"Fluff" and "Puffery" are one thing. Explicitly showing people doing things the device can not do is plain false advertising.
Isn't a large amount of advertisements out there patently false? Look at the claims made by supplement vendors and diet pill pushers. How do you know a marketing guy is lying? His lips are moving...
As noted by http://tech.slashdot.org/comme..., the USA has truth in advertising laws - both at the Federal and State levels for most States.
That said, advertisers can get around it somewhat by disclosures in the ads, which are typically in fine print shown for the duration of the activity that they are not recommending, advising, etc. Same with the diet stuff where they disclose that results may vary, etc. However, they usually have to also have stuff that backs up the general case - IOW, they can't use a one-off example in adversing, it has to be something that falls within the data-backed realm of general use of the product.
While most snorkeling is close to the surface, it's extremely easy to go beyond 1 meter, especially when entering the water from a boat (as is often the case, especially for those doing so on vacation and guided tours). You're also very likely to forget, and dive a little further (2-3 meters is easy to do) to look at rocks, marine life, etc too.
One reason why sports watches typically are 100 meter water resistant, and dive watches even more so.
If I could change one thing about the phone, I'd gladly give up the USB port and just use inductive charging in order to have the waterproofing be more reliable. I never transfer data over USB.
No need. For example, the new Moto G (2015 model) that was just released has some water resistant features (1 meter/3ft for 30 minutes) as well. Only, it has no plug for the USB as it uses a new method to allow the USB to be exposed even during immersion.
Now their purpose if more for those who accidentally drop the phone in water; but I doubt that would really change anything related to the USB port.
Also, the lack of a USB port would be a problem as you wouldn't be able to diagnose a faulty device without it since USB is used for all the diagnostics functionality on a running device. So it'd be better to do what Motorola is doing versus dropping it entirely.
willworkforbeer: Ads for trucks often show warranty-voiding off road activities. It's not CGI, the trucks will DO the stuff in the ad, but you're probably SOT (Spot Outta Truck) when you break it that way.
Nothing to see here.
And what, exactly, are they showing trucks doing that voids their warranties?
If I break a tie-rod end off-road they'll replace it. If I snap a ball joint they'll replace it and will probably fix the bent wheel opening molding and fender that resulted. If the steering gearbox or rack-and-pinion fail they'll replace those unless they failed as a direct result of striking a rock with the housing itself.
Same goes for axle shafts, axle housings, springs, even driveshafts, depending on the cause. Most truck and true-SUV manufacturers also have either options for underbody skid protection or OEM-aftermarket skid plates specifically for these applications.
Obviously if I sideswipe a tree they're not going to repair and repaint the side of the truck or replace the glass, that's a given. If the truck is sold as a serious off-road vehicle then there's an expectation that it'll do the job that it's marketed for and that the manufacturer will, to at least an extent, stand behind it.
Sure they'll fit it, but it won't likely be covered by the warranty - it'll likely be at your cost. Why? At a minimum, normal wear and tear is not covered by warranty. No different than my Mazda3 which, despite Mazda having a program for racers, explicitly states that racing will void the warranty. The Mazda3 is a popular vehicle for Rally Racing, and it will certainly do it. They also have had a bunch of ads - including some you find at the dealer - showing it doing stuff that they don't generally recommend. Many car commercials show off the performance, all while showing tiny print saying "do not do this" and all kinds of other disclaimers.
The ENIAC was built in 1946. So if the FERMIAC came after the first bomb, then what did they use for calculations on the first? The GUESSIAC? PAPERIAC?
Probably a slide-rule which when used correctly is highly accurate to quite a few decimal places, fast, and easy to use. And everyone involved in the Manhattan Project would have known how to use them.
Assuming for the moment that you are correct, where does the research non-profit get its funding from if the media portion has been sold to hostile interests?
One of the big changes between XP and Vista drivers specifically was the Video driver. There were "XPDM" XP drivers, and "WDDM" Vista drivers. WDDM drivers were required for Aero. Crappy hardware like the intel i910/i915 (at the center of the "Vista Capable" fiasco) only had XPDM capability, so though they would work at full resolution, etc, Aero would not work.
You also skip over the fact that Video and Sound Driver in Vista and later are user-space drivers, not kernel space drivers. They entire architecture of the drivers changed.
Because regardless of what changed, drivers designed for Windows XP (or Windows 2000) can run unmodified in Windows Vista / 7. I ran Windows 7 on my Intel i810 graphics in the Pentium 3, and it worked just fine with the Windows 2000/XP drivers.
What would be interesting though is verifying that it is actually using those 2k/XP drivers - it may have auto-updated them to a newer compatible driver set.
Even in Windows, drivers don't typically work across major kernel versions (5.x to 6.x), but will within minor version (5.1 vs 5.2). Now sometimes they may work if the kernel interfaces didn't change too much...it depends on the driver, but that's rare.
However, I wouldn't be surprised if it auto-upgraded the driver on you without you realizing it. Otherwise it's relying on some pretty neat sand-boxing functionality and while MS is good at user-space backwards compatibility they usually don't care about kernel space backwards compatibility at all. Realize too that MS does ship a lot of drivers for older hardware by default, so it (Win7) may have decided it had a better driver than you for the same hardware.
Do you know of any case where there was sanctions for not doing something known to be impossible?
