Watch this.. Remember the MS philosophy of "Embrace and extend". They will start claiming that this is "Open Source" in the truest sense, and by means of massive advertising to this effect, the MS definition of what Open Source means will become the accepted one in the publics eye. The average joe on the street doesn't know anything about Open Source, and is waiting for the organization with the most advertising bucks to tell them what it means. That ain't us folks...
There is nothing which prevents you from reading in template files when designing using PHP3, in fact its a piece of cake to do, and I am using it in at least one area of my current project. You can do anything you want to do in PHP that you can do in Perl with regards to includes, functions, templates etc.
There is even a group currently producing some sort of meta-scripting language for templates that is used with PHP - although I know nothing more than that about this project (Personally I think it is unnecessary because PHP is already so easy to use that it hardly needs an even simpler scripting language dropped on top of it).
Perls advantage is that it offers greater flexibility in the methods you can use to construct your script than PHP does. PHP's advantage is that someone else coming along after you can very easily determine what your script is doing - which is a different matter with Perl.
Its probably comes down to a matter of personal preference. Both are excellent scripting languages, both have strengths and weaknesses, both have their advantages in specific situations. I personally prefer PHP because I find it easier to understand, suited to my needs, and capable of rapid development.
If you are building webpages I think the best tool is undoubtedly PHP. It has all the power of perl (with the exception of regexes which are not as evolved) and it is far faster to develop in, and probably to learn as well.
It supports multiple different databases, including mysql, postgresql, as well as any ODBC compliant db.
Version 4, due to be released this month I believe (its currently available as RC1) offers an optimizer (available at Zend.com), and will come with a compiler as well.
It easily integrates directly into your HTML code. It is multiplatform, and its free.
Its main advantage is the ease with which web applications or websites can be developed. I am currently working on the software for the backend support of several websites, and using PHP I am able to develop this application very rapidly. Far faster than I might be able to do with Perl.
Obviously for those who already know Perl, they will be able to develop just as effectively in that scripting language anything that can be done in PHP. But for the new user seeking to learn a scripting language, PHP cannot be beat.
Okay, so it was a bit snobby of me. I have had a busy day, forgive me.
I have also submitted a few news stories to slashdot in the past that were posted on Spaceref.com, only to have them rejected, then appear a day later as submitted by someone else and linked to another site./. is a wonderful website (and my default page) but it can be a frustrating experience. Sometimes I let the frustration get the better of me.
The press releases is available in HTML format (and with an active link to additional information on the Hubble website) here. As usual, Spaceref.com had this posted yesterday, Slashdot is tad slow on the uptake where space science and exploration is concerned.
Re: Applications being rejected
on
Who Owns Dmoz?
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· Score: 2
I applied for a position in the PHP programming language category. I am a PHP programmer, and use it on a daily basis. I supplied 8 sites on the subject which were not listed in the directory under that category. All of the sites were directly related to PHP programming - many of them were well known sites that should be listed if that category of the directory was to be of any use to visitors.
I am not sure about what you mean by "competitors" - unless you are assuming I applied to edit the category on Canadian search engines/Directories - which I did not. Certainly if I had been editing a category which directly affected my work position I would have listed our competitors. The point of becoming an editor was to help the internet population as a whole - to give back to the community so to speak - not to advance my company or any such thing. I understand that this does happen, and that they might wish to avoid those sorts of situations. That is why I did not volunteer for that sort of category. I did not want to be rejected because someone perceived the potential for abuse as a cause to reject my application.
At the time I was somewhat miffed I admit, now I am just blase about it. I made the effort to volunteer - if they are stupid enough to reject my help then what can I do? Go on to other projects I suppose, its not like I have any free time anyways - the moment I finish one project I take up another.
I should mention that in addition to my listed employment activities, I also maintain a directory of my own as a hobby - http://www.omphalos.net. I suppose I have directories on the brain.
Re: Applications being rejected
on
Who Owns Dmoz?
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· Score: 2
Yeah I think its hilarious. I applied to be an editor for DMOZ a while ago. I filled in the form, found 8 websites they did not have listed, wrote original descriptions for them, and posted the results. They rejected me though, apparently because they thought I was not qualified.
I am in fact the editor for Maplesquare - A Canadian directory of websites (and probably the largest Canadian-owned and operated one at that). As well I am a programmer for Spaceref.com, doing some backend administration stuff.
But am I qualified to volunteer my time to work on DMOZ? Evidently not. Oh, well, it gives me more time to write code.
