That is a nice game sir. Just saved the link to it to, err, analyze it better over the weekend.
Seriously, I once created a simple logic puzzle in Java and seeing what you did makes me want to port it to HTML5 to make it easier to be shared. And performance is not really an issue in that kind of game.
So, 89% give the all Kindle 4+ stars and by that measure the new Kindle Fire has not been that well recieved.
Numbers are not everything, also. If you read the old 1-star reviews you'll find mostly people with hardware problems but most people were saying the equivalent of "If you get a good one you'll be happy with it" (And a 6.5% failure might be acceptable to Amazon, who knows?). This time, 1-star reviews are really grinding Amazon.
I guess it depends on how you read the article. I saw it as saying the Kindle Fire is a blazing success and comparing it with the e-ink Kindle I think the article is correct. Last year I browsed the Kindle reviews (in the Amazon page and other sites) for two months before purchasing mine (which I'm really happy about, BTW).
Last year some people reported problems with the hardware, lockups and things like that but there were much more people happy with it. This year I've checked the reviews too (thinking of giving a Fire as a gift) and decided to skip this device for the time being because I found many well-written negative reviews and positive reviews that acknowledged the same problems but said that there minor for them. So, I had the same impression this NYT article gets.
It's selling well? Sure. It's as loved as the previous Kindle? Don't think so.
"The advanced extension compatibility fixing has been removed starting with Nightly Tester Tools 2.5, instead there is a checkbox to disable extension compatibility checking for all addons. Users are encouraged to install the Addon Compatibility Reporter which does the same thing but lets you also report feedback on compatibility to extension authors."
So, if I understand correctly, from now on the Compatibility Reporter is what non-beta-testers could use for dealing with broken extensions.
I know major number upgrades affect addons, so follow minor upgrades but I don't apply major version upgrades (I waited at least a month before upgrading to Firefox 4).
This rapid releases will make me less prone to update, not the other way around. Firefox developers are forgetting that addons are a main feature of the browser for many of us.
Way offtopic but you reminded me of an argument of a comic of Jenny Sparks (The Authority) where Hitler is a miserable mediocre painter who tries to sell his work in the street, and Sparks tells him that he should change career and how perhaps politics is a good choice for him.
Sadly this seems to be the deal in journalism at the moment. Everything is sacrificed in order to be first to publish or, if not first then, not too far behind. Accuracy appears to be sacrificed in the race to publish.
At least your worry number 2 is somewhat valid.
I have a Dell machine whose CPU fan goes faster when the CPU works harder (and therefore gets hotter). After a few weeks of running F@H the machine failed. Luckily it was still in warranty and a new motherboard solved the problem without data-loss.
So, I learned that my machine was not built for constant processor work even when it had been (and still is) excellent for irregular heavy usage (Java development)
I don't think english is a "piece of shit".
I'm not a native english speaker and I like english because I feel that I can say some technical things more accurately than in my native language. This is related to the same ubiquity you mention in your post.
Languages are complex and have exceptions because the world they are supposed to describe is changing and forcing them to change as well.
I've found that the people who tries to encapsulate a language in terms of rules complains about the exceptions and say that x language is hard. I've seen this happen to people learning spanish, english and french.
I also disagree with automatic checkins because of changes that affect several files. Even CVS doesn't get this right. You need atomic commits to ensure consistent states even in the case of major changes (like API changes, by example).
A graphical aproach I've seen to handle ant scripts is done by NetBeans. Starting with version 4 all the project management is ant-based and you can add targets and parameters from the IDE.
Last time I used it the paths were added as absolute paths so I continued editing my scripts by hand, though.
Switching desktops hitting the edge is not the thing for everyone. I tried that a long time ago in Afterstep (or WindowMaker, perhaps) thinking it would be cool but I switched it off because I realised that it was more usable for me to be able to use the borders to get to some icons in the dockbar. I love virtual desktops (and tabbed browsing) but I rather switch some other way.
"This is the first release of the new Tomcat 5.5 branch, and as such it is not yet stable. We expect significant additional changes, including possible changes to packaging, dependencies, and Tomcat internal APIs, before the first 5.5 stable release is made."
Slashdot Mirror
That is a nice game sir. Just saved the link to it to, err, analyze it better over the weekend.