Personally, no. But I'd wouldn't be surprised if there was one. I also wouldn't be surprised if a judge decided that it should be possible and did it to try to force the tech community into doing what the government wanted (e.g making back doors), though I would expect the sanction to ultimately fail (at SCOTUS level) which is why I said it would be more political in nature.
Most people do not know how to use System Restore or Roll-back drivers - even in Windows.
If your system fails to boot or has some other serious problem, the first thing Windows does is suggest you roll back to the last system restore point. In fact on Windows 7 and later if you select the "fix it for me" option it will do it automatically in many cases.
If a Linux system fails to boot, the first thing you typically do is select to boot the previous kernel, especially if you did a kernel upgrade. That functionality has been there since the 1990's - before Windows even let you choose between booting multiple systems.
If you need to do advanced tax preparation you're probably better off having a CPA do them and avoid the software altogether. A CPA is worth their weight in gold.
My wife is a CPA who specializes in taxes.:) Nearly all the software she uses is Windows only and has significant license costs.
``I believe GIMP introduced the single-window mode in version 2.4 or 2.6; the multi-window mode was just a PITA.''
Yes. GIMP began offering the single window interface a couple of point releases ago. As for the multi-window PITAness you mentioned... having a single honkin' window must be be something you like about Photoshop. I've been using GIMP for years in multi-window mode and find the single window interface is just not my cup-o-tea. We all has our druthers.
If the multi-window mode made things usable...then I'd agree. Rather, it makes it really hard to find stuff and know what's associated, etc. Most often, I'd end up losing track of which went with GIMP or did what, etc. So yes, I prefer a single-window mode that operates like Eclipse/VisualStudio with dockable parts - if you want to move something, undock it and move it. That alone can make a really big difference in the learning curve for GIMP.
One of the big changes between XP and Vista drivers specifically was the Video driver. There were "XPDM" XP drivers, and "WDDM" Vista drivers. WDDM drivers were required for Aero. Crappy hardware like the intel i910/i915 (at the center of the "Vista Capable" fiasco) only had XPDM capability, so though they would work at full resolution, etc, Aero would not work.
You also skip over the fact that Video and Sound Driver in Vista and later are user-space drivers, not kernel space drivers. They entire architecture of the drivers changed.
Why would there be any sanctions? The government doesn't sanction people for not having the data they need (why the government cannot arbitrarily sanction you for not predicting the future). They sanction you for not turning over data you do have/explaining why it's impossible.
They could sanction for not complying with the orders of the court. So if Apple did not turn over anything, then the court could hold Apple in contempt of court. However, the court cannot jail Apple, so sanctions would be used instead.
Now, I'm not saying it's a likely event. Just saying it is a possible scenario and it would be a very interesting one to watch play out if it ever did happen, which if it did would probably be more political in nature than anything else.
OS to be easy to recover, not the apps. And by easy I do not mean a re-install.
Linux does not typically require a re-install to recover the OS, and if you're having that kind of issue, then it doesn't matter what OS you're using - most users will typically call someone else or pay someone to fix it; that someone else typically knows where to look - whether MS KB (which is horrendous), TechNet, or Linux Distribution equivalents.
And, FYI - Ubuntu and Red Hat all have equivalents of MS KB and TechNet for their subscribers to support the corporates that want that kind of thing. However, that's just a centralized copy of all the decentralized works. MS has nothing comparative to that amount of software shipped in a normal Linux distribution - they (MS) only have a few products compared to the thousands of products in any given Linux distro. If you have an issue with GIMP you may first try your distribution, but the issue will more likely be documented with GIMP unless it is distro specific. Same goes for any of those other pieces of software in the distro. Not necessarily an ideal situation, but not one that is easy to rectify either.
In comparison, you don't go to MS KB to solve an Adobe Photoshop issue; you go to Adobe. MS could care less.
So you do realize that every distribution has that kind of thing already, no?
For Ubuntu as an example, I know there's a wiki and a bug tracker but nothing that compares to the MS KB pages that detail problems, error codes, version application, fixes, etc. What I know of Ubuntu's solutions is more MS Answers quality than MS KB.
Again, MS doesn't do that for every single application that runs on Windows. They do it on their own, and they may have some high profile ones where they are the culprit of the issue. It's no different with Linux distros other than the fact that you don't have to go to 1000 different places to get all the software to start with.
Well, the first part here is remote access. For Linux users that means adding a new user account and enabling SSH for a third-party to be able to access it. True, you could install TeamViewer, LogMeIn, or similar third-party services, but you have to first and foremost solve the remote-access issue.
I don't need to know what it involves, I just need to know it works for stupid people. My aunt-in-law has a problem with her computer, I send her a link to a fix and it fixes the problem without me having to go to her house or have a working remote login for myself on her system. I spend enough time fixing peoples computers, I want to be done with it as quickly and with as little inconvenience to myself as possible. Like it or not, those "Mr FixIt" scripts save a LOT of time.
Typically for Linux the solution is: "Go to updater, refresh, click apply" Sometimes you'll have to add "log out and log back in" but that's it. You can do that over the phone. Some times, you may have to wait a day while the patch comes through, but that's really it.
Of course, there are other solutions that you could do too - like giving her text to copy/paste into a terminal (with minimum direction to do so) that would run a shell script you wrote - e.g "wget https://mysite.com/myshellscri... | bash" and you could automate some things yourself.