This is what pisses me off about the whole thing. The RIAA can claim (or seek) $6bn in damages, when there is no way to prove that they have lost a single dime as a result of MP3.com. Given the statistics that people frequently throw around, it seems more likely that they have made additional money as a result of the rise of MP3 as a format.
The courts are becoming less of a means to seek redress and more of a means to punish one's competition - and drive them out of business.
Its all the same to me, I expect Big Business to win no matter what the law should support. To quote (Roy Rogers I think) "This country has the best politicians money can buy" - and the legal system is now an adjunct to those who can afford the lawyers most.
My prediction - RIAA and Cabal will win hands down in every case. MP3s will be driven underground except where permission is expressly given by the artist - despite the fact that RIAA is rooking the musicians, and MP3 combined with the internet is a superior method of musical distribution.
Thanks for the compliment on the site. As you can see it also offers a slashdot-like message interface (entirely original PHP3 and mysql code BTW), a directory of links to over 375 Wiccan and Pagan websites, and - most recently - a true search engine that indexes the content of the websites listed in the directory (currently we have indexed over 21000 pages of material).
Omphalos was probably the first Pagan directory when it was originally created back in 1997 or so, and as far as I can tell its now the first true search engine (most sites index only their own sites contents).
Now if I can just get the word out to folks to let them know the site exists....
I used to run The Cauldron BBS just north of you in Pembroke Ontario. Then it moved to Saltspring Island, BC (my hometown). I remember you from the old days...
I maintain a website called Omphalos which contains some 18Mb or so of text files relating to modern Wicca, Paganism and the occult. The files are divided into 26 categories and are accessible from the menu on the bottom left of the main page. There are also humour files, SCA stuff, etc.
This is all stuff from the old BBS days preserved from when I closed down my Fidonet/PODS BBS and moved to the internet. The materials used to be maintained in a website called Atho's Pagan Files Collection but I have since consolidated the two websites.
Yeah, but the way it gets used in the article makes me think Jon Katz has a deal with the owner of Chickcliker.com and is trying to use slashdot to create a new buzzword and promote the site. I personally prefer to call women, er "Women". I don't need to use bullshit trendy terms like grrrrrrrrrrrrls, or geekgrrls or whatever.
If you don't want your data copied by spiders, use a robots.txt. By definition spiders are expected to obey the instructions in the robots.txt file. You can direct which directories and files are okay to index, and which are not. That is the entire purpose of robots.txt - it is not the spider's fault if you did not know to use it. Now if you did use one and it ignored it, thats another matter.
As for the methods used by the spiders, it is simply more efficient in most cases for a spider to make a local copy of the file and do its indexing on that copy rather than to index directly over the web. In either case it has to actually download the entire page to do so, its simply a matter of whether or not it keeps the copy it downloaded in its database.
The spider I helped to create had 2 parts, one of which visited the site and built up a list of links on the server after reading the robots.txt to determine which were legitimate targets for indexing. It saved the files locally on our HD. The second process read the files locally and indexed the results, storing them in a database. The reason for this was simply to avoid having to visit a site twice - and avoid problems occuring when a page was changed in between the first visit and the indexing (grabbing links is much quicker than indexing so the indexer tends to fall behind over time).Also indexing from local files is much faster and more generally efficient.
It is basically impossible to make a spider that does not download the page (after all that is exactly what you do when you view it with a browser), and keeping a copy on the HD is also entirely practical. Otherwise you end up with twice the traffic when the spider hits your site.
This is twice now that I have posted a story suggestion to slashdot *hours* before the story that appears on the front page. Man, I get sick of this. Makes me feel its not worth suggesting stories....
The human gene sequence is in the public domain and will remain there - anything else would be ludicrous (although I agree that when it comes to the law ludicrous seems to be perfectly acceptable. Witness patenting software algorithms). What I believe they will get the patent on is their process for deriving the gene sequences - which is perfectly acceptable. They will also have the rights to their database of human gene information, which they can license the access rights to. The Human Genome Project will be making its results publically available, so it might become a matter of whose database provides the most ancilliary information.
Adding things like LIMITED weapons, ammo & powerups would require people to conserve their ammo and to play strategically, rather than switching over to rocket launcher, putting it on autorun and holding down their fire button.
This is exactly why I have been spending too much time playing the free Counterstrike mod for Halflife. Halflife is already a fantastic game, but the CS mod to it has improved the online play so greatly that I think it easily surpasses the quality of game play of any other online game in this genre. There are no powerups, you can only purchase weapons you can afford - and you get paid for killing your opponents in game cash, so you must be successful to get the good weapons.
