I have an idea. How about letting the human species's immune system continue to adapt for the flu rather than short-circuiting continued adaptation the way we are in countless other areas by creating drugs that then eventually become ineffective as the diseases evolve while human immune systems devolve?
You seem to be lumping vaccination in with other anti-infectious measures that protect you from exposure, such as sterilizing potentially infectious objects or wearing disposable gloves, but in this case your concerns are not valid.
Vaccination stimulates the human species' [no need for "s" after the apostrophe] immune system by exposing it to a safe version of the pathogen. In this way the immune system continues to "adapt for the flu", exactly as you had hoped, and in no way short-circuits the continued adaptation. As the influenza virus mutates, so does the vaccination, and each year the scientists try to figure out which strain of flu to protect against. (One year they guessed wrong, and the flu vaccine ended up next to useless as it protected against a strain of flu that only appeared in a small minority of people.)
Even for other vaccinations such as TdaP (tetanus, diphtheria, acellular pertussis) which is given only every ten years, vaccinations don't interfere with adaptation. The special case you may be thinking of is with smallpox, which was completely eradicated to the point that there is no further need for vaccination. That is not interference with adaptation, since:
any reintroduction of smallpox is by artificial means, so in any case adaptation has nothing to do with it
it's not worthwhile continuing to administer smallpox vaccine to let the immune system "adapt" to a potential smallpox outbreak, since the smallpox vaccine itself has a number of significant side effects. I myself was offered the smallpox vaccine shortly after the Sept11 incidents, and there was a non-negligible chance of serious illness including hospitalization and, by extension, death. (I did accept, but the threat level then decreased and it was no longer considered necessary.)
if smallpox were to return due to natural circumstances rather than some human reintroducing the locked-up version, it would evolve from an existing virus in the wild, and vaccinations would play no part in whether the human immune system adapted
Letting the human immune system adapt doesn't work all that well. SARS is an example of a virus for which we don't have a vaccine, and it had a mortality rate approaching 10%. That sucks. No antibiotics or other antimicrobial drugs, either, so you can't blame it on that.
I don't know if you're actually referring to the use of antibiotics, where pathogens do evolve against a fixed, unchanging drug molecule, but there are certainly advantages to having antibiotics, too, just as there are appropriate circumstances for sterilizing medical instruments or wearing disposable gloves. Nowadays we can treat skin cancer by a simple office procedure, for which the risk is negligible. Can you imagine if we didn't use sterile instruments, or if the doctor didn't wear sterile gloves, or we couldn't treat a surgical wound infection with antibiotics?
Be careful not to confuse excessive anti-exposure measures with vaccination, which takes leverages rather than suppresses the immune system.
We cannot break Skype encryption, and we have publicly announced that, so it's perfectly safe for you to keep on using it! Really!
This is exactly what I would proclaim if I was able to decrypt the traffic and want users to think that I couldn't. Maybe not all whatever terrorists would fall for this but some would.
But then again, maybe they're smarter than this. Maybe they really can't break it. But they want you to think they can break it, so they tell you they can't, because they know terrorists (and slashdotters) always expect the government to try and mislead them.
Well, I hope this brings more public awareness of the pitfalls of closed-source software, and its open-source alternatives such as OpenWengo. Even law-abiding users who don't mind using a proprietary solution like Skype should be aware of open alternatives, just as Slashdot geeks will often use unencrypted email but know how to use OpenPGP when the situation calls for it.
GNOME has user-configurable key shortcuts (GNOME has it's own term called keybinding or depending on what you mean accelerator keys), if it means you want to give "shortcuts" to menu items, just set/desktop/gnome/interface/can_change_accels gconf key to true. Then you can set accelerator key to whatever you want when you hover on a menu item.
Oh, GNOME has that? I didn't know that. Maybe it's time to give GNOME another look.
Would you know if the key configs are stored in a file that I can replicate on other systems? That is, if I've got the keys set to what I want, can I copy the file from my laptop to my desktop (or vice versa) and have them take effect, rather than going through all the menus and pressing the keys again?
Also, is there any danger of me pressing a key accidentally while on a menu item? Normally I would use (say) Alt-F to get the File Menu, then cursor down, and space (let's say). Does that mean that the Space key will be redefined as that menu item? What if the mouse accidentally moves by a pixel before I hit the space key --can it still tell that the mouse move was accidental?
Also, am I able to use the Meta key (labeled as the Windows symbol on most keyboards)?
This is exciting --maybe I will once again have the choice of using either desktop environment after all.
Asimov did say it first, and not just in fiction
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Earth's Moon is a Rarity
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· Score: 4, Interesting
As you probably know, Asimov wrote not only fiction, but non-fiction for the masses, and was rightly well-known for the way in which he made science not just understandable but interesting. He explained in a number of works, including The Tragedy Of The Moon, explaining how unique the moon is.
As noted in the parent post, Asimov will often incorporate real science into his fiction.
So, what's this about how the Earth's moon is unique? Is this something new?
Thank you for providing a link to the survey. The survey was not on the main page; the link there merely led a page that blabbed all about how wonderful it was to have a survey, etc. but didn't point to THE ACTUAL SURVEY. Grrr! (Okay, now that I've said this, someone's going to point out some obvious link to the survey, but I had trouble getting to the survey.)
Before we get into a GNOME vs KDE flamewar...
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KDE 4.0 RC 1 Released
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· Score: 2, Insightful
It's already starting. People are volunteering to post messages of the format: "(x) sucks! Real people like me use (1-x) instead!" where x = KDE or GNOME, and KDE+GNOME=1.