And again, it's not really any different on Windows aside from the fact that you would have to go to one of any number of websites to download an update to a particular package, hope she gets the right one (and it's not infected with malware), and then guide her through running the install -which could be as simple as click-click-click or as complicated as building a 747 depending on the vendor.
Conversely, the Linux distros validate everything that is being updated against its source
[she] needs access to Quicken/QuickBooks and others tools (MS Excel) that are pretty much industry standard for her. It would be great to have those all ported to Linux,
Actually, MS Excel has already been ported to Linux, although and to be completely fair, it is a rather specialized distribution of Linux called "Android"
Well...not really. If I'm not mistaken it's just a dumb interface to Office365.
How about a "roll back drivers" or "system restore" when updates go wrong, something Windows has had since Win2K? The zealots can get pissy and downmod all they want but there is a reason that "the hairyfeet challenge" has lasted for 8 years with nobody passing, its because updates break shit in Linux and when it does you had better 1.- Know EXACTLY the make/model/rev of the affected hardware, 2.- Have a SECOND device to hunt for fixes, as the first one can easily be broken beyond use, and 3.- Have the skills to take a bunch of arcane bash commands and tweak it for the hardware in question as the "fixes" are often NOT written for YOUR hardware, they are written for a previous version and Linux is so God damned picky that if you have hardware Foo, rev bar version X and the fix is for hardware Foo, rev bar version X1 it will not work and the end user HAS to fix it himself!
Funny, given how much breaks when you update Windows; and the only solution there is to typically to take it into a help desk of some sort (e.g GeekSquad). Most people do not know how to use System Restore or Roll-back drivers - even in Windows.
Now you can top that off by the fact that with Linux, many issues that break things in an update will be fixed in another update, typically released faster than a user can drop it off to support and get it back.
As to hardware, you really do have the same issue in Window and on Mac. The main difference is the included installation disk. For printers, most Linux systems will auto-recognize the printer and load up the CUPS driver (thank you Apple) to use with it.
So even most Windows users would not pass your "Hairy Feet Challenge" when running Windows.
I can take a copy of Win2K, go from RTM to EOL and the drivers that worked at the start will work at the finish and the same is true of every subsequent release, Hell just for shits and giggles I went from Vista to Win 7 to Win 8 to Win 8.1 once, guess what? ALL of the drivers worked!
That's funny, given that every release of WIndows uses a different driver model. And the driver model between Windows XP and Windows Vista was an extremely great change. One of the main issues with Vista was that Microsoft changed the device driver interfaces between Vista RC2 and Vista RTM with no RC3 in between - so all the drivers that Microsoft did not themselves support broke! Hmm...wonder what you're smoking...
The fans can scream all they want but Linux in 2015 reminds me of Windows in 1998, where if something fails? You are SOL unless you are a geek with some serious troubleshooting skills, if you don't have those? Well give it up Chuck, you are just boned.
Funny how that's the same issue for Windows users. The big difference is that Windows users learned to stop complaining and pay someone to fix it. They just don't know who to call for Linux, and the various support groups out there (f.e GeekSquad) don't officially support it. Change that aspect and the support issue will quickly go away.
Microsoft Excel
Free Libre/Openoffice versions suck balls.
Funny since LibreOffice/OpenOffice have better mathematical formula support than Excel does. Please be ware that most Excel users do not know that there are major short-comings in the mathematical functions in Excel, some of which can have huge impacts on businesses.
(Note: see the OOXML debacle regarding the accuracy of the Excel formulas, and check how FLOOR() and CEILING() work with negative numbers with respect to their mathematical definitions.)
It probably depends on what tech stack you're working with.
At a former employer, we did a lot of embedded stuff, but the tools were only Windows-based. Some of the vendors had started a Linux port of their toolchain, but it depended on which version of the tool-chain you licensed as to whether or not you got access to that port, which also was determined by what hardware you purchased.
So for large embedded shops, they're probably all supporting Linux as they have a very large customer base since Linux is extremely popular for embedded work; but the smaller shops that don't have a lot of turn over[1] then they probably are on the trailing wave of the ports.
[1] My former employer purchased cameras from one such shop. We bought one camera to test with and see if it could do what we wanted; 1.5 years later when we bought them for the lab and customers, the serial numbers had barely moved - I think it was a delta of 20 or so. Good cameras, but low volume. They were on the trailing edge; sadly we didn't purchase the right edition to get the Linux support.
Why Turbo Tax? I mean 8 or 9 years ago I would get the CD. 7 years ago I would download the installer. But now it just works on the web. Sign up, pay, and use it in the browser. Why would anyone install it anymore?
That works fine for simple tax returns; but you can get more advanced versions for the more complex returns. Not everything in the client-side installed software is available in the web version.
I can understand the appeal of Visual Studios having used it for a number of years; however, I have found I am by far a better coder without it. And no, I don't miss VS.
If you want integrated debugging, there are a number of projects that do that and do it well. GDB has been extended to have interfaces specifically for doing so - so it's easier for programmatic access to GDB, and programs like ddd (http://www.gnu.org/software/ddd/) and QtCreator utilize it.
And honestly, QtCreator is about the closest thing to VS, and in many ways superior for JS/C++/Qt programming.
