If both branches are GPL'd (or close enough to GPL that such code sharing isn't legally opposed) and someone gets annoyed about code sharing, then I think it's time for someone (the fussy party) to grow up and learn to revel in the fact that "the best parts" get propagated.
If the code un-forks later because all the real innovations got accepted by the original branch, that might or might not be better. It might also be a sign to the keepers of the original branch that they should have accepted more of that group of people's changes earlier so they didn't feel they just had to fork or be ignored.
cheers...ank
C&T Calendar? Why not Shire Reckoning?
on
New Calendar Proposal
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
If you're going to propose a different calendar, why not use the Shire Reckoning?
But seriously, you need a sweeping new regime to get acceptance for a new calendar. If you look at the introduction of any calendar anywhere, it's always been either (a) highly localized in a particular spatio-, chrono-, ethno- or credo-sphere (or combination thereof), or (b) gradual, viral, and not entirely successful.
Examples of the former are:
Chinese
Hebrew
Iranian
Islamic
Japanese
The most notable example of the latter is the transition to worldwide dominance of the Gregorian Calendar which actually took a very long time. The Julian Calendar still hangs on in the Orthodox religious calendar, and legal documents in various areas are still written using other local calendars (e.g. Japanese drivers' licenses).
Yet another calendar? Don't need it. There are enough disjoint relationships between the different numbers describing the earth's motions (and hence the seasons) that ultimately, the irregular way "Newton" shows up in the year is just as confusing as what we have now.
It's a little soon to boycott Ubi. Buying from them now may help the share-holders other than EA stave off demands to change the board and the direction.
Of course EA wants to buy out or squeeze out the competition. The most pertinent remaining question for us as individuals is what'll we do to help out the folks whose lives will be disrupted as a result of the carnage. "When they came for the... because I was not a..." but in another form.
Human compassion is the only defence against the bestial appetite of the large corporation for devouring all surrounding worlds. Are you up for it?
Other than that, I hope Cyan (the Millers et al.) have an "out" in their contract and can find another distributor. I can't imagine what'll do more to destroy Myst than the "Myst-2006" approach to new titles.
I'll probably get modded to Troll for this but I was disappointed. Instead of insight, I got a re-run of portions of his (relatively interesting) Hominids and Humans book.
And he didn't even mention the books -- which could have been classed as a shameless plug, so it was perhaps better that he didn't. Still I was hoping for more than what he dished.
... we'd stop declairing "war" on abstract concepts ("war on terror" is working about as well as "war on drugs" did)...
I had a sound-byte moment the other day:
Lyndon Johnston declared War on Poverty in America. The problems of poverty in America have only gotten worse.
Richard Nixon declared War on Drugs in America. The drug problem in America has only gotten worse. Did America really want George W. Bush to declare War on Terror?
"Send in the troops" isn't always the best metaphor for throwing lots of resources at solving an endemic, annoying and debilitating problem. Somehow that seems to be harder to see from inside the beltway than from outside or even outside the borders entirely (me; Canada). <sigh>
What struck me and why I posted it was a revelation of a plausible motivation for claiming that Linus derived Linux from Minix.
There aren't any grounds to say that enough derivative leaked into Linux from IBM's small but important contributsions to say the whole thing was derivative.
There are even less grounds to get from Unix through Minix to Linux but SCO's problematic diagram seems to suggest there is.
If SCO brays its propaganda on that point far and wide they may eventually convince a significant number of people that the link might exists (herein lies the FUD).
If you can do that, then the whole of Linux could be alleged to be a derivative of Unix.
Motive, means, opportunity. Means and opportunity are easy to spot. Motive is less so. I found this article insightful in that vein and apparently so did one of the editors.
AND I heartily agree with you that the case is not shown to be one whit more plausible with this than it was before (see.sig below -- still applies).
I don't know how scientific the whole thing is, but it's all a protracted (but low-key) advert for some kind of "pep" pills. And as if that weren't enough, the layout doesn't work for Firefox (non-portable HTML), and it's very easy to confuse its text generator.
Yes, okay, BUT WHY!??? Does it work better as an expense that way as opposed to a depreciating asset?
Who's stupid? "most large companies"? or the slashdot community? Please! I can't believe that either of us are "dumb". There must be some rational basis for large companies preferring to pay every month for commoditized applications. What pre-supposition am I missing here? All I'm looking for is a little enlightenment. Is there any available here?
Or perhaps accountants have become like lawyers: as soon as they get involved, they win and everyone else loses.
To quote: > businesses (that have to upgrade every year or so anyway)
Why do businesses "have to upgrade every year or so"? Is this like that old SF short story whose title escapes me where everyone was obliged to consume a certain amount of stuff constantly, and only the really rich were free not to do so?
Perhaps I am a simpleton but a business' need to upgrade periodically is not self-evident to me.
