The problem that I saw with all the linux hardware vendors, is that they failed to take advantage of Linux' primary competitive advantage over Windows: Cost.
every vendor I looked at (VA, Penguin etc..) tried to break in to the market with high end preconfigured with everything under the sun systems.
what they should have done, is build bottom of the market systems aimed at newbies, with the cheapest possible hardware spec (think packard bell, or compaq presario) and load them up with a cleanly configured kde or gnome desktop,
but - dont put EVERY PIECE OF FREE SOFTWARE IN THE WORLD (tm) on them, but instead cherry-pick, put the best e-mail (but only one) the best browser (but only one) the best office suite (but only one) etc etc, and have them configured properly.
then sell this machine, equivalent in hw & sw to a presario with xp, office, a games pack and an applications bundle, and visualStudio FOR A LOT LESS THAN THE EQUIVALENT MICROSOFT LOADED COMPUTER.
selling high end pre-configured linux boxes is not the way to go, because the people who want one of those, would rather build their own.
it's not about legislation, it's about the anti-trust case. if the case were still being pressed, MS wouldn't be able to push this shit down customers throats.
bush made it clear during his campaign that he would stop/hinder/castrate the prosecution if elected.
this installment of the us govt clearly values the rights of corporations and government agencies above the rights of CITIZENS.
fuck off. my sister's husband was on flight 11. my niece and nephew don't have a daddy anymore. my sister doesn't have a husband anymore. his parents don't have a son, my parents dont have a son in law.
the very first words out of the dubya's mouth after the attacks were "WE WILL HAVE REVENGE!!". this from a man claiming to be a devout born again christian. I guess the whole "vengeance is mine sayeth the lord" business doesn't apply to him because he is george fuckin bush.
I am not suggesting originating missions on earth, stopping for lunch on the moon then hopping off to mars.
I am suggesting that missions start from scratch from the moon using things like linear accelerators ( fuel stays behind, you only have to launch the payload, no aerodynamic drag and 1/6th earths gravity well )
sure it will take time and money to set up a true moon colony (not a hotel for astronauts but a true living facility, complete with hydroponics, solar power generation and manufacturing facilities)
but if we had gone on straight to that after Apollo 16 instead of 30 years of thumb sitting, we would be there by now.
besides, if we cant put together a base on the moon, what could possibly make anyone think we could do it on mars?
we need a moon base. in the words of hienlein (I think), "once you are on the moon, you are halfway to anywhere"
I was born in 1967, by the time I was in kindergarten, we had been to the moon several times. by the time I was 10, we had driven dune buggies on the moon. now, 23 years later, we have sat around with our thumbs you know where, and we think Skylab++ is an amazing achievement, while we underfund or dont even try to fund the cool stuff which could lead to a truly spacefaring humanity.
look at the launchers that have been cancelled or delayed just in the last 5 years:
delta clipper (dc-x) (cancelled)
x-33 (delayed)
rotary rocket (died for lack of funding)
kistler k-1 (delayed - please don't kill it)
Beal BA-2 (killed by a concerted effort by 2 governments and enviro-weenies)
blackhorse (rocketplane) (lack of funding)
kellyspace (lack of funding)
most of these programs required no more than $100M to survive, but couldn't get even that, at a time when our gov't spends that much every day dropping bombs on empty "terrorist training camps".
are you pissed yet? you should be living on the moon by now.
I believe billG/Micro$oft contributed on the order of $650,000 each to both bush and gore.
All governments are for sale, it is just disturbing how cheap they are....
for a measely $50K you can have your very own pet congressman, about $200K for a senator and for the low low price of $500k, your very own president.
by the way, these prices are good only for one issue. they also do not guarantee that you have exclusive ownership, it's more like the fractional ownership of business jets that has become so popular recently.
if you have more than one issue, or desire exclusive ownership, volume discounts can be negotiated....
my company has several g4 systems an order of magnitude more powerful (320 CPUs) both in house for testing and in customers hands. and they only eat up 9u in a 19" rack.
and as far as ppc architecture clusters go, just about any IBM RS-6000-SP2 system is more powerful, and probably takes up less space too.