I don't do much work with photos or digital art however I do use gimp it can be skinned and switched to single window mode so it more resembles photoshop's interface. I have no idea if it has the same features but was under the impression that it did have nearly all the same plus a few.
I believe GIMP introduced the single-window mode in version 2.4 or 2.6; the multi-window mode was just a PITA. Overall, GIMP is suppose to be on par with PhotoShop; it's just got a lot higher learning curve so it's harder to take advantage of it.
I've tried a few times to use GIMP for the small things I do on occasion - making icons, etc - and given up each time simply because it was too difficult to get the tools I needed working right and easily. Even with single-window mode, they still have a long way to go on usability.
Apps aren't the blocking element for the switch to Linux. I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's the ability to recover relatively painlessly that is lacking in Linux.
Recover from what? Apps in Linux are typically very centralized in app-specific manners compared to Windows where everything tends to get thrown in and around the Windows Registry. Have an issue with Firefox? Reset firefox - rename its directory (~/.mozilla/firefox) and start-it up again; you can even recover the old stuff if you like. Have a user account issue? Just rename your user folder (/home/username) and login again.
The same cannot be said on Windows. Have an issue with an App on Windows? Good luck - find the registry setting that's causing the problem and reset it and its 4 or 5 backups. Have a user account issue? You might be able to get by with resetting a registry setting, but more likely than not you'll have to create a new user using the tools - so now you have all new ACLs, a new user directory, and you've lost all your settings, etc.
As for apps, there are hundreds of business specific ones (TimeMatters for the legal profession, Photoshop for graphic artists, Final Cut Studio for film makers, and so on) the open source alternatives for these are woefully lacking - most don't exist and if they do they are pale imitations of the originals (GIMP vs Photoshop... there's just no comparison).
Agreed. I can't move my wife to Linux simply because she's an accountant and needs access to Quicken/QuickBooks and others tools (MS Excel) that are pretty much industry standard for her. It would be great to have those all ported to Linux, but you'll have to convince a lot of corporate oriented software development houses (f.e Intuit) to do so. It's a big chicken-vs-egg issue - corporates won't move over unless there's software and the software devs won't make the software without the corporates.
First and foremost, something like the MS KB system for errors with the OS rather than 3rd hand forum jockeying.
So you do realize that every distribution has that kind of thing already, no?
Remote & trusted diagnostics/fixes that do not reset personal settings.
Well, the first part here is remote access. For Linux users that means adding a new user account and enabling SSH for a third-party to be able to access it. True, you could install TeamViewer, LogMeIn, or similar third-party services, but you have to first and foremost solve the remote-access issue.
Online anti-virus/malware/etc akin to Panda Software's old 'Active Scan' so that when stupid user syndrome hits it can be dealt with *without* having to lock my system down with every anti-whatever under the sun.
So now you're projecting issues from Windows onto Linux. Even then, there are tools - like the venerable Open Source ClamAV - which can do the job; but you typically don't need them to start with.
...is if court decides to sanction Apple. After all, there's a lot of money in Apple's coffers which the court could use to incentivise Apple do doing its bidding or risk losing. Of course, Apple will appeal any such sanction but it could have a massive impact on the stock price in the mean time...and could cause Apple to rethink its cash reserves.
It's probably a skewed result because half of the testimonies will have been selected by republicans because they are reject the mainstream science. This makes the finding even more surprising. For a more balanced view you can look to the statements made by scientific organizations.
over 50 organizations including the Royal Society, American Chemical Society, American Institute of Physics, American Physical Society, Australian Institute of Physics, European Physical Society, etc, etc, etc.
Dissenting:
NONE
You are missing what parts scientists are well agreed upon:
1.The instrumental record, which spans about 100 years, shows a clear warming trend.
2. CO2 is a greenhouse gas and increasing it's concentration will increase heat storage.
3. CO2 concentrations as observed for about the last 60ish years have been increasing.
4. Humans have been steadily contributing CO2 to the atmosphere for about the last 100 years.
5. The above points clearly are strong evidence that the recent warming has been influenced by human behaviour.
That about encompasses the consensus. 90% of everything that everyone is talking about though does NOT have a broad consensus and is still being actively studied, things like:
1.What quantitative relationship do our CO2 emissions have to future temperature change?
2. What cost is there to us from future temperature change.
3. What cost is there to us for reducing our CO2 emissions by a set factor.
Climate models are one of the key parts to answering these questions, and they are getting better at helping us study our theories on how climate works. Regrettably, the reality is that climate models still do NOT accurately predict or model global Top Of Atmosphere energy imbalance. One of the key tuning processes in model development is still adjusting loosely bound or poorly understood parameters, like clouds, to force a reasonable behaviour of global TOA energy. I hate to have to point it out, but long term predictions of climate, are pretty much entirely driven by TOA energy imbalance as it IS the entirety of the greenhouse effect.
You missed one point of disagreement:
A. Is the 100 years of data (point #1 in the first list) a sufficient sample size to predict going forward?
B. Much of the 100 years of instrumental records (point #1 in the first list) is modified or untrusted due to instrument accuracy, land development, etc.
That is where most non-AGW people fall. They may agree that GW exists but don't necessitate that its AGW.
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"Fluff" and "Puffery" are one thing. Explicitly showing people doing things the device can not do is plain false advertising.
Isn't a large amount of advertisements out there patently false? Look at the claims made by supplement vendors and diet pill pushers. How do you know a marketing guy is lying? His lips are moving ...