Seriously, I once created a simple logic puzzle in Java and seeing what you did makes me want to port it to HTML5 to make it easier to be shared. And performance is not really an issue in that kind of game.
Kudos!
People keep comparing this with the iPad and the article does mention iPad rating but it mention those of the previous Kindle too.
From Amazon:
Kindle Keyboard (formerly 3rd gen): 34,590 reviews: 72% - 5 stars, 17% - 4 stars, 4.6% - 3 stars, 2.5% - 2 stars, 4% - 1 star
So, 89% give the all Kindle 4+ stars and by that measure the new Kindle Fire has not been that well recieved.
Numbers are not everything, also. If you read the old 1-star reviews you'll find mostly people with hardware problems but most people were saying the equivalent of "If you get a good one you'll be happy with it" (And a 6.5% failure might be acceptable to Amazon, who knows?). This time, 1-star reviews are really grinding Amazon.
I guess it depends on how you read the article. I saw it as saying the Kindle Fire is a blazing success and comparing it with the e-ink Kindle I think the article is correct. Last year I browsed the Kindle reviews (in the Amazon page and other sites) for two months before purchasing mine (which I'm really happy about, BTW).
Last year some people reported problems with the hardware, lockups and things like that but there were much more people happy with it. This year I've checked the reviews too (thinking of giving a Fire as a gift) and decided to skip this device for the time being because I found many well-written negative reviews and positive reviews that acknowledged the same problems but said that there minor for them. So, I had the same impression this NYT article gets.
It's selling well? Sure.
It's as loved as the previous Kindle? Don't think so.
From the page you linked:
"The advanced extension compatibility fixing has been removed starting with Nightly Tester Tools 2.5, instead there is a checkbox to disable extension compatibility checking for all addons. Users are encouraged to install the Addon Compatibility Reporter which does the same thing but lets you also report feedback on compatibility to extension authors."
So, if I understand correctly, from now on the Compatibility Reporter is what non-beta-testers could use for dealing with broken extensions.
Exactly!
I know major number upgrades affect addons, so follow minor upgrades but I don't apply major version upgrades (I waited at least a month before upgrading to Firefox 4).
This rapid releases will make me less prone to update, not the other way around. Firefox developers are forgetting that addons are a main feature of the browser for many of us.
Sometimes they have, but not always: http://scienceblogs.com/cortex/2008/01/expensive_wine_tastes_better.php
After a year developing a web application meant to work in IE7 but where FF was everyones favorite browser, I should know.
Really funny scene.
At least your worry number 2 is somewhat valid. I have a Dell machine whose CPU fan goes faster when the CPU works harder (and therefore gets hotter). After a few weeks of running F@H the machine failed. Luckily it was still in warranty and a new motherboard solved the problem without data-loss. So, I learned that my machine was not built for constant processor work even when it had been (and still is) excellent for irregular heavy usage (Java development)
Languages are complex and have exceptions because the world they are supposed to describe is changing and forcing them to change as well.
I've found that the people who tries to encapsulate a language in terms of rules complains about the exceptions and say that x language is hard. I've seen this happen to people learning spanish, english and french.
I also disagree with automatic checkins because of changes that affect several files. Even CVS doesn't get this right. You need atomic commits to ensure consistent states even in the case of major changes (like API changes, by example).
and yet is modded Insightful?
Like we need another reason to avoid upgrading to Vista?
The TabMix extension does this. Also allows to un-close tabs (really useful) and other things.
A graphical aproach I've seen to handle ant scripts is done by NetBeans. Starting with version 4 all the project management is ant-based and you can add targets and parameters from the IDE.
Last time I used it the paths were added as absolute paths so I continued editing my scripts by hand, though.
Of course XML is not a typesetting system, although XSL can be used to produce LaTeX output and, therefore, be as good.
Switching desktops hitting the edge is not the thing for everyone. I tried that a long time ago in Afterstep (or WindowMaker, perhaps) thinking it would be cool but I switched it off because I realised that it was more usable for me to be able to use the borders to get to some icons in the dockbar. I love virtual desktops (and tabbed browsing) but I rather switch some other way.
Just for the record: NetBeans also allows plugins.
Although it's true that there ain't many...
And there's a new version to celebrate: http://download.openoffice.org/1.1.3/index.html/
It's important to note that:
From http://jakarta.apache.org/site/news/news-2004-2nd