Anyway, let me step outside all this and say what *I* wish. I wish that KDE and GNOME apps would let the user choose what widget set to use. I think each of KDE and GNOME have applications that simply have no counterpart with the same quality. KDE has Amarok and K3b, while GNOME has Firefox and GIMP, not to mention non-KDE/non-GNOME apps like OpenOffice and FontForge. I'm glad that it's possible to run all of these under any desktop environment we choose --I myself happen to use the KDE desktop even for GNOME apps.
But those file dialogs and other GNOME widgets are just different enough from KDE to be irritating. In addition to the old debate about whether the "OK" or the "Cancel" button should be on the left, the file dialog shortcuts are inconsistent. Bookmarks for KDE file dialogs don't show up in GNOME apps, and the tree navigation in GNOME is different from KDE. I can never remember whether I click once or twice to get to that part of the directory tree.
Wouldn't it be nice to be able to set apps to use a certain type of widget, the way KDE has modified OpenOffice so that it's only partially inconsistent with KDE, and maybe even make it user-customizable on the spot? (Yes, I know I'm dreaming, but still...) Then all the volunteer recruits in the KDE/GNOME flamewar to go bash things out somewhere else, and the rest of us could get on with just plain using the various applications.
Yes, choice is good. GNOME is good, KDE is good, and Xfce, Enlightenment and twm are good. But we've come a long way, so let's set our sights a bit higher now.
Release Candidate or Beta --what's the diff?
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KDE 4.0 RC 1 Released
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· Score: 5, Insightful
Am I alone in thinking that people are abusing the term "Release Candidate"? Since there already is a term, "beta", that means "functional, with minor bugs to be ironed out", I would consider "Release Candidate" to refer to a true candidate --that is, it might really be released! KDE (or whoever the responsible author is) might say: "Okay, all those of you who downloaded Release Candidate x (where x=1,2,...), you can just go ahead and keep using it, because the RC has turned into the real thing."
Software or distros that are "coming together" are not Release Candidates. They have no possibility of being released. Suppose everyone who tried this KDE4 RC1 said, "Yup, everything works fine! No changes need to be made," would KDE release it? No, because they're NOT DONE YET --Plasma still has to be put together. Since they won't be releasing this version at all, it shouldn't be called a Release Candidate. It's another beta.
There's no shame in calling it beta (heck, half of Google's services are labeled beta); I don't see the need to keep advancing the terms. What's next? If "Release Candidate" comes to mean "beta", should we start using the term "Release Candidate with Potential For Use Unchanged"?
Maybe someone can correct on this if I'm wrong. What makes this a Release Candidate and not a Beta?
(Btw, diehard KDE fan here --I'm not even considering GNOME until they start having user-configurable key shortcuts. Waiting for KDE4 final release in December to be worked into Gutsy so I can put it on my Came-With-Ubuntu laptop.)
The title and summary do not explain what NAS is. Nor have the comments so far.
Of course, any geek worth his/her salt must know what NAS is. Since it must be a very common term for people to use it without explanation, I looked it up on Wikipedia. Now I no longer need to turn in my geek card, because I know that NAS is a 34-year-old American rap musician. It would surely be awesome to invite him home to perform over the network, thus solving problems of scrambled hard disks with the Best Home Network Nas.
Of course, NAS might stand for any number of other things including Network-Attached Storage, Network Access Server, Non-Access Stratum, Network Audio System, or of course that shining epitome of disk failure prevention, the New American Standard bible.
Anyway, I'm glad I'm done scratching my head over this, because I'm developing a bald spot.
The great-grandparent poster, who was anonymous, said:
(I also have to post this anonymously)
Then the grandparent poster said something about the GGP being dishonest. Then you answered:
Basically, my point is this
Of course, you aren't necessarily the GGP poster. Nope. No, sirree. You just see things from his point of view, I'm sure.
And besides, even if you were the GGP poster, no one would notice this reply, buried in a Slashdot thread. And not modded up. We hope.
Anyway, don't worry, we still don't know any more about you beyond your Slashdot alias. At least, not until we Google your handle and comb through your Slashdot posts to see what other details of your identity you've let slip...
Yes, the article gives further specific info that can tell us how seriously the respondents are thinking of switching: 961 respondents 865 said they didn't want to deploy Linux 423 said they would consider non-Windows systems 38 are already switching to non-Windows 106 have not started switching, but expect to switch before 2008 ends (so much for "Windows 7")
What I can't tell is how many people they asked which non-MS system they'd switch to. Did they just ask people who considered non-Windows, or did they ask everyone, "If you were forced to choose non-Windows, which would you choose?" Assuming the former, then they asked 423 people, of which:
118 would choose Mac OS 106 would choose Red Hat Linux 76 would choose SuSE 76 would choose Ubuntu 38 would choose another Linux distro of some sort 17 weren't sure
That makes 431 people, so 8 extra people snuck in there somewhere, but you get the idea. About 2/3 of people (who considered non-MS systems) chose Linux of some sort, although the article chose to "split the vote" and said that Mac OS came out on top. Anyway, that is good news that over a quarter of the 961 respondents said they would consider switching to Linux. It gives Linux more standing in the eyes of hardware manufacturers who, hopefully, will be more willing to offer hardware drivers for Linux. (Broadcom Wireless, are you listening?)
How is MATLAB better than Octave?
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Open Source Math
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· Score: 1
I have the luxury of being in a university environment with a MATLAB site license. I think the benefits are worth what the institution pays.
I'm interested: what are the benefits of MATLAB over Octave?