As noted by http://tech.slashdot.org/comme..., the USA has truth in advertising laws - both at the Federal and State levels for most States.
That said, advertisers can get around it somewhat by disclosures in the ads, which are typically in fine print shown for the duration of the activity that they are not recommending, advising, etc. Same with the diet stuff where they disclose that results may vary, etc. However, they usually have to also have stuff that backs up the general case - IOW, they can't use a one-off example in adversing, it has to be something that falls within the data-backed realm of general use of the product.
"now I can take my phone snorkeling"
While most snorkeling is close to the surface, it's extremely easy to go beyond 1 meter, especially when entering the water from a boat (as is often the case, especially for those doing so on vacation and guided tours). You're also very likely to forget, and dive a little further (2-3 meters is easy to do) to look at rocks, marine life, etc too.
One reason why sports watches typically are 100 meter water resistant, and dive watches even more so.
If I could change one thing about the phone, I'd gladly give up the USB port and just use inductive charging in order to have the waterproofing be more reliable. I never transfer data over USB.
No need. For example, the new Moto G (2015 model) that was just released has some water resistant features (1 meter/3ft for 30 minutes) as well. Only, it has no plug for the USB as it uses a new method to allow the USB to be exposed even during immersion.
Now their purpose if more for those who accidentally drop the phone in water; but I doubt that would really change anything related to the USB port.
Also, the lack of a USB port would be a problem as you wouldn't be able to diagnose a faulty device without it since USB is used for all the diagnostics functionality on a running device. So it'd be better to do what Motorola is doing versus dropping it entirely.
willworkforbeer: Ads for trucks often show warranty-voiding off road activities. It's not CGI, the trucks will DO the stuff in the ad, but you're probably SOT (Spot Outta Truck) when you break it that way.
Nothing to see here.
And what, exactly, are they showing trucks doing that voids their warranties? If I break a tie-rod end off-road they'll replace it. If I snap a ball joint they'll replace it and will probably fix the bent wheel opening molding and fender that resulted. If the steering gearbox or rack-and-pinion fail they'll replace those unless they failed as a direct result of striking a rock with the housing itself. Same goes for axle shafts, axle housings, springs, even driveshafts, depending on the cause. Most truck and true-SUV manufacturers also have either options for underbody skid protection or OEM-aftermarket skid plates specifically for these applications. Obviously if I sideswipe a tree they're not going to repair and repaint the side of the truck or replace the glass, that's a given. If the truck is sold as a serious off-road vehicle then there's an expectation that it'll do the job that it's marketed for and that the manufacturer will, to at least an extent, stand behind it.
Sure they'll fit it, but it won't likely be covered by the warranty - it'll likely be at your cost. Why? At a minimum, normal wear and tear is not covered by warranty. No different than my Mazda3 which, despite Mazda having a program for racers, explicitly states that racing will void the warranty. The Mazda3 is a popular vehicle for Rally Racing, and it will certainly do it. They also have had a bunch of ads - including some you find at the dealer - showing it doing stuff that they don't generally recommend. Many car commercials show off the performance, all while showing tiny print saying "do not do this" and all kinds of other disclaimers.
The ENIAC was built in 1946. So if the FERMIAC came after the first bomb, then what did they use for calculations on the first? The GUESSIAC? PAPERIAC?
Probably a slide-rule which when used correctly is highly accurate to quite a few decimal places, fast, and easy to use. And everyone involved in the Manhattan Project would have known how to use them.
Assuming for the moment that you are correct, where does the research non-profit get its funding from if the media portion has been sold to hostile interests?
Same place they did before - donors.
There's already been PLENTY of RPi compatible touchscreens (PiTFT).
I've looked around. Yes there are quite a few. But how many are at that price (~$60 USD) and how many support 10 points of touch?
Hint: Not many. Most are more expensive and/or only support 1-2 points of touch.
Note: Most tablets only support 2-3 points of touch at most.
One of the big changes between XP and Vista drivers specifically was the Video driver. There were "XPDM" XP drivers, and "WDDM" Vista drivers. WDDM drivers were required for Aero. Crappy hardware like the intel i910/i915 (at the center of the "Vista Capable" fiasco) only had XPDM capability, so though they would work at full resolution, etc, Aero would not work.
You also skip over the fact that Video and Sound Driver in Vista and later are user-space drivers, not kernel space drivers. They entire architecture of the drivers changed.
Because regardless of what changed, drivers designed for Windows XP (or Windows 2000) can run unmodified in Windows Vista / 7. I ran Windows 7 on my Intel i810 graphics in the Pentium 3, and it worked just fine with the Windows 2000/XP drivers.
What would be interesting though is verifying that it is actually using those 2k/XP drivers - it may have auto-updated them to a newer compatible driver set.
Even in Windows, drivers don't typically work across major kernel versions (5.x to 6.x), but will within minor version (5.1 vs 5.2). Now sometimes they may work if the kernel interfaces didn't change too much...it depends on the driver, but that's rare.
However, I wouldn't be surprised if it auto-upgraded the driver on you without you realizing it. Otherwise it's relying on some pretty neat sand-boxing functionality and while MS is good at user-space backwards compatibility they usually don't care about kernel space backwards compatibility at all. Realize too that MS does ship a lot of drivers for older hardware by default, so it (Win7) may have decided it had a better driver than you for the same hardware.