This may seem like you're only doubling the speed, but due to the way binary works, you're adding 2^10 number of bits can be passed.
um, no. you are multiplying by 2^10 the number of bits that can be addressed, but are only doubling the number of bits that can be passed in any given period of time.
a book is a thing, made by someone and sold, when new, at a profit.
a house is a thing, made by someone and sold, when new, at a profit.
are the IP rights of an author greater than the IP rights of a carpenter? how about those of a really good carpenter, who makes chairs that could be considered art? how about and artist (say rembrandt) do they get a comission on resale of their work? HELL NO! so whay should an author, or publishing house, or software company? what makes their product so freaking special that they should have control over what they have SOLD for FAIR COMPENSATION and KNOWING THAT IT COULD BE RESOLD WHEN THEY SOLD IT THE FIRST TIME??????
the right to re-sell a used book has been enshrined in law almost as long as there has been copyright law.
it doesn't matter if the book is 1 minute or 1000 years old.
the prominence given to used listing is, and should be, entirely up to the vendor of said used book.
this is not an open source principle, it is a property rights issue.
tell you what, next time you go to sell your house, let's list yours at the bottom of the page, because the builders of new houses have a right to make money, while you are just abusing the rights of the guy who built your house by selling it again after he sold it to you.
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The problem that I saw with all the linux hardware vendors, is that they failed to take advantage of Linux' primary competitive advantage over Windows: Cost.
every vendor I looked at (VA, Penguin etc..) tried to break in to the market with high end preconfigured with everything under the sun systems.
what they should have done, is build bottom of the market systems aimed at newbies, with the cheapest possible hardware spec (think packard bell, or compaq presario) and load them up with a cleanly configured kde or gnome desktop,
but - dont put EVERY PIECE OF FREE SOFTWARE IN THE WORLD (tm) on them, but instead cherry-pick, put the best e-mail (but only one) the best browser (but only one) the best office suite (but only one) etc etc, and have them configured properly.
then sell this machine, equivalent in hw & sw to a presario with xp, office, a games pack and an applications bundle, and visualStudio FOR A LOT LESS THAN THE EQUIVALENT MICROSOFT LOADED COMPUTER.
selling high end pre-configured linux boxes is not the way to go, because the people who want one of those, would rather build their own.
try $1500 for a g3/500/512mb node
and $1500 for the case
so for $4500 you get 2 count 'em 2 g3 nodes (no altivec)
$2k for the g4 node (same speed & mem)
so for an 8 node cluster, you are looking at $17,500
makes the rocketcalc machine look like a bargain, no?
(ok, ok, the briq is better engineered, but still...)
it's not about legislation, it's about the anti-trust case. if the case were still being pressed, MS wouldn't be able to push this shit down customers throats.
bush made it clear during his campaign that he would stop/hinder/castrate the prosecution if elected.
this installment of the us govt clearly values the rights of corporations and government agencies above the rights of CITIZENS.
seriously. they (and other large companies) bought the government that they wanted, and now are proceeding with their agenda.
fuck off. my sister's husband was on flight 11. my niece and nephew don't have a daddy anymore. my sister doesn't have a husband anymore. his parents don't have a son, my parents dont have a son in law.
the very first words out of the dubya's mouth after the attacks were "WE WILL HAVE REVENGE!!". this from a man claiming to be a devout born again christian. I guess the whole "vengeance is mine sayeth the lord" business doesn't apply to him because he is george fuckin bush.
so I say again:
[RANT]
the last thing we need is a slowr cash machine with pretty colors.
my bank just replaced all their old, green screen, keypad operated cash machines with new, color touch screen cash machines.
guess what. it takes twice as long to get cash from the new machine.
guess what. visually impaired people can't use the new machines, because there is no brail facility.
sure they are pretty.
I don't want pretty in a cash machine, I WANT CASH!
I don't want slow in a cash machine, I WANT FAST!
now, on top of slow color touchscreens, they are going to add winXP???
it will take 3 days and an air conditioned 8Ghz pentium4 to get my $20, when 30 seconds and a z80 used to be sufficient.
[/RANT]
through the miracle of compound interest, a man in a long coma wakes to find he owns the world.
check out Mercury Computer Systems
one of the co-designers of RapidIO, they make ppc shared memory multicomputers which will use RapidIO in the future.
think 320 PPC nodes, 256MB RAM each, the whole thing in one 9u 19" rack mount chassis, running on standard power with no special cooling requirements.
you get what you pay for.
um no.
I am not suggesting originating missions on earth, stopping for lunch on the moon then hopping off to mars.