I previously used MATLAB in university, and have recently discovered Octave. What would I miss in Octave that would be available in MATLAB?
Also, when you say that the benefits are worth what the institution pays, I presume that you might not find it worthwhile if you yourself paid? I can't even find the price for MATLAB for Linux, because the MathWorks web site wants me to log in before quoting a price for me. I'm not sure they're interested in selling copies to individuals.
Slashdot is a blog not a news source. I wish more people would realize that.
Agree. It's time to get this out in the open.
People complain that Slashdot sucks: the headlines are sensationalistic, the editors get commissions based on the number of dupes they post, and articles about 6-month-old events get posted as "news".
So why do I even bother visiting Slashdot? The answer is two things: the community of posters, and Slashcode moderation.
The value of Slashdot is in its community. You and I, dear Slashdotters. Our collective mind will pick through the various articles, point out their flaws, expose sensationalist FUD for what it is (and, surprisingly, will do this equally for anti-Linux and anti-MS FUD), debate various trends, and provide a signficantly international (though heavily USA-centric) perspective.
This value is enhanced by Slashdot's moderating system, so that information and insight can bubble to the top among the mass of inane posts. Metamoderation limits the amount of crack that the moderators can be on.
So, Slashdot editors, take note! *WE* are the reason we are here. *YOU* are not. Many of us don't even bother to read the articles any more, preferring to soak up the collective wisdom of techies from varying age groups and fields. If you piss us off, and the collective community of Slashdot deteriorates, then there's no reason for me (or others) to keep coming back.
The thing that drives me nuts with YouTube is their fixed movie radio (4:3). There's so much good content in 16:9 but encoded in 4:3 by YouTube. When I watch full screen on my 16:9 monitor, I have 1.5" of black bars all around the movie.:-(
When I encounter YouTube videos that are the wrong aspect ratio, I just download it and then play it back with mplayer with the "-aspect 16:9" option. This also works for videos that I want to replay slowly if the movement is too fast to be caught (e.g. cool CGI effects).
If you don't have mplayer, I'm sure any video player worth its disk space would have similar features; anyway, mplayer is multiplatform, so there's hardly any excuse.
Perhaps there's less competition because residential internet is not profitable without a monopoly?
Correct: having a monopoly is more profitable. There are other examples where agencies are government run because it would make sense to have a "monopoly" --say, having only one police force for one jurisdiction.
At the same time, explaining why a monopoly is better for the given circumstances does not remove the fact that it is indeed a monopoly, and that this imposes extra ethical obligations to the general public, which are codified in the laws regarding monopoly. Slashdot has had many discussions on Microsoft's monopoly, so I won't rehash them here, but the gist is that a company can enjoy its monopoly status, and its clients enjoy its services, with some sensible regulation. When that company oversteps its bounds to the detriment of the people, then something needs to be done.
A company shouldn't be able to unilaterally decide what product or service it is going to sell?
Not if it is a local monopoly.
What is this frikin North Korea?
No.
Who should decide what the company is going to offer then?
In general, the people, through their elected representatives and the laws created on behalf of the people. Specifically in this case, I would agree that if there were competition among the network providers and if some other company could say, "We will use the publicly available cables to provide a competing service," then the companies involved should no longer have the legal obligations usually associated with a monopoly.
President Bush?
No, not by himself, anyway.
The Supreme Court?
They might be indirectly involved, but they would not make the day-to-day decisions.
Based on what does anyone other than the company have any right to make that determination?
Based on the lack of competition due to the carrier company (in this case, Comcast) having exclusive control over the cables, and the near-impossible startup costs for another company to come in to compete. While Comcast may not be officially classified as a monopoly, it is a de-facto monopoly in most of its markets (similar to the way Microsoft was determined by the Supreme Court --answering your question about the Supreme Court-- to be effectively a monopoly despite existence of minor competition). Similarly, while access to the Internet may not be officially classified as an essential service, its importance in our everyday lives is well known, to the extent that disaster shelters in the Southern California fires have set up Internet access. I think the agency involved in this case would be the FCC. I wonder if the FTC might be involved --aren't they the ones who get involved in monopoly regulation? In summary, a company's "right" to compete is balanced by its clients' "right" to to choose that company. Comcast is effectively a local monopoly on an essential service, a situation that should come with restrictions for the protection of the people.
It'd be notable if Apple did much worse than this.
1.) It's boxed sales. The people who upgrade via boxed sales are the ones who aren't going to wait to get new hardware to upgrade the OS. These people are likely to be the early adopters who will buy within the first week
Say, that gives me an idea: let's promote Linux with a similar strategy.
So Microsoft will say: "More Windows sold than any other OS." Apple says: "More OS X sold than any other boxed sales." Linux says: "More Linux copies downloaded than any other OS."
Hah! Think big companies are the only ones who can twist statistics to their own ends?
Actually, the issue isn't blocking or throttling, it's sending packets telling you to disconnect from the sender...
This has been repeated a number of times, and I recognize the truth in this, but you need to remember that the bigger picture is that an ISP is trying to change unilaterally how (and whether) it delivers traffic based on content.
If we all complain, "Comcast is sending RST packets!" and then eventually Comcast says, "Okay, fine, no more RST packets," and then goes on to do other forms of extreme traffic shaping, then what? No, we want to nip this in the bud: no ISP, Comcast or not, should be allowed to unilaterally decide, "Hey, we don't like this traffic, so I just won't carry it." or "This is for The Good Of The People to Prevent Piracy" (or "Prevent Undermining Our Glorious President" or whatever).