If you have not heard of it, Counterstrike pits teams of Terrorists (sometimes with hostages sometimes with a target to be bombed) against teams of Counter-Terrorists in a variety of real-world situations. More recent additions include assassination scenarios (where the Counter-Terrorists must escort a VIP who is armed only with a knife - and played by one of the CT players - to a safe zone on the far side of the map), and escape scenarios (where the Terrorists must escape from a dangerous and disadvantageous situtation to a safe zone on the far side of the map). The maps cover a wide variety of fascinating tactical challenges, ranging from a hostage situation onboard a 747 in an airport to a VIP Assassination scenario on an oilrig. Brilliant stuff.
In contrast to most online shooters, CS requires you to be careful, plan your moves, and cooperate with other players on your team to be successful. You can run into a room with gun blazing but often as not you will be shot dead by the guy with the shotgun in the shadows. It does not have stupidly overpowerful weapons - all of the weapons in the game are realworld items with realistic (sic) performance. Not all weapons are available to both sides either - although a lot of care has gone into ensuring the balance of play.
All round this is an amazing effort on the part of the CS developers, and well deserving of a good look by anyone who owns Halflife.
Or you can write your own, and manage to get a few users using it. I wrote my own version in PHP3, and because of that I now understand the interface much better than if I had simply setup the existing slashcode version and used it. I would recommend that anyone who wants to create a similiar interface design their own, rather than use the slashcode per se. I admit, mine is simpler, and lacks a lot of features that slashdot has, but I understand it all, and can make any required changes myself. Decrypting someone elses perl scripting is a task I do not want to contemplate facing. Of course, my site focuses on an entirely different topic and some adds features that slashdot doesn't have as well.
I have not read the perl scripts for slashdot, so my version is based entirely on my own code. I did spend a lot of time analyzing the slashdot site from the user's perspective though, so some variables have the same names for instance. My site has a long way to go still of course.
The essential problem for prospective webmasters is that the current slashdot already covers technical issues so well, and with such a large audience that encouraging folks to visit another site on the same topics is basically impossible. Why visit the lesser cousin when the original site has so much more information? If you are focusing on a different topic, with a different prospective audience you might stand a chance of success...
Its a long, slow uphill battle to get sufficient traffic to make a slashdot-like interface useful to users. I am only just starting to make some headway on this front, and I think the only reason I have made any headway at all is that I already had an audience before I redesigned the site to include a messageboard system.
Oh, if you are curious, my site is called Omphalos, and is located at: http://www.omphalos.net and focuses on modern Paganism (so its not for all users).
Actually, I think the reason that most Canadians react so forceably to the US propensity for firearms ownership is that we get along just fine without everyone and his dog owning their own handgun/automatic assault rifle/machine gun or what-have-you. Our *national* annual murder rate is (I am led to understand) equal to the annual murder rate of the city of Detroit alone. If this is the case, then it obviously works for us. Canadians as a whole seem completely unable to understand the US fascination with firearms. But then you probably don't understand our peculiarities - tea, curling, and the incredibly divisive issue of bilingualism to nane a few. This is probably not the place to discuss this at all since its completely offtopic.
As for Western Canadians liking the US better than Ontario - well, at least in my opinion - I dislike both equally. Washington State is okay, I have visited it several times and always liked the folks I met. The culture there is *almost* Canadian when you are near the border. On the rest of the US I have little or no opinion. On Ontario, well I lived there when I was in the Armed Forces, but I cannot say I liked the place all that much - except Ottawa and Kingston both of which are nice places to live (except for the weather).
All in all I am content to stay right here in Victoria...
Bravo! Nice to see an American who doesn't have time for mindless nationalism (of whatever nation). Unfortunately, the yahoos out there often give the impression that *all* Americans are that way.
And while we are identifying our national origins, just for the record I am Canadian, and proud to be so. I also served in our Armed Forces (such as they are - good but waaaaay too small and underequiped.). I can't stand mindless support of any nation by any citizen - even if they are Canadian. Our government does stupid things, so does yours. Our culture has its disreputable elements - so does yours. Some of our laws suck, and so do yours. Any everyone elses.
I personally think the time is coming when we need to stop thinking nationally and start thinking globally.
Oh, I have exchanged emails with him before I believe, back when I frequented alt.design.games, and was impressed with the quality of his ideas. So perhaps I should check it out.