What difference does it make how cheap it is? What difference does it make how fast it is? What difference does it make how many features it implements? What difference does it make how cool the interface is?
This is the SUBSCRIPTION MODEL! This depends on the web being up all the time. (which it mostly, but not always is) This brings in a progressive billing relationship. Who in their right mind wants to pay every month for ANY commoditized application? Existing WordProcessors are already so feature rich I can't imagine wanting ever to buy a new one. Same goes for Spreadsheets, Presentation Makers, even desktop databases.
Let's get real here. A subscription model is fundamentally evil and pointless whether it's being flogged by Microsoft, IBM or even by Linus.
Have we decided that IBM is our friend and therefore suddenly the subscription model is a good idea? (besides the price is so much lower than what Microsoft would charge) Let's remember where we came from and that one plus one is still equal to two.
the defeat of Microsoft won't necessarily make everything better...ank
But seriously, if you've ever needed an argument against electing judges, here it is.
But seriously, no I mean it, this time... oh, never mind. I'm still too sick with laughing over the "Canadians are Evil!" thread. Can I sue slashdot for medical expenses from the resulting gut-ache? Oh, wait. I live in Canada. Once I've paid my Medical Services Plan premium, my costs aren't big enough to be worth suing over.
Add to that the fact that it's covered by a payroll deduction and my employer's extended medical covers prescriptions. Never mind....
2. It's immune to the kind of MS mischief that.NET will undoubtedly have to struggle with.
It may be immune to that kind of mischief but I find I'm more worried by that "RAND" licensing. The software can not be entirely F/L-OSS if there's the spectre of "we'll only let you keep going if we think you're playing fair."
No matter how smart Miguel is technically, he may be wrong on the IP-issues front. How would we all like to have a SCO-like suit coming at Linux from Redmond?
I read the whole transcript yesterday. I just wish I could have watched it or at least listened to it. The online archive is in perpetual time-out mode. Has anyone got an (unofficial?) mirror of it? Is anyone allowed to? Can we 'torrent this?
I just want to hear Eben's jokes in Eben's voice. Someone worth listening to for an hour and a half is a rare bird.
Wasn't there a version of the beasties that implemented "X ^ R" already? I remember looking at some diffs which, for the Intel version, had complaints about how this feature wasn't supported at all on x86's so the whole thing was reduced to "NOP"s and "return true;"s -- just can't remember which one. At this point my national pride kicks in and I remember that it was a fellow Canuck who was checking it in (did he build it himself as well?).
Eventually Windows will support the good things others are already doing... and get all the credit, too.
DevX has long been a (good) source for Microsoft SDK and machine setup/maintnenance information. Anyone who says (as some of the other repliers are doing) that it's obviously a MS-Shill because of the ads being run hasn't looked at the top of their slashdot window recently.
I'm not surprised he'd say this, given what a good source for "dark-side" information his site always is. Unfortunately, I'm also not surprised at the churlish, childish pseudo-refutations being flung back at him. otoh, the best piece so far has been the "get what you payfor" vs. "IIS uptime as seen on Netcraft" response.
C'mon, folks. Grow up. Yes this is garbage journalism. Why not burn Knoppix CDs to give to your non-techy friends as you explain all the reasons why F/OSS is better to counter the FUD? Personal recommendations from people that someone trusts are the best kind of marketing. And good marketing is all that Linux is lacking in order to achieve the kind of dominance we all believe it deserves.
cheers...ank
and yes, I'm preparing to be modded down
Stephen Evans' article below is unadulterated innuendo. There is nothing but circumstantial evidence to suggest that it was a Linux hacker who wrote MyDoom. Personally, I suspect it came from a shill who was ordered to provide a new reason for SCO to say that the Open Source movement was a threat to civilization. For this I ask you to refer to the so-called "signing" of the viral code: something along the lines of "this is andy, i'm just doing my job."
It has been my experience that the BBC doesn't publish innuendo as commentary but this appears to suggest that things have changed a tad.
Also, apparently Mr. Evans doesn't really understand the GPL. It's not about all code being free. It's about the author of the code being able to attach a rather unique condition to the use of his intellectual property: use it, modify it, but whatever you do, share it. Sort of a hi-tech "Pay It Forward" scheme.
Please, for the sake of truth and honour and for the reputations of some very bright people who have given me some very reliable software, order Mr. Evans to retract his story and get his facts straight before he goes to press like this again. Otherwise it'll be the BBC's turn to be suspected of being a shill for Microsoft -- something I consider dubious at best but circumstantial evidence can point both ways.
...as DVD country codes and the various "disposible" digital cameras whose contents have been analysed and the results posted here on a regular basis, right?