Moreover, people need to know the implications of traffic shaping / net neutrality / dearth of ISP competition. I was very frustrated about how BitTorrent has been marginalized as "something that only pirates would use". The more we show the lay public the many versatile uses for a protocol like BitTorrent (or any other protocol, really), the more we get a public response.
Kudos to Bruce Schneier for being a respected voice of reason and (seen to be) a disinterested party to critically analyze the strengths and weaknesses of what will be a backbone of computing (and, indeed, our daily lives).
If I were the NSA trying to work in a back door, instead of coming up with a subtle flaw in the algorithm, I'd get Bruce Schneier to publicly praise an algorithm known to have flaws, while simultaneously offering to pay him a gajillion bucks and threatening his family if he refuses. That would probably derail publicly available encryption for a while. ("Bruce Schneier recommends: WinCrypt Terrorist Edition!")
Okay, sorry, I couldn't resist being snarky. My apologies. Anyway, yeah, snopes says that there really is such a web site, but it doesn't belong to PowerGen.
First Symbian now Microsoft. It sure has the two competitors in a uproar.
Agreed. Microsoft seems rather defensive compared to their usual, given that they are supposedly in a strong market position:
Right now they have a press release, we have many, many... customers, great software...
Gee, what's this, Mr. Ballmer? You mean you don't like it when a Big Company announces way ahead of time that they're coming out with A New System? You're worried that customers will wait and hold off on buying the competitor's systems? Do you find that it sound familiar?
Maybe, Mr. Ballmer, at the next press conference you can say, "Yeah, their promises sound good, but what if they pull a Vista?" Then maybe the general public would become a bit more inured to the time-tested MS strategy of marketing semi-vapourware against products that exist already.
I echo the sentiments of the sibling/parent posters. To sum up:
We have had steady advances in medicine. Just during the time I was in medical school (a decade ago), I was astounded by how much medical science had advanced. By the time I was finishing up on my medical training and getting ready for independent practice, we were being taught: "Remember that treatment for arthritis you learned in second year? Well, we don't do that any more --here's what we do instead..."
However, from the standpoint of the ordinary patient, there has been a problem in one specific area of medical research: Big Pharma. (That's what they call the largest pharmaceutical industries: Pfizer, Merck, Novartis, GSK, Astra-Zeneca, Wyeth, etc.) This is because they are not bringing new drugs to market.
Don't misunderstand me, now. I didn't say that basic research wasn't taking place, or that it didn't have potential to be developed into useful products. I said that Big Pharma was not bringing new drugs to market. I blame this on the profit-centred, corporate-minded groupthink that has been running Big Pharma. In a nutshell, Big Pharma has been mismanaged.
In the pharmaceutical industry, you can see a new drug coming from a long way off. First there has to be basic research; one in ten research studies will show a promising molecule (ie. possible drug candidate). One in ten molecules will be developed into a stable usable form that doesn't have to be sealed in gaseous form or injected directly into the kidney or other impractical things. One in ten usable molecules will show promise when tested on animals. One in ten animal-tested drugs will go on to clinical trials in humans. One in ten human trials will show something that's worthwhile marketing. (Okay, don't take the one-in-ten ratio too literally; a better estimate is that every drug brought to market came from somewhere around 500 to 1000 possible molecules.)
It takes time to go through all these discovery phases, and to go through clinical trials, get approval from the FDA (or equivalent regional drug authority), etc. There's a very long pipeline to go through before a drug gets to market, so you can see right now what sorts of drugs will be coming out five years down the road.
And Big Pharma has, basically, nothing coming out.
This is because there has been a huge merging frenzy in the past decade, almost like an orgy of nested expressions that would do any LisP programmer proud. Toss in SmithKline and Beecham, blend with Burroughs and Wellcome, sprinkle in some Glaxo, bake at high temperature, and out comes a steaming hot GlaxoSmithKline. Then there's Pfizer, gobbling up Warner and Pharmacia / Upjohn, and then spitting out the bones, a process so repetitious that the people eaten up and summarily laid off produced a T-shirt with the oval blue logo in the style of the Pfizer logo that says, "Pfired!"
It's been great for people juggling stocks. Valuations went up, people made money, CEO's made speeches... and they sort of forgot about making any drugs. Instead, they made money through tactics with which any Slashdotter will be disgustingly familiar.
Any of you heard of "patent lawsuits"?
Yup, they went through patents! Hey, little company there, you can't sell our drugs, cuz WE have the patents! We have to make our money! My favourite example: a few years ago, a little company called Andrax sees that the patent for omeprazole (brand name Losec, or Prilosec in the USA) will be expiring soon, so they start developing a generic equivalent, preparing studies for the FDA to show that their generic equivalent is safe and equal to the brand name version. The plan is that, a year later, all the manufacturing equipment and research will be in place and they can start mass producing omeprazole the instant it comes off patent.
What happens? AstraZeneca ("AZ"), owner of the original brand name, sues Andrax for violating the patent. They say that the patent actually
Wow, this is a really interesting conversation, even if it's starting to wander off-topic. Congratulations; it's not often that someone can induce me to answer three times to the same thread. By this time, this article is old enough that most readers have probably moved on to the fresher articles, but I'll answer because I think the answer is worth sharing --and if anyone else has any insight, I'd love to hear it.
Why did you not want to use apt-get?
"newbies don't like the command line"
For me both dselect and apt-get are commandline utilities, that's why I didn't even think about that point of yours... I know that a lot of newbies are afraid of the commandline.... I just can't understand why... for a lot of things it is actually faster and more natural
The answer is actually very simple.