Do you know of any case where there was sanctions for not doing something known to be impossible?
Personally, no. But I'd wouldn't be surprised if there was one. I also wouldn't be surprised if a judge decided that it should be possible and did it to try to force the tech community into doing what the government wanted (e.g making back doors), though I would expect the sanction to ultimately fail (at SCOTUS level) which is why I said it would be more political in nature.
Most people do not know how to use System Restore or Roll-back drivers - even in Windows.
If your system fails to boot or has some other serious problem, the first thing Windows does is suggest you roll back to the last system restore point. In fact on Windows 7 and later if you select the "fix it for me" option it will do it automatically in many cases.
If a Linux system fails to boot, the first thing you typically do is select to boot the previous kernel, especially if you did a kernel upgrade. That functionality has been there since the 1990's - before Windows even let you choose between booting multiple systems.
If you need to do advanced tax preparation you're probably better off having a CPA do them and avoid the software altogether. A CPA is worth their weight in gold.
My wife is a CPA who specializes in taxes. :) Nearly all the software she uses is Windows only and has significant license costs.
Yes. GIMP began offering the single window interface a couple of point releases ago. As for the multi-window PITAness you mentioned... having a single honkin' window must be be something you like about Photoshop. I've been using GIMP for years in multi-window mode and find the single window interface is just not my cup-o-tea. We all has our druthers.
If the multi-window mode made things usable...then I'd agree. Rather, it makes it really hard to find stuff and know what's associated, etc. Most often, I'd end up losing track of which went with GIMP or did what, etc. So yes, I prefer a single-window mode that operates like Eclipse/VisualStudio with dockable parts - if you want to move something, undock it and move it. That alone can make a really big difference in the learning curve for GIMP.
One of the big changes between XP and Vista drivers specifically was the Video driver. There were "XPDM" XP drivers, and "WDDM" Vista drivers. WDDM drivers were required for Aero. Crappy hardware like the intel i910/i915 (at the center of the "Vista Capable" fiasco) only had XPDM capability, so though they would work at full resolution, etc, Aero would not work.
You also skip over the fact that Video and Sound Driver in Vista and later are user-space drivers, not kernel space drivers. They entire architecture of the drivers changed.
Why would there be any sanctions? The government doesn't sanction people for not having the data they need (why the government cannot arbitrarily sanction you for not predicting the future). They sanction you for not turning over data you do have/explaining why it's impossible.
They could sanction for not complying with the orders of the court. So if Apple did not turn over anything, then the court could hold Apple in contempt of court. However, the court cannot jail Apple, so sanctions would be used instead.
Now, I'm not saying it's a likely event. Just saying it is a possible scenario and it would be a very interesting one to watch play out if it ever did happen, which if it did would probably be more political in nature than anything else.
Recover from what?...
OS to be easy to recover, not the apps. And by easy I do not mean a re-install.
Linux does not typically require a re-install to recover the OS, and if you're having that kind of issue, then it doesn't matter what OS you're using - most users will typically call someone else or pay someone to fix it; that someone else typically knows where to look - whether MS KB (which is horrendous), TechNet, or Linux Distribution equivalents.
And, FYI - Ubuntu and Red Hat all have equivalents of MS KB and TechNet for their subscribers to support the corporates that want that kind of thing. However, that's just a centralized copy of all the decentralized works. MS has nothing comparative to that amount of software shipped in a normal Linux distribution - they (MS) only have a few products compared to the thousands of products in any given Linux distro. If you have an issue with GIMP you may first try your distribution, but the issue will more likely be documented with GIMP unless it is distro specific. Same goes for any of those other pieces of software in the distro. Not necessarily an ideal situation, but not one that is easy to rectify either.
In comparison, you don't go to MS KB to solve an Adobe Photoshop issue; you go to Adobe. MS could care less.
So you do realize that every distribution has that kind of thing already, no?
For Ubuntu as an example, I know there's a wiki and a bug tracker but nothing that compares to the MS KB pages that detail problems, error codes, version application, fixes, etc. What I know of Ubuntu's solutions is more MS Answers quality than MS KB.
Again, MS doesn't do that for every single application that runs on Windows. They do it on their own, and they may have some high profile ones where they are the culprit of the issue. It's no different with Linux distros other than the fact that you don't have to go to 1000 different places to get all the software to start with.
Well, the first part here is remote access. For Linux users that means adding a new user account and enabling SSH for a third-party to be able to access it. True, you could install TeamViewer, LogMeIn, or similar third-party services, but you have to first and foremost solve the remote-access issue.
I don't need to know what it involves, I just need to know it works for stupid people. My aunt-in-law has a problem with her computer, I send her a link to a fix and it fixes the problem without me having to go to her house or have a working remote login for myself on her system. I spend enough time fixing peoples computers, I want to be done with it as quickly and with as little inconvenience to myself as possible. Like it or not, those "Mr FixIt" scripts save a LOT of time.
Typically for Linux the solution is: "Go to updater, refresh, click apply" Sometimes you'll have to add "log out and log back in" but that's it. You can do that over the phone. Some times, you may have to wait a day while the patch comes through, but that's really it.
