphics, good art, good design. Very fun game. But the AI is so limited. All the townspeople walk pre-set paths. The baddies walk preset paths and are triggered dumbly. Pathing is bad, but hidden by the fact that the baddies only appear in limited areas. Most areas to fight in are large open arenas. Not closed areas with lots of corners and walls. The few fights that are in closed areas you end up fighting bats and other flying creatures.

    Ok I could go on, but I hope you get my point. This game is a AAA quality title, most games are no where near the quality of this game. Yet the AI is bad. You could counter this example with another, but if you were to take this argument to it's end I think that you woudl find that the number of games with good AI is miniscule compared to the games with bad AI. Which is why online gaming is so popular. It's the only place where you can get good competition that doesn't suck.