Imagine for a moment that you have just been seated at a restaurant serving ethnic food that is new to you --say, for example, that your new girlfriend (who's dying to learn Linux from you) wants to try out that new Thai restaurant with you (replace "Thai" with any type of cuisine with which you are not familiar).
The waiter comes up to you and, instead of handing you a menu, says, "So, what do you want?" "Well, what do you have?" you ask. He shrugs. "Anything," he says. "What do you mean, 'anything'?" "It means exactly what I said," he answers. "You can order anything you want. We cook hundreds of different dishes, any way you like." "Okay, I'll have a steak." "That's not a Thai dish." "But you said *anything*." "But this is a Thai restaurant. When I said 'anything', I meant anything *Thai*, of course." "Okay, I'll have a typical Thai entree dish." "No such thing as 'Thai entree dish'. You have to tell me which Thai entree dish." "Well I have no idea." "Well, order anything. Anything *Thai*," he adds pointedly. "Such as?" The waiter becomes exasperated. "Well, you can have Pad See Ew, or Tom Yum Gong, or--" At this point, your girlfriend wisely cuts in and says, "Could we have a menu?" The waiter rolls his eyes. "All these newbies wanting to order from a menu! I don't know why you don't just specify what you want. It's a lot faster and a lot more natural to just order directly!"
The point, I'm sure you'll have seen, is that when the command line asks the newbie, "Okay, what do you want to do now?" the newbie has absolutely no idea. There are too many possibilities. Sometimes the newbie will gamely try a command like "check my email" or "email", but the stony response of "bash: email: command not found" quickly puts him in his place. Hell, even *I* forget the ins and outs of some commands with their options (is it "find " or "find "?).
A common mistake, of which I will make yours an example (but you're certainly not alone in this), is that you think the newbie fears text mode. That's why you felt that both apt-get and dselect were command line tools. Now you see the difference? With apt-get, you could type any sequence of characters for a package name and there would be nothing to stop you except some cryptic message, "No such package as 'Thai entree dish'." The "dselect" command limits your options so that it guides you to what you want. You can select packages. It doesn't matter whether the interface is graphical, ncurses, or just "Press 1, 2 or 3". Of course, newbies are more likely to warm up to the GUI, but that's secondary.
I would love to have a tool that showed a menu of choices, either in a GUI or a ncurses text interface, that let me choose common commands, like that confusing "find" command I mentioned earlier. On the "find" window would be a form with a space to fill in "Enter directories to search" and "What filename are you looking for?" with perhaps some radio buttons or checkboxes for various command-line parameters. When you click OK, not only does it execute the comm
Why did you not want to use apt-get? I think it's the way better alternative to dselect.
I will answer you because I think you really genuinely don't know, although I'd classify this as one of those things that are obvious to a newbie but somehow gets missed by veterans.
Using "apt-get" requires that you know what you want to install. There is no "apt-get install one of the board games I already know but doesn't take too long to play". If you know that the chess game you want to install is called "xboard" and needs the chess engine "crafty", yes, you can do "apt-get install xboard crafty". But, as a newbie, I wanted to see a list of games (or whatever type of program I needed), read through the descriptions, etc. Even if I knew (for example) that I could install xboard and crafty, I wanted to see what alternatives there were. You know, kinda like the way you browse through the menu at a restaurant rather than just ordering as you are seated, "I want a 8-ounce steak medium with potatoes."
(And, no, it wasn't the same browsing through FTP listings of the Debian archive; their web site wasn't as good then as it is now.)
So, in a nutshell, apt-get and dselect serve entirely different purposes.
This is apart from the obvious "newbies don't like the command line" platitude that every veteran should have taped to their computer monitor before asking a newbie, "Why don't you just..."
I've been reading the Ubuntu forums on feature requests etc. As a Kubuntu user, I feel like I'm irrelevant or left out.
There are lively discussions going on in Ubuntu about what can be improved. As I read through the list, I think, "Wait, that's already fixed in Kubuntu. Don't these peopel talk to each other?" To be sure, a lot of the time it's because the KDE system is more tightly integrated than GNOME, but sometimes it's just that the KDE app already has the feature and the GNOME app doesn't. (Didn't I read a Slashdot comment some months earlier wishing for a terminal app that would automatically reflow lines when the window was resized? I've been using one for the past few years.)
For example, this comment in this very thread says:
- Recursive file permissions and ownership changes: Nautilus' interface for this clunky and doesn't work right. - Directory compare & synchronization: sync two folders by content. Yes, I know there are tools for this, but most of them are too difficult for the average user to setup and use. - Easy interface for massive file renames by pattern matching. See the support for this in Total Commander. Really easy.
All of these are irrelevant in Kubuntu, which can do recursive renaming in Konqueror, easy one-click synchronize in Krusader (and Konqueror, too, I think), and the awesome file renamer Krename; they were already available in the v6.06 Long-Term Support version.
On the other hand, Kubuntu has some issues that are completely ignored in mainstream GNOME Ubuntu. There's all this hoopla about Meta Tracker being installed --do I understand correctly that it doesn't work with KDE? Instead, Kubuntu has to use Strigi. And there has been a problem with Kopete, which is generally ignored by GNOME users.
Also, the timing of Ubuntu releases like Gutsy are based on GNOME releases, but the newest version of KDE (3.5.8) came out half a month after Gutsy. But that's not what I'm drooling over; I'm waiting for KDE 4 to come out in December. I don't know how long it will take for that to make it into Gutsy, but it should make Kubuntu Hardy Heron a wicked, wicked upgrade. And --imagine, when onlookers say, "Wow, I wish I had that software!" then you can reply, "Ok, here's how to run KDE 4 on Windows." One more pathway to FOSS for those people too insecure to let go of their Windows boxen.