How many times did we hear rumours of pay-per-run services being the wave of the future in the last 10 years? But the best way to keep this from being adopted, is for us as the consumers to boycott such products in the stores and for us as the voters to remember what democratically elected individual supported the adoption of the DMCA-like laws required to back it up.
Slashdot Mirror
fwiw: I got into the page after 15 tries, myself.
cheers...ank
If both branches are GPL'd (or close enough to GPL that such code sharing isn't legally opposed) and someone gets annoyed about code sharing, then I think it's time for someone (the fussy party) to grow up and learn to revel in the fact that "the best parts" get propagated.
If the code un-forks later because all the real innovations got accepted by the original branch, that might or might not be better. It might also be a sign to the keepers of the original branch that they should have accepted more of that group of people's changes earlier so they didn't feel they just had to fork or be ignored.
cheers...ank
But seriously, you need a sweeping new regime to get acceptance for a new calendar. If you look at the introduction of any calendar anywhere, it's always been either (a) highly localized in a particular spatio-, chrono-, ethno- or credo-sphere (or combination thereof), or (b) gradual, viral, and not entirely successful.
Examples of the former are:
- Chinese
- Hebrew
- Iranian
- Islamic
- Japanese
The most notable example of the latter is the transition to worldwide dominance of the Gregorian Calendar which actually took a very long time. The Julian Calendar still hangs on in the Orthodox religious calendar, and legal documents in various areas are still written using other local calendars (e.g. Japanese drivers' licenses).Yet another calendar? Don't need it. There are enough disjoint relationships between the different numbers describing the earth's motions (and hence the seasons) that ultimately, the irregular way "Newton" shows up in the year is just as confusing as what we have now.
€ 0,02 worth...ank
It's a little soon to boycott Ubi. Buying from them now may help the share-holders other than EA stave off demands to change the board and the direction.
Of course EA wants to buy out or squeeze out the competition. The most pertinent remaining question for us as individuals is what'll we do to help out the folks whose lives will be disrupted as a result of the carnage. "When they came for the... because I was not a..." but in another form.
Human compassion is the only defence against the bestial appetite of the large corporation for devouring all surrounding worlds. Are you up for it?
Other than that, I hope Cyan (the Millers et al.) have an "out" in their contract and can find another distributor. I can't imagine what'll do more to destroy Myst than the "Myst-2006" approach to new titles.
cheers...ank
I'll probably get modded to Troll for this but I was disappointed. Instead of insight, I got a re-run of portions of his (relatively interesting) Hominids and Humans book.
...ank
And he didn't even mention the books -- which could have been classed as a shameless plug, so it was perhaps better that he didn't. Still I was hoping for more than what he dished.
and so I dis'd (just not very strongly)
cheers...ank
- There aren't any grounds to say that enough derivative leaked into Linux from IBM's small but important contributsions to say the whole thing was derivative.
- There are even less grounds to get from Unix through Minix to Linux but SCO's problematic diagram seems to suggest there is.
- If SCO brays its propaganda on that point far and wide they may eventually convince a significant number of people that the link might exists (herein lies the FUD).
- If you can do that, then the whole of Linux could be alleged to be a derivative of Unix.
Motive, means, opportunity. Means and opportunity are easy to spot. Motive is less so. I found this article insightful in that vein and apparently so did one of the editors.AND I heartily agree with you that the case is not shown to be one whit more plausible with this than it was before (see .sig below -- still applies).
cheers...ank
the mark of the Beastie?
couldn't resist...ank
aw, shucks. you beat me to it. That "2600" just jumped out at me. great minds? or fools? but if fools, let us at least be coloured motley... :)
cheers...ank
I don't know how scientific the whole thing is, but it's all a protracted (but low-key) advert for some kind of "pep" pills. And as if that weren't enough, the layout doesn't work for Firefox (non-portable HTML), and it's very easy to confuse its text generator.
Just walk on, folks...ank
cheers...ank
Yes, okay, BUT WHY!??? Does it work better as an expense that way as opposed to a depreciating asset?
Who's stupid? "most large companies"? or the slashdot community? Please! I can't believe that either of us are "dumb". There must be some rational basis for large companies preferring to pay every month for commoditized applications. What pre-supposition am I missing here? All I'm looking for is a little enlightenment. Is there any available here?
Or perhaps accountants have become like lawyers: as soon as they get involved, they win and everyone else loses.
cheers...ank
To quote:
> businesses (that have to upgrade every year or so anyway)
Why do businesses "have to upgrade every year or so"? Is this like that old SF short story whose title escapes me where everyone was obliged to consume a certain amount of stuff constantly, and only the really rich were free not to do so?
Perhaps I am a simpleton but a business' need to upgrade periodically is not self-evident to me.
cheers...ank
What difference does it make how cheap it is?
What difference does it make how fast it is?
What difference does it make how many features it implements?
What difference does it make how cool the interface is?