Of course, there are other solutions that you could do too - like giving her text to copy/paste into a terminal (with minimum direction to do so) that would run a shell script you wrote - e.g "wget https://mysite.com/myshellscri... | bash" and you could automate some things yourself.
And again, it's not really any different on Windows aside from the fact that you would have to go to one of any number of websites to download an update to a particular package, hope she gets the right one (and it's not infected with malware), and then guide her through running the install -which could be as simple as click-click-click or as complicated as building a 747 depending on the vendor.
Conversely, the Linux distros validate everything that is being updated against its source
[she] needs access to Quicken/QuickBooks and others tools (MS Excel) that are pretty much industry standard for her. It would be great to have those all ported to Linux,
Actually, MS Excel has already been ported to Linux, although and to be completely fair, it is a rather specialized distribution of Linux called "Android"
Well...not really. If I'm not mistaken it's just a dumb interface to Office365.
How about a "roll back drivers" or "system restore" when updates go wrong, something Windows has had since Win2K? The zealots can get pissy and downmod all they want but there is a reason that "the hairyfeet challenge" has lasted for 8 years with nobody passing, its because updates break shit in Linux and when it does you had better 1.- Know EXACTLY the make/model/rev of the affected hardware, 2.- Have a SECOND device to hunt for fixes, as the first one can easily be broken beyond use, and 3.- Have the skills to take a bunch of arcane bash commands and tweak it for the hardware in question as the "fixes" are often NOT written for YOUR hardware, they are written for a previous version and Linux is so God damned picky that if you have hardware Foo, rev bar version X and the fix is for hardware Foo, rev bar version X1 it will not work and the end user HAS to fix it himself!
Funny, given how much breaks when you update Windows; and the only solution there is to typically to take it into a help desk of some sort (e.g GeekSquad). Most people do not know how to use System Restore or Roll-back drivers - even in Windows.
Now you can top that off by the fact that with Linux, many issues that break things in an update will be fixed in another update, typically released faster than a user can drop it off to support and get it back.
As to hardware, you really do have the same issue in Window and on Mac. The main difference is the included installation disk. For printers, most Linux systems will auto-recognize the printer and load up the CUPS driver (thank you Apple) to use with it.
So even most Windows users would not pass your "Hairy Feet Challenge" when running Windows.
I can take a copy of Win2K, go from RTM to EOL and the drivers that worked at the start will work at the finish and the same is true of every subsequent release, Hell just for shits and giggles I went from Vista to Win 7 to Win 8 to Win 8.1 once, guess what? ALL of the drivers worked!
That's funny, given that every release of WIndows uses a different driver model. And the driver model between Windows XP and Windows Vista was an extremely great change. One of the main issues with Vista was that Microsoft changed the device driver interfaces between Vista RC2 and Vista RTM with no RC3 in between - so all the drivers that Microsoft did not themselves support broke! Hmm...wonder what you're smoking...
The fans can scream all they want but Linux in 2015 reminds me of Windows in 1998, where if something fails? You are SOL unless you are a geek with some serious troubleshooting skills, if you don't have those? Well give it up Chuck, you are just boned.
Funny how that's the same issue for Windows users. The big difference is that Windows users learned to stop complaining and pay someone to fix it. They just don't know who to call for Linux, and the various support groups out there (f.e GeekSquad) don't officially support it. Change that aspect and the support issue will quickly go away.
Microsoft Excel Free Libre/Openoffice versions suck balls.
Funny since LibreOffice/OpenOffice have better mathematical formula support than Excel does. Please be ware that most Excel users do not know that there are major short-comings in the mathematical functions in Excel, some of which can have huge impacts on businesses.
(Note: see the OOXML debacle regarding the accuracy of the Excel formulas, and check how FLOOR() and CEILING() work with negative numbers with respect to their mathematical definitions.)
It probably depends on what tech stack you're working with.
At a former employer, we did a lot of embedded stuff, but the tools were only Windows-based. Some of the vendors had started a Linux port of their toolchain, but it depended on which version of the tool-chain you licensed as to whether or not you got access to that port, which also was determined by what hardware you purchased.
So for large embedded shops, they're probably all supporting Linux as they have a very large customer base since Linux is extremely popular for embedded work; but the smaller shops that don't have a lot of turn over[1] then they probably are on the trailing wave of the ports.
[1] My former employer purchased cameras from one such shop. We bought one camera to test with and see if it could do what we wanted; 1.5 years later when we bought them for the lab and customers, the serial numbers had barely moved - I think it was a delta of 20 or so. Good cameras, but low volume. They were on the trailing edge; sadly we didn't purchase the right edition to get the Linux support.
Why Turbo Tax? I mean 8 or 9 years ago I would get the CD. 7 years ago I would download the installer. But now it just works on the web. Sign up, pay, and use it in the browser. Why would anyone install it anymore?
That works fine for simple tax returns; but you can get more advanced versions for the more complex returns. Not everything in the client-side installed software is available in the web version.
VS is definitely a very nice IDE for C++.
I can understand the appeal of Visual Studios having used it for a number of years; however, I have found I am by far a better coder without it. And no, I don't miss VS.
If you want integrated debugging, there are a number of projects that do that and do it well. GDB has been extended to have interfaces specifically for doing so - so it's easier for programmatic access to GDB, and programs like ddd (http://www.gnu.org/software/ddd/) and QtCreator utilize it.