So, I'm starting to see Kubuntu being marginalized, which is a pity, since GNOME and KDE have so much to learn from each other.
Btw, lest you think I'm trying to feed the GNOME/KDE wars here, the #1 reason I use KDE over GNOME is that key bindings are configurable in KDE. <rant>When will GNOME get this? Why do I have to invoke the Paste function with Ctrl-V instead of Alt-Shift-F3 (or any other arbitrary key that I want)? When will Mozilla realize that not everyone wants to go to their home page with Alt-Home? (Yes, I know there's A Firefox Extension available, but that doesn't apply for GnuCash or Grip or any number of GNOME programs.) By contrast, you'd be hard-pressed to find a major KDE program that *doesn't* let you assign two possible keybindings to each command. As I geek, keyboard controls mean everything to me, and until GNOME has this feature, I'll be running KDE. </rant>
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Vaccination stimulates the human species' [no need for "s" after the apostrophe] immune system by exposing it to a safe version of the pathogen. In this way the immune system continues to "adapt for the flu", exactly as you had hoped, and in no way short-circuits the continued adaptation. As the influenza virus mutates, so does the vaccination, and each year the scientists try to figure out which strain of flu to protect against. (One year they guessed wrong, and the flu vaccine ended up next to useless as it protected against a strain of flu that only appeared in a small minority of people.)
Even for other vaccinations such as TdaP (tetanus, diphtheria, acellular pertussis) which is given only every ten years, vaccinations don't interfere with adaptation. The special case you may be thinking of is with smallpox, which was completely eradicated to the point that there is no further need for vaccination. That is not interference with adaptation, since:
- any reintroduction of smallpox is by artificial means, so in any case adaptation has nothing to do with it
- it's not worthwhile continuing to administer smallpox vaccine to let the immune system "adapt" to a potential smallpox outbreak, since the smallpox vaccine itself has a number of significant side effects. I myself was offered the smallpox vaccine shortly after the Sept11 incidents, and there was a non-negligible chance of serious illness including hospitalization and, by extension, death. (I did accept, but the threat level then decreased and it was no longer considered necessary.)
- if smallpox were to return due to natural circumstances rather than some human reintroducing the locked-up version, it would evolve from an existing virus in the wild, and vaccinations would play no part in whether the human immune system adapted
- Letting the human immune system adapt doesn't work all that well. SARS is an example of a virus for which we don't have a vaccine, and it had a mortality rate approaching 10%. That sucks. No antibiotics or other antimicrobial drugs, either, so you can't blame it on that.
I don't know if you're actually referring to the use of antibiotics, where pathogens do evolve against a fixed, unchanging drug molecule, but there are certainly advantages to having antibiotics, too, just as there are appropriate circumstances for sterilizing medical instruments or wearing disposable gloves. Nowadays we can treat skin cancer by a simple office procedure, for which the risk is negligible. Can you imagine if we didn't use sterile instruments, or if the doctor didn't wear sterile gloves, or we couldn't treat a surgical wound infection with antibiotics?Be careful not to confuse excessive anti-exposure measures with vaccination, which takes leverages rather than suppresses the immune system.
Would you know if the key configs are stored in a file that I can replicate on other systems? That is, if I've got the keys set to what I want, can I copy the file from my laptop to my desktop (or vice versa) and have them take effect, rather than going through all the menus and pressing the keys again?
Also, is there any danger of me pressing a key accidentally while on a menu item? Normally I would use (say) Alt-F to get the File Menu, then cursor down, and space (let's say). Does that mean that the Space key will be redefined as that menu item? What if the mouse accidentally moves by a pixel before I hit the space key --can it still tell that the mouse move was accidental?
Also, am I able to use the Meta key (labeled as the Windows symbol on most keyboards)?
This is exciting --maybe I will once again have the choice of using either desktop environment after all.
As you probably know, Asimov wrote not only fiction, but non-fiction for the masses, and was rightly well-known for the way in which he made science not just understandable but interesting. He explained in a number of works, including The Tragedy Of The Moon, explaining how unique the moon is.
As noted in the parent post, Asimov will often incorporate real science into his fiction.
So, what's this about how the Earth's moon is unique? Is this something new?
Thank you for providing a link to the survey. The survey was not on the main page; the link there merely led a page that blabbed all about how wonderful it was to have a survey, etc. but didn't point to THE ACTUAL SURVEY. Grrr! (Okay, now that I've said this, someone's going to point out some obvious link to the survey, but I had trouble getting to the survey.)
It's already starting. People are volunteering to post messages of the format:
...) Then all the volunteer recruits in the KDE/GNOME flamewar to go bash things out somewhere else, and the rest of us could get on with just plain using the various applications.
"(x) sucks! Real people like me use (1-x) instead!"
where x = KDE or GNOME, and KDE+GNOME=1.
Anyway, let me step outside all this and say what *I* wish. I wish that KDE and GNOME apps would let the user choose what widget set to use. I think each of KDE and GNOME have applications that simply have no counterpart with the same quality. KDE has Amarok and K3b, while GNOME has Firefox and GIMP, not to mention non-KDE/non-GNOME apps like OpenOffice and FontForge. I'm glad that it's possible to run all of these under any desktop environment we choose --I myself happen to use the KDE desktop even for GNOME apps.