Have they finally dropped character classes in favour of a skills-based system? or is it not *that* evolved yet?
I think the world needs a simple set of rules with complex possibilities - and that is the focus of the rules I am writing myself. Originally, D&D met that criteria - you could explain it to someone in under 15 mins so they could play it. With the volume of rules for the typical RPG these days, you practically need a degree - at least a short college course - to be able to play and use even a significant fragment of the rules system.
I have to get away from programming and back to writing my system I suppose. It does not seem right criticizing other systems without having something to point at and say "This does it better" and why.:)
Then, of course, landing comes closer, and we are glutted with money from NASA. But what's the point? We get 10 sysadmins one month before landing, and we have to spend hours training them up; much more preferable to have had one good one ten months before!
I hate the inconsistency of this. Far better to give NASA a fixed budget of sufficient funds to tackle all of their projects and let you folks handle how its spent. This is supposed to be about science, not political maneuvering to gain sufficient funds to complete projects - and then getting the funds too late to be of use.
For my part, the exploration of space is the most important challenge facing humanity, we should be spending whatever is necessary to make it possible. The scientific spinoffs from space exploration have had a tremendous impact on a multitude of industries worldwide, and the benefits easily outweigh the costs associated. Besides, its not like the money isn't spent here on earth:)
So what? A company that produces paper-based RPGs is going to Open Source the rules system - ie they are going to capitalize on current buzzwords and try to revive a lousy RPG system. It might be the most popular because it was first, but that doesn't make it better. I started playing D&D back in 1978, and kept with it until better alternatives came out. I was even unhappy with those and every group I played with added its own variants to the rules.
I eventually decided that if I was so damn critical of every system I had tried that I should put my effort where my mouth is and write my own RPG system (I have been doing it for the last 3 years now, and its a never ending project. 128 pgs written though). If I release my version (when complete) as Open Source will it get this attention? No way. This is only news because a bigname company can marshal the attention by dropping a buzzword or two.
Making the D20 rules system open source is fairly meaningless since you cannot copyright the rules themselves in any case, all you can copyright is the manual text, diagrams, charts and artwork - and of course trademarked names.
The truth is, there have been open source - truly open source, text and all - RPGs out there for several years. The best known is probably one called FUDGE. There are many others.
As always with anything to do with Space, if you want the latest information on this issue, be sure to check Spaceref.com and NASA Watch. In this matter, I believe NASA Watch was reporting a possible engine problem back in November - although there was no corroborating evidence at the time. The fact that they knew about the problems with the MPL was reported yesterday.
Certainly, some heads are going to roll in NASA, and hopefully the blame gets placed where it should be - on the shoulders of whoever decided to cover this up. Also, blame should apparently be placed on the folks at Lockheed Martin (the company that I believe built the engines on the MPL) who must have known there was a problem with their engines.
The biggest problem is of course the budget for NASA, which has been steadily decreasing over the last few years. I think it is ludicrous of us to expect NASA to launch missions like these without a proper budget for development, manufacturing, and testing of the equipment. In this case, apparently the money was simply not there to afford a complete test of the whole landing proceedure - which would have made it obvious that the engines were not going to work and that the censors for shutting them off would not work either.
OTOH, it is also criminal for a project of this magnitude and expense to go ahead with a known flaw that will prevent its success, and those responsible should be called to the mat for their explanations.
Sadly, this will probably put space exploration back several years, and the blame will probably end up on the shoulders of good people who didn't deserve it.
Yes, but if I recall correctly, it is *only* the media that is reporting that cphack allows you to see the passwords. Matthew's page explaining the process they went through and including the description of cphack is (now, thanks to Mattel's long reach) gone from its server. But I believe I recall reading that it *does not* do anything other than reveal the list of URLs which are blocked - end of story.
This means that all it makes possible for some kid using a Cyberpatrolled machine is to see the list of sites which are banned. Not change the list, edit the list, or bypass it. Granted some of the websites that are listed probably have names which are in bad taste to most folks, but thats about it.
This court case seems to be more about how well a big company can crush any opposition, regardless of legality or any sense of right or wrong. The media is simply playing the tunes for them as Mattel dances. Practically every story on this issue that I have read was based on content from the original, badly written and quite slanted report from AP.
One of the stories I read even identified Mr Johannson (spelling?) as *believed to be living in Norway* - as if he was some sort of criminal on the run.
Every story has stated the software allows you to see the passwords - which is false AFAIK. I would ask Matthew but he has been told not to discuss this at all with anyone by his lawyers.