This is the SUBSCRIPTION MODEL! This depends on the web being up all the time. (which it mostly, but not always is) This brings in a progressive billing relationship. Who in their right mind wants to pay every month for ANY commoditized application? Existing WordProcessors are already so feature rich I can't imagine wanting ever to buy a new one. Same goes for Spreadsheets, Presentation Makers, even desktop databases.
Let's get real here. A subscription model is fundamentally evil and pointless whether it's being flogged by Microsoft, IBM or even by Linus.
Have we decided that IBM is our friend and therefore suddenly the subscription model is a good idea? (besides the price is so much lower than what Microsoft would charge) Let's remember where we came from and that one plus one is still equal to two.
the defeat of Microsoft won't necessarily make everything better...ank
Sounds like a great opportunity to apply the new RFC from yesterday, #3751:
You can't have them, they're OURS! :)
But seriously, if you've ever needed an argument against electing judges, here it is.
But seriously, no I mean it, this time... oh, never mind. I'm still too sick with laughing over the "Canadians are Evil!" thread. Can I sue slashdot for medical expenses from the resulting gut-ache? Oh, wait. I live in Canada. Once I've paid my Medical Services Plan premium, my costs aren't big enough to be worth suing over.
Add to that the fact that it's covered by a payroll deduction and my employer's extended medical covers prescriptions. Never mind....
cheers...ank
Oh just ignore me. My attention was distracted when I posted this. I was referring to Mono, not Parrot
No matter how smart Miguel is technically, he may be wrong on the IP-issues front. How would we all like to have a SCO-like suit coming at Linux from Redmond?
cheers...ank
Thanks Jayfar, but that's the exact link that constantly times-out for me. Is it working for you? Perhaps my corner of the 'net is sick in that way.
now back to regular programming already in progress...ank (double entendre entendred)
I read the whole transcript yesterday. I just wish I could have watched it or at least listened to it. The online archive is in perpetual time-out mode. Has anyone got an (unofficial?) mirror of it? Is anyone allowed to? Can we 'torrent this?
I just want to hear Eben's jokes in Eben's voice. Someone worth listening to for an hour and a half is a rare bird.
cheers...ank
Wasn't there a version of the beasties that implemented "X ^ R" already? I remember looking at some diffs which, for the Intel version, had complaints about how this feature wasn't supported at all on x86's so the whole thing was reduced to "NOP"s and "return true;"s -- just can't remember which one. At this point my national pride kicks in and I remember that it was a fellow Canuck who was checking it in (did he build it himself as well?).
Eventually Windows will support the good things others are already doing... and get all the credit, too.
cheers...ank
I'm not surprised he'd say this, given what a good source for "dark-side" information his site always is. Unfortunately, I'm also not surprised at the churlish, childish pseudo-refutations being flung back at him. otoh, the best piece so far has been the "get what you payfor" vs. "IIS uptime as seen on Netcraft" response.
C'mon, folks. Grow up. Yes this is garbage journalism. Why not burn Knoppix CDs to give to your non-techy friends as you explain all the reasons why F/OSS is better to counter the FUD? Personal recommendations from people that someone trusts are the best kind of marketing. And good marketing is all that Linux is lacking in order to achieve the kind of dominance we all believe it deserves.
cheers...ank
and yes, I'm preparing to be modded down
Here's what I wrote...
Stephen Evans' article below is unadulterated innuendo. There is nothing but circumstantial evidence to suggest that it was a Linux hacker who wrote MyDoom. Personally, I suspect it came from a shill who was ordered to provide a new reason for SCO to say that the Open Source movement was a threat to civilization. For this I ask you to refer to the so-called "signing" of the viral code: something along the lines of "this is andy, i'm just doing my job."
It has been my experience that the BBC doesn't publish innuendo as commentary but this appears to suggest that things have changed a tad.
Also, apparently Mr. Evans doesn't really understand the GPL. It's not about all code being free. It's about the author of the code being able to attach a rather unique condition to the use of his intellectual property: use it, modify it, but whatever you do, share it. Sort of a hi-tech "Pay It Forward" scheme.
Please, for the sake of truth and honour and for the reputations of some very bright people who have given me some very reliable software, order Mr. Evans to retract his story and get his facts straight before he goes to press like this again. Otherwise it'll be the BBC's turn to be suspected of being a shill for Microsoft -- something I consider dubious at best but circumstantial evidence can point both ways.
Sincerely,
...as DVD country codes and the various "disposible" digital cameras whose contents have been analysed and the results posted here on a regular basis, right?
How many times did we hear rumours of pay-per-run services being the wave of the future in the last 10 years? But the best way to keep this from being adopted, is for us as the consumers to boycott such products in the stores and for us as the voters to remember what democratically elected individual supported the adoption of the DMCA-like laws required to back it up.
F-IW...ank