But those file dialogs and other GNOME widgets are just different enough from KDE to be irritating. In addition to the old debate about whether the "OK" or the "Cancel" button should be on the left, the file dialog shortcuts are inconsistent. Bookmarks for KDE file dialogs don't show up in GNOME apps, and the tree navigation in GNOME is different from KDE. I can never remember whether I click once or twice to get to that part of the directory tree.
Wouldn't it be nice to be able to set apps to use a certain type of widget, the way KDE has modified OpenOffice so that it's only partially inconsistent with KDE, and maybe even make it user-customizable on the spot? (Yes, I know I'm dreaming, but still
Yes, choice is good. GNOME is good, KDE is good, and Xfce, Enlightenment and twm are good. But we've come a long way, so let's set our sights a bit higher now.
Am I alone in thinking that people are abusing the term "Release Candidate"? Since there already is a term, "beta", that means "functional, with minor bugs to be ironed out", I would consider "Release Candidate" to refer to a true candidate --that is, it might really be released! KDE (or whoever the responsible author is) might say: "Okay, all those of you who downloaded Release Candidate x (where x=1,2,...), you can just go ahead and keep using it, because the RC has turned into the real thing."
Software or distros that are "coming together" are not Release Candidates. They have no possibility of being released. Suppose everyone who tried this KDE4 RC1 said, "Yup, everything works fine! No changes need to be made," would KDE release it? No, because they're NOT DONE YET --Plasma still has to be put together. Since they won't be releasing this version at all, it shouldn't be called a Release Candidate. It's another beta.
There's no shame in calling it beta (heck, half of Google's services are labeled beta); I don't see the need to keep advancing the terms. What's next? If "Release Candidate" comes to mean "beta", should we start using the term "Release Candidate with Potential For Use Unchanged"?
Maybe someone can correct on this if I'm wrong. What makes this a Release Candidate and not a Beta?
(Btw, diehard KDE fan here --I'm not even considering GNOME until they start having user-configurable key shortcuts. Waiting for KDE4 final release in December to be worked into Gutsy so I can put it on my Came-With-Ubuntu laptop.)
The title and summary do not explain what NAS is. Nor have the comments so far.
Of course, any geek worth his/her salt must know what NAS is. Since it must be a very common term for people to use it without explanation, I looked it up on Wikipedia. Now I no longer need to turn in my geek card, because I know that NAS is a 34-year-old American rap musician. It would surely be awesome to invite him home to perform over the network, thus solving problems of scrambled hard disks with the Best Home Network Nas.
Of course, NAS might stand for any number of other things including Network-Attached Storage, Network Access Server, Non-Access Stratum, Network Audio System, or of course that shining epitome of disk failure prevention, the New American Standard bible.
Anyway, I'm glad I'm done scratching my head over this, because I'm developing a bald spot.
And besides, even if you were the GGP poster, no one would notice this reply, buried in a Slashdot thread. And not modded up. We hope.
Anyway, don't worry, we still don't know any more about you beyond your Slashdot alias. At least, not until we Google your handle and comb through your Slashdot posts to see what other details of your identity you've let slip
Just kidding. But be more careful next time, eh?
Sorry about replying to myself --that error slipped by my tired eyes until after I had hit the submit button.
Of 961 people, 865 said no to Vista, and 423 considered non-Windows, of which about 280 (assuming my assumptions are correct) would choose Linux.
Yes, the article gives further specific info that can tell us how seriously the respondents are thinking of switching:
961 respondents
865 said they didn't want to deploy Linux
423 said they would consider non-Windows systems
38 are already switching to non-Windows
106 have not started switching, but expect to switch before 2008 ends (so much for "Windows 7")
What I can't tell is how many people they asked which non-MS system they'd switch to. Did they just ask people who considered non-Windows, or did they ask everyone, "If you were forced to choose non-Windows, which would you choose?" Assuming the former, then they asked 423 people, of which:
118 would choose Mac OS
106 would choose Red Hat Linux
76 would choose SuSE
76 would choose Ubuntu
38 would choose another Linux distro of some sort
17 weren't sure
That makes 431 people, so 8 extra people snuck in there somewhere, but you get the idea. About 2/3 of people (who considered non-MS systems) chose Linux of some sort, although the article chose to "split the vote" and said that Mac OS came out on top. Anyway, that is good news that over a quarter of the 961 respondents said they would consider switching to Linux. It gives Linux more standing in the eyes of hardware manufacturers who, hopefully, will be more willing to offer hardware drivers for Linux. (Broadcom Wireless, are you listening?)
I previously used MATLAB in university, and have recently discovered Octave. What would I miss in Octave that would be available in MATLAB?
Also, when you say that the benefits are worth what the institution pays, I presume that you might not find it worthwhile if you yourself paid? I can't even find the price for MATLAB for Linux, because the MathWorks web site wants me to log in before quoting a price for me. I'm not sure they're interested in selling copies to individuals.
People complain that Slashdot sucks: the headlines are sensationalistic, the editors get commissions based on the number of dupes they post, and articles about 6-month-old events get posted as "news".
So why do I even bother visiting Slashdot? The answer is two things: the community of posters, and Slashcode moderation.
The value of Slashdot is in its community. You and I, dear Slashdotters. Our collective mind will pick through the various articles, point out their flaws, expose sensationalist FUD for what it is (and, surprisingly, will do this equally for anti-Linux and anti-MS FUD), debate various trends, and provide a signficantly international (though heavily USA-centric) perspective.
This value is enhanced by Slashdot's moderating system, so that information and insight can bubble to the top among the mass of inane posts. Metamoderation limits the amount of crack that the moderators can be on.