Slashdot Mirror
Watch this.. Remember the MS philosophy of "Embrace and extend". They will start claiming that this is "Open Source" in the truest sense, and by means of massive advertising to this effect, the MS definition of what Open Source means will become the accepted one in the publics eye. The average joe on the street doesn't know anything about Open Source, and is waiting for the organization with the most advertising bucks to tell them what it means. That ain't us folks...
There is nothing which prevents you from reading in template files when designing using PHP3, in fact its a piece of cake to do, and I am using it in at least one area of my current project. You can do anything you want to do in PHP that you can do in Perl with regards to includes, functions, templates etc.
There is even a group currently producing some sort of meta-scripting language for templates that is used with PHP - although I know nothing more than that about this project (Personally I think it is unnecessary because PHP is already so easy to use that it hardly needs an even simpler scripting language dropped on top of it).
Perls advantage is that it offers greater flexibility in the methods you can use to construct your script than PHP does. PHP's advantage is that someone else coming along after you can very easily determine what your script is doing - which is a different matter with Perl.
Its probably comes down to a matter of personal preference. Both are excellent scripting languages, both have strengths and weaknesses, both have their advantages in specific situations. I personally prefer PHP because I find it easier to understand, suited to my needs, and capable of rapid development.
If you are building webpages I think the best tool is undoubtedly PHP. It has all the power of perl (with the exception of regexes which are not as evolved) and it is far faster to develop in, and probably to learn as well.
It supports multiple different databases, including mysql, postgresql, as well as any ODBC compliant db.
Version 4, due to be released this month I believe (its currently available as RC1) offers an optimizer (available at Zend.com), and will come with a compiler as well.
It easily integrates directly into your HTML code. It is multiplatform, and its free.
Its main advantage is the ease with which web applications or websites can be developed. I am currently working on the software for the backend support of several websites, and using PHP I am able to develop this application very rapidly. Far faster than I might be able to do with Perl.
Obviously for those who already know Perl, they will be able to develop just as effectively in that scripting language anything that can be done in PHP. But for the new user seeking to learn a scripting language, PHP cannot be beat.
Okay, so it was a bit snobby of me. I have had a busy day, forgive me.
I have also submitted a few news stories to slashdot in the past that were posted on Spaceref.com, only to have them rejected, then appear a day later as submitted by someone else and linked to another site. /. is a wonderful website (and my default page) but it can be a frustrating experience. Sometimes I let the frustration get the better of me.
Slashdot screwed up the links for me somehow (or I screwed up). The press release is here.
The press releases is available in HTML format (and with an active link to additional information on the Hubble website) here. As usual, Spaceref.com had this posted yesterday, Slashdot is tad slow on the uptake where space science and exploration is concerned.
I applied for a position in the PHP programming language category. I am a PHP programmer, and use it on a daily basis. I supplied 8 sites on the subject which were not listed in the directory under that category. All of the sites were directly related to PHP programming - many of them were well known sites that should be listed if that category of the directory was to be of any use to visitors.
I am not sure about what you mean by "competitors" - unless you are assuming I applied to edit the category on Canadian search engines/Directories - which I did not. Certainly if I had been editing a category which directly affected my work position I would have listed our competitors. The point of becoming an editor was to help the internet population as a whole - to give back to the community so to speak - not to advance my company or any such thing. I understand that this does happen, and that they might wish to avoid those sorts of situations. That is why I did not volunteer for that sort of category. I did not want to be rejected because someone perceived the potential for abuse as a cause to reject my application.
At the time I was somewhat miffed I admit, now I am just blase about it. I made the effort to volunteer - if they are stupid enough to reject my help then what can I do? Go on to other projects I suppose, its not like I have any free time anyways - the moment I finish one project I take up another.
I should mention that in addition to my listed employment activities, I also maintain a directory of my own as a hobby - http://www.omphalos.net. I suppose I have directories on the brain.
Yeah I think its hilarious. I applied to be an editor for DMOZ a while ago. I filled in the form, found 8 websites they did not have listed, wrote original descriptions for them, and posted the results. They rejected me though, apparently because they thought I was not qualified.
I am in fact the editor for Maplesquare - A Canadian directory of websites (and probably the largest Canadian-owned and operated one at that). As well I am a programmer for Spaceref.com, doing some backend administration stuff.
But am I qualified to volunteer my time to work on DMOZ? Evidently not. Oh, well, it gives me more time to write code.