I am suggesting that missions start from scratch from the moon using things like linear accelerators ( fuel stays behind, you only have to launch the payload, no aerodynamic drag and 1/6th earths gravity well )
sure it will take time and money to set up a true moon colony (not a hotel for astronauts but a true living facility, complete with hydroponics, solar power generation and manufacturing facilities)
but if we had gone on straight to that after Apollo 16 instead of 30 years of thumb sitting, we would be there by now.
besides, if we cant put together a base on the moon, what could possibly make anyone think we could do it on mars?
well never do it on mars..
i've said it before but...
[RANT]
we need a moon base. in the words of hienlein (I think), "once you are on the moon, you are halfway to anywhere"
I was born in 1967, by the time I was in kindergarten, we had been to the moon several times. by the time I was 10, we had driven dune buggies on the moon. now, 23 years later, we have sat around with our thumbs you know where, and we think Skylab++ is an amazing achievement, while we underfund or dont even try to fund the cool stuff which could lead to a truly spacefaring humanity.
look at the launchers that have been cancelled or delayed just in the last 5 years:
delta clipper (dc-x) (cancelled)
x-33 (delayed)
rotary rocket (died for lack of funding)
kistler k-1 (delayed - please don't kill it)
Beal BA-2 (killed by a concerted effort by 2 governments and enviro-weenies)
blackhorse (rocketplane) (lack of funding)
kellyspace (lack of funding)
most of these programs required no more than $100M to survive, but couldn't get even that, at a time when our gov't spends that much every day dropping bombs on empty "terrorist training camps".
are you pissed yet? you should be living on the moon by now.
[/RANT]
that's no reason to think he is scheming...
which is what they will say when you ask for better service....
I believe billG/Micro$oft contributed on the order of $650,000 each to both bush and gore.
All governments are for sale, it is just disturbing how cheap they are....
for a measely $50K you can have your very own pet congressman, about $200K for a senator and for the low low price of $500k, your very own president.
by the way, these prices are good only for one issue. they also do not guarantee that you have exclusive ownership, it's more like the fractional ownership of business jets that has become so popular recently.
if you have more than one issue, or desire exclusive ownership, volume discounts can be negotiated....
i mean really!
my company has several g4 systems an order of magnitude more powerful (320 CPUs) both in house for testing and in customers hands. and they only eat up 9u in a 19" rack.
and as far as ppc architecture clusters go, just about any IBM RS-6000-SP2 system is more powerful, and probably takes up less space too.
X-34 looks like a cross between a pegasus and the shuttle.
x-33 looks like 6-million dollar man lifting bodies fom 60's
x-34 uses a conventional rocket
x-33 uses linear aerospike.
x-34 is dropped from an l-1011
x-33 is ground based
the only things they have in common are reuseability.
"Within 10 years, we should use this machine in various places, handling various problems," Singleterry said.
[BLATANT_FLAME_IGNITOR]
it's already around 48-49 on the list.
[/BLATANT_FLAME_IGNITOR]
Apple?
Casio?
Franklin?
NEC?
IBM?
Sony?
HP?
TRG?
Phillips?
Compaq?
whoever it is who is making the YOPY?
very nicely done, sure to bring out the hordes..
reminds me of the simpsons episode with the winged skeleton statue.
in the end it was a publicity stunt for a new mall...
This may seem like you're only doubling the speed, but due to the way binary works, you're adding 2^10 number of bits can be passed.
um, no. you are multiplying by 2^10 the number of bits that can be addressed, but are only doubling the number of bits that can be passed in any given period of time.
a book is a thing, made by someone and sold, when new, at a profit.
a house is a thing, made by someone and sold, when new, at a profit.
are the IP rights of an author greater than the IP rights of a carpenter? how about those of a really good carpenter, who makes chairs that could be considered art? how about and artist (say rembrandt) do they get a comission on resale of their work? HELL NO! so whay should an author, or publishing house, or software company? what makes their product so freaking special that they should have control over what they have SOLD for FAIR COMPENSATION and KNOWING THAT IT COULD BE RESOLD WHEN THEY SOLD IT THE FIRST TIME??????
the right to re-sell a used book has been enshrined in law almost as long as there has been copyright law.
it doesn't matter if the book is 1 minute or 1000 years old.
the prominence given to used listing is, and should be, entirely up to the vendor of said used book.
this is not an open source principle, it is a property rights issue.
tell you what, next time you go to sell your house, let's list yours at the bottom of the page, because the builders of new houses have a right to make money, while you are just abusing the rights of the guy who built your house by selling it again after he sold it to you.