And honestly, QtCreator is about the closest thing to VS, and in many ways superior for JS/C++/Qt programming.
I don't do much work with photos or digital art however I do use gimp it can be skinned and switched to single window mode so it more resembles photoshop's interface. I have no idea if it has the same features but was under the impression that it did have nearly all the same plus a few.
I believe GIMP introduced the single-window mode in version 2.4 or 2.6; the multi-window mode was just a PITA. Overall, GIMP is suppose to be on par with PhotoShop; it's just got a lot higher learning curve so it's harder to take advantage of it.
I've tried a few times to use GIMP for the small things I do on occasion - making icons, etc - and given up each time simply because it was too difficult to get the tools I needed working right and easily. Even with single-window mode, they still have a long way to go on usability.
Apps aren't the blocking element for the switch to Linux. I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's the ability to recover relatively painlessly that is lacking in Linux.
Recover from what? Apps in Linux are typically very centralized in app-specific manners compared to Windows where everything tends to get thrown in and around the Windows Registry. Have an issue with Firefox? Reset firefox - rename its directory (~/.mozilla/firefox) and start-it up again; you can even recover the old stuff if you like. Have a user account issue? Just rename your user folder (/home/username) and login again.
The same cannot be said on Windows. Have an issue with an App on Windows? Good luck - find the registry setting that's causing the problem and reset it and its 4 or 5 backups. Have a user account issue? You might be able to get by with resetting a registry setting, but more likely than not you'll have to create a new user using the tools - so now you have all new ACLs, a new user directory, and you've lost all your settings, etc.
As for apps, there are hundreds of business specific ones (TimeMatters for the legal profession, Photoshop for graphic artists, Final Cut Studio for film makers, and so on) the open source alternatives for these are woefully lacking - most don't exist and if they do they are pale imitations of the originals (GIMP vs Photoshop... there's just no comparison).
Agreed. I can't move my wife to Linux simply because she's an accountant and needs access to Quicken/QuickBooks and others tools (MS Excel) that are pretty much industry standard for her. It would be great to have those all ported to Linux, but you'll have to convince a lot of corporate oriented software development houses (f.e Intuit) to do so. It's a big chicken-vs-egg issue - corporates won't move over unless there's software and the software devs won't make the software without the corporates.
First and foremost, something like the MS KB system for errors with the OS rather than 3rd hand forum jockeying.
So you do realize that every distribution has that kind of thing already, no?
Remote & trusted diagnostics/fixes that do not reset personal settings.
Well, the first part here is remote access. For Linux users that means adding a new user account and enabling SSH for a third-party to be able to access it. True, you could install TeamViewer, LogMeIn, or similar third-party services, but you have to first and foremost solve the remote-access issue.
Online anti-virus/malware/etc akin to Panda Software's old 'Active Scan' so that when stupid user syndrome hits it can be dealt with *without* having to lock my system down with every anti-whatever under the sun.
So now you're projecting issues from Windows onto Linux. Even then, there are tools - like the venerable Open Source ClamAV - which can do the job; but you typically don't need them to start with.
...is if court decides to sanction Apple. After all, there's a lot of money in Apple's coffers which the court could use to incentivise Apple do doing its bidding or risk losing. Of course, Apple will appeal any such sanction but it could have a massive impact on the stock price in the mean time...and could cause Apple to rethink its cash reserves.
Just saying...
It's probably a skewed result because half of the testimonies will have been selected by republicans because they are reject the mainstream science. This makes the finding even more surprising. For a more balanced view you can look to the statements made by scientific organizations.
Statements by scientific organizations of national or international standing - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Concurring:
over 50 organizations including the Royal Society, American Chemical Society, American Institute of Physics, American Physical Society, Australian Institute of Physics, European Physical Society, etc, etc, etc.
Dissenting:
NONE
You are missing what parts scientists are well agreed upon: 1.The instrumental record, which spans about 100 years, shows a clear warming trend. 2. CO2 is a greenhouse gas and increasing it's concentration will increase heat storage. 3. CO2 concentrations as observed for about the last 60ish years have been increasing. 4. Humans have been steadily contributing CO2 to the atmosphere for about the last 100 years. 5. The above points clearly are strong evidence that the recent warming has been influenced by human behaviour.
That about encompasses the consensus. 90% of everything that everyone is talking about though does NOT have a broad consensus and is still being actively studied, things like: 1.What quantitative relationship do our CO2 emissions have to future temperature change? 2. What cost is there to us from future temperature change. 3. What cost is there to us for reducing our CO2 emissions by a set factor.
Climate models are one of the key parts to answering these questions, and they are getting better at helping us study our theories on how climate works. Regrettably, the reality is that climate models still do NOT accurately predict or model global Top Of Atmosphere energy imbalance. One of the key tuning processes in model development is still adjusting loosely bound or poorly understood parameters, like clouds, to force a reasonable behaviour of global TOA energy. I hate to have to point it out, but long term predictions of climate, are pretty much entirely driven by TOA energy imbalance as it IS the entirety of the greenhouse effect.
You missed one point of disagreement:
A. Is the 100 years of data (point #1 in the first list) a sufficient sample size to predict going forward?
B. Much of the 100 years of instrumental records (point #1 in the first list) is modified or untrusted due to instrument accuracy, land development, etc.
That is where most non-AGW people fall. They may agree that GW exists but don't necessitate that its AGW.