This is what pisses me off about the whole thing. The RIAA can claim (or seek) $6bn in damages, when there is no way to prove that they have lost a single dime as a result of MP3.com. Given the statistics that people frequently throw around, it seems more likely that they have made additional money as a result of the rise of MP3 as a format.
The courts are becoming less of a means to seek redress and more of a means to punish one's competition - and drive them out of business.
Its all the same to me, I expect Big Business to win no matter what the law should support. To quote (Roy Rogers I think) "This country has the best politicians money can buy" - and the legal system is now an adjunct to those who can afford the lawyers most.
My prediction - RIAA and Cabal will win hands down in every case. MP3s will be driven underground except where permission is expressly given by the artist - despite the fact that RIAA is rooking the musicians, and MP3 combined with the internet is a superior method of musical distribution.
Thanks for the compliment on the site. As you can see it also offers a slashdot-like message interface (entirely original PHP3 and mysql code BTW), a directory of links to over 375 Wiccan and Pagan websites, and - most recently - a true search engine that indexes the content of the websites listed in the directory (currently we have indexed over 21000 pages of material).
Omphalos was probably the first Pagan directory when it was originally created back in 1997 or so, and as far as I can tell its now the first true search engine (most sites index only their own sites contents).
Now if I can just get the word out to folks to let them know the site exists....
Hi Farrell,
I used to run The Cauldron BBS just north of you in Pembroke Ontario. Then it moved to Saltspring Island, BC (my hometown). I remember you from the old days...
I maintain a website called Omphalos which contains some 18Mb or so of text files relating to modern Wicca, Paganism and the occult. The files are divided into 26 categories and are accessible from the menu on the bottom left of the main page. There are also humour files, SCA stuff, etc.
This is all stuff from the old BBS days preserved from when I closed down my Fidonet/PODS BBS and moved to the internet. The materials used to be maintained in a website called Atho's Pagan Files Collection but I have since consolidated the two websites.
Yeah, but the way it gets used in the article makes me think Jon Katz has a deal with the owner of Chickcliker.com and is trying to use slashdot to create a new buzzword and promote the site. I personally prefer to call women, er "Women". I don't need to use bullshit trendy terms like grrrrrrrrrrrrls, or geekgrrls or whatever.
If you don't want your data copied by spiders, use a robots.txt. By definition spiders are expected to obey the instructions in the robots.txt file. You can direct which directories and files are okay to index, and which are not. That is the entire purpose of robots.txt - it is not the spider's fault if you did not know to use it. Now if you did use one and it ignored it, thats another matter.
As for the methods used by the spiders, it is simply more efficient in most cases for a spider to make a local copy of the file and do its indexing on that copy rather than to index directly over the web. In either case it has to actually download the entire page to do so, its simply a matter of whether or not it keeps the copy it downloaded in its database.
The spider I helped to create had 2 parts, one of which visited the site and built up a list of links on the server after reading the robots.txt to determine which were legitimate targets for indexing. It saved the files locally on our HD. The second process read the files locally and indexed the results, storing them in a database. The reason for this was simply to avoid having to visit a site twice - and avoid problems occuring when a page was changed in between the first visit and the indexing (grabbing links is much quicker than indexing so the indexer tends to fall behind over time).Also indexing from local files is much faster and more generally efficient.
It is basically impossible to make a spider that does not download the page (after all that is exactly what you do when you view it with a browser), and keeping a copy on the HD is also entirely practical. Otherwise you end up with twice the traffic when the spider hits your site.
This is twice now that I have posted a story suggestion to slashdot *hours* before the story that appears on the front page. Man, I get sick of this. Makes me feel its not worth suggesting stories....
The human gene sequence is in the public domain and will remain there - anything else would be ludicrous (although I agree that when it comes to the law ludicrous seems to be perfectly acceptable. Witness patenting software algorithms). What I believe they will get the patent on is their process for deriving the gene sequences - which is perfectly acceptable. They will also have the rights to their database of human gene information, which they can license the access rights to. The Human Genome Project will be making its results publically available, so it might become a matter of whose database provides the most ancilliary information.
Adding things like LIMITED weapons, ammo & powerups would require people to conserve their ammo and to play strategically, rather than switching over to rocket launcher, putting it on autorun and holding down their fire button.
This is exactly why I have been spending too much time playing the free Counterstrike mod for Halflife. Halflife is already a fantastic game, but the CS mod to it has improved the online play so greatly that I think it easily surpasses the quality of game play of any other online game in this genre. There are no powerups, you can only purchase weapons you can afford - and you get paid for killing your opponents in game cash, so you must be successful to get the good weapons.
If you have not heard of it, Counterstrike pits teams of Terrorists (sometimes with hostages sometimes with a target to be bombed) against teams of Counter-Terrorists in a variety of real-world situations. More recent additions include assassination scenarios (where the Counter-Terrorists must escort a VIP who is armed only with a knife - and played by one of the CT players - to a safe zone on the far side of the map), and escape scenarios (where the Terrorists must escape from a dangerous and disadvantageous situtation to a safe zone on the far side of the map). The maps cover a wide variety of fascinating tactical challenges, ranging from a hostage situation onboard a 747 in an airport to a VIP Assassination scenario on an oilrig. Brilliant stuff.
In contrast to most online shooters, CS requires you to be careful, plan your moves, and cooperate with other players on your team to be successful. You can run into a room with gun blazing but often as not you will be shot dead by the guy with the shotgun in the shadows. It does not have stupidly overpowerful weapons - all of the weapons in the game are realworld items with realistic (sic) performance. Not all weapons are available to both sides either - although a lot of care has gone into ensuring the balance of play.
All round this is an amazing effort on the part of the CS developers, and well deserving of a good look by anyone who owns Halflife.
Or you can write your own, and manage to get a few users using it. I wrote my own version in PHP3, and because of that I now understand the interface much better than if I had simply setup the existing slashcode version and used it. I would recommend that anyone who wants to create a similiar interface design their own, rather than use the slashcode per se. I admit, mine is simpler, and lacks a lot of features that slashdot has, but I understand it all, and can make any required changes myself. Decrypting someone elses perl scripting is a task I do not want to contemplate facing. Of course, my site focuses on an entirely different topic and some adds features that slashdot doesn't have as well.
I have not read the perl scripts for slashdot, so my version is based entirely on my own code. I did spend a lot of time analyzing the slashdot site from the user's perspective though, so some variables have the same names for instance. My site has a long way to go still of course.
The essential problem for prospective webmasters is that the current slashdot already covers technical issues so well, and with such a large audience that encouraging folks to visit another site on the same topics is basically impossible. Why visit the lesser cousin when the original site has so much more information? If you are focusing on a different topic, with a different prospective audience you might stand a chance of success...
Its a long, slow uphill battle to get sufficient traffic to make a slashdot-like interface useful to users. I am only just starting to make some headway on this front, and I think the only reason I have made any headway at all is that I already had an audience before I redesigned the site to include a messageboard system.
Oh, if you are curious, my site is called Omphalos, and is located at: http://www.omphalos.net and focuses on modern Paganism (so its not for all users).
Actually, I think the reason that most Canadians react so forceably to the US propensity for firearms ownership is that we get along just fine without everyone and his dog owning their own handgun/automatic assault rifle/machine gun or what-have-you. Our *national* annual murder rate is (I am led to understand) equal to the annual murder rate of the city of Detroit alone. If this is the case, then it obviously works for us. Canadians as a whole seem completely unable to understand the US fascination with firearms. But then you probably don't understand our peculiarities - tea, curling, and the incredibly divisive issue of bilingualism to nane a few. This is probably not the place to discuss this at all since its completely offtopic.
As for Western Canadians liking the US better than Ontario - well, at least in my opinion - I dislike both equally. Washington State is okay, I have visited it several times and always liked the folks I met. The culture there is *almost* Canadian when you are near the border. On the rest of the US I have little or no opinion. On Ontario, well I lived there when I was in the Armed Forces, but I cannot say I liked the place all that much - except Ottawa and Kingston both of which are nice places to live (except for the weather).
All in all I am content to stay right here in Victoria...
Bravo! Nice to see an American who doesn't have time for mindless nationalism (of whatever nation). Unfortunately, the yahoos out there often give the impression that *all* Americans are that way.
And while we are identifying our national origins, just for the record I am Canadian, and proud to be so. I also served in our Armed Forces (such as they are - good but waaaaay too small and underequiped.). I can't stand mindless support of any nation by any citizen - even if they are Canadian. Our government does stupid things, so does yours. Our culture has its disreputable elements - so does yours. Some of our laws suck, and so do yours. Any everyone elses.
I personally think the time is coming when we need to stop thinking nationally and start thinking globally.
Jonathan Tweet is involved
Oh, I have exchanged emails with him before I believe, back when I frequented alt.design.games, and was impressed with the quality of his ideas. So perhaps I should check it out.
Have they finally dropped character classes in favour of a skills-based system? or is it not *that* evolved yet?
I think the world needs a simple set of rules with complex possibilities - and that is the focus of the rules I am writing myself. Originally, D&D met that criteria - you could explain it to someone in under 15 mins so they could play it. With the volume of rules for the typical RPG these days, you practically need a degree - at least a short college course - to be able to play and use even a significant fragment of the rules system.
I have to get away from programming and back to writing my system I suppose. It does not seem right criticizing other systems without having something to point at and say "This does it better" and why. :)
Then, of course, landing comes closer, and we are glutted with money from NASA. But what's the point? We get 10 sysadmins one month before landing, and we have to spend hours training them up; much more preferable to have had one good one ten months before!
I hate the inconsistency of this. Far better to give NASA a fixed budget of sufficient funds to tackle all of their projects and let you folks handle how its spent. This is supposed to be about science, not political maneuvering to gain sufficient funds to complete projects - and then getting the funds too late to be of use.
For my part, the exploration of space is the most important challenge facing humanity, we should be spending whatever is necessary to make it possible. The scientific spinoffs from space exploration have had a tremendous impact on a multitude of industries worldwide, and the benefits easily outweigh the costs associated. Besides, its not like the money isn't spent here on earth :)
So what? A company that produces paper-based RPGs is going to Open Source the rules system - ie they are going to capitalize on current buzzwords and try to revive a lousy RPG system. It might be the most popular because it was first, but that doesn't make it better. I started playing D&D back in 1978, and kept with it until better alternatives came out. I was even unhappy with those and every group I played with added its own variants to the rules.
I eventually decided that if I was so damn critical of every system I had tried that I should put my effort where my mouth is and write my own RPG system (I have been doing it for the last 3 years now, and its a never ending project. 128 pgs written though). If I release my version (when complete) as Open Source will it get this attention? No way. This is only news because a bigname company can marshal the attention by dropping a buzzword or two.
Making the D20 rules system open source is fairly meaningless since you cannot copyright the rules themselves in any case, all you can copyright is the manual text, diagrams, charts and artwork - and of course trademarked names.
The truth is, there have been open source - truly open source, text and all - RPGs out there for several years. The best known is probably one called FUDGE. There are many others.
Its not news to me.
As always with anything to do with Space, if you want the latest information on this issue, be sure to check Spaceref.com and NASA Watch. In this matter, I believe NASA Watch was reporting a possible engine problem back in November - although there was no corroborating evidence at the time. The fact that they knew about the problems with the MPL was reported yesterday.
Certainly, some heads are going to roll in NASA, and hopefully the blame gets placed where it should be - on the shoulders of whoever decided to cover this up. Also, blame should apparently be placed on the folks at Lockheed Martin (the company that I believe built the engines on the MPL) who must have known there was a problem with their engines.
The biggest problem is of course the budget for NASA, which has been steadily decreasing over the last few years. I think it is ludicrous of us to expect NASA to launch missions like these without a proper budget for development, manufacturing, and testing of the equipment. In this case, apparently the money was simply not there to afford a complete test of the whole landing proceedure - which would have made it obvious that the engines were not going to work and that the censors for shutting them off would not work either.
OTOH, it is also criminal for a project of this magnitude and expense to go ahead with a known flaw that will prevent its success, and those responsible should be called to the mat for their explanations.
Sadly, this will probably put space exploration back several years, and the blame will probably end up on the shoulders of good people who didn't deserve it.
Yes, but if I recall correctly, it is *only* the media that is reporting that cphack allows you to see the passwords. Matthew's page explaining the process they went through and including the description of cphack is (now, thanks to Mattel's long reach) gone from its server. But I believe I recall reading that it *does not* do anything other than reveal the list of URLs which are blocked - end of story.
This means that all it makes possible for some kid using a Cyberpatrolled machine is to see the list of sites which are banned. Not change the list, edit the list, or bypass it. Granted some of the websites that are listed probably have names which are in bad taste to most folks, but thats about it.
This court case seems to be more about how well a big company can crush any opposition, regardless of legality or any sense of right or wrong. The media is simply playing the tunes for them as Mattel dances. Practically every story on this issue that I have read was based on content from the original, badly written and quite slanted report from AP.
One of the stories I read even identified Mr Johannson (spelling?) as *believed to be living in Norway* - as if he was some sort of criminal on the run.
Every story has stated the software allows you to see the passwords - which is false AFAIK. I would ask Matthew but he has been told not to discuss this at all with anyone by his lawyers.