So, Slashdot editors, take note! *WE* are the reason we are here. *YOU* are not. Many of us don't even bother to read the articles any more, preferring to soak up the collective wisdom of techies from varying age groups and fields. If you piss us off, and the collective community of Slashdot deteriorates, then there's no reason for me (or others) to keep coming back.
Think about it.
If you don't have mplayer, I'm sure any video player worth its disk space would have similar features; anyway, mplayer is multiplatform, so there's hardly any excuse.
There ya go!
At the same time, explaining why a monopoly is better for the given circumstances does not remove the fact that it is indeed a monopoly, and that this imposes extra ethical obligations to the general public, which are codified in the laws regarding monopoly. Slashdot has had many discussions on Microsoft's monopoly, so I won't rehash them here, but the gist is that a company can enjoy its monopoly status, and its clients enjoy its services, with some sensible regulation. When that company oversteps its bounds to the detriment of the people, then something needs to be done.
Similarly, while access to the Internet may not be officially classified as an essential service, its importance in our everyday lives is well known, to the extent that disaster shelters in the Southern California fires have set up Internet access.
I think the agency involved in this case would be the FCC. I wonder if the FTC might be involved --aren't they the ones who get involved in monopoly regulation?
In summary, a company's "right" to compete is balanced by its clients' "right" to to choose that company. Comcast is effectively a local monopoly on an essential service, a situation that should come with restrictions for the protection of the people.
So Microsoft will say: "More Windows sold than any other OS."
Apple says: "More OS X sold than any other boxed sales."
Linux says: "More Linux copies downloaded than any other OS."
Hah! Think big companies are the only ones who can twist statistics to their own ends?
If we all complain, "Comcast is sending RST packets!" and then eventually Comcast says, "Okay, fine, no more RST packets," and then goes on to do other forms of extreme traffic shaping, then what? No, we want to nip this in the bud: no ISP, Comcast or not, should be allowed to unilaterally decide, "Hey, we don't like this traffic, so I just won't carry it." or "This is for The Good Of The People to Prevent Piracy" (or "Prevent Undermining Our Glorious President" or whatever).
Moreover, people need to know the implications of traffic shaping / net neutrality / dearth of ISP competition. I was very frustrated about how BitTorrent has been marginalized as "something that only pirates would use". The more we show the lay public the many versatile uses for a protocol like BitTorrent (or any other protocol, really), the more we get a public response.
Kudos to Bruce Schneier for being a respected voice of reason and (seen to be) a disinterested party to critically analyze the strengths and weaknesses of what will be a backbone of computing (and, indeed, our daily lives).
If I were the NSA trying to work in a back door, instead of coming up with a subtle flaw in the algorithm, I'd get Bruce Schneier to publicly praise an algorithm known to have flaws, while simultaneously offering to pay him a gajillion bucks and threatening his family if he refuses. That would probably derail publicly available encryption for a while. ("Bruce Schneier recommends: WinCrypt Terrorist Edition!")
Maybe, Mr. Ballmer, at the next press conference you can say, "Yeah, their promises sound good, but what if they pull a Vista?" Then maybe the general public would become a bit more inured to the time-tested MS strategy of marketing semi-vapourware against products that exist already.
I echo the sentiments of the sibling/parent posters. To sum up:
..."
... and they sort of forgot about making any drugs. Instead, they made money through tactics with which any Slashdotter will be disgustingly familiar.
We have had steady advances in medicine. Just during the time I was in medical school (a decade ago), I was astounded by how much medical science had advanced. By the time I was finishing up on my medical training and getting ready for independent practice, we were being taught: "Remember that treatment for arthritis you learned in second year? Well, we don't do that any more --here's what we do instead
However, from the standpoint of the ordinary patient, there has been a problem in one specific area of medical research: Big Pharma. (That's what they call the largest pharmaceutical industries: Pfizer, Merck, Novartis, GSK, Astra-Zeneca, Wyeth, etc.) This is because they are not bringing new drugs to market.
Don't misunderstand me, now. I didn't say that basic research wasn't taking place, or that it didn't have potential to be developed into useful products. I said that Big Pharma was not bringing new drugs to market. I blame this on the profit-centred, corporate-minded groupthink that has been running Big Pharma. In a nutshell, Big Pharma has been mismanaged.
In the pharmaceutical industry, you can see a new drug coming from a long way off. First there has to be basic research; one in ten research studies will show a promising molecule (ie. possible drug candidate). One in ten molecules will be developed into a stable usable form that doesn't have to be sealed in gaseous form or injected directly into the kidney or other impractical things. One in ten usable molecules will show promise when tested on animals. One in ten animal-tested drugs will go on to clinical trials in humans. One in ten human trials will show something that's worthwhile marketing. (Okay, don't take the one-in-ten ratio too literally; a better estimate is that every drug brought to market came from somewhere around 500 to 1000 possible molecules.)
It takes time to go through all these discovery phases, and to go through clinical trials, get approval from the FDA (or equivalent regional drug authority), etc. There's a very long pipeline to go through before a drug gets to market, so you can see right now what sorts of drugs will be coming out five years down the road.
And Big Pharma has, basically, nothing coming out.
This is because there has been a huge merging frenzy in the past decade, almost like an orgy of nested expressions that would do any LisP programmer proud. Toss in SmithKline and Beecham, blend with Burroughs and Wellcome, sprinkle in some Glaxo, bake at high temperature, and out comes a steaming hot GlaxoSmithKline. Then there's Pfizer, gobbling up Warner and Pharmacia / Upjohn, and then spitting out the bones, a process so repetitious that the people eaten up and summarily laid off produced a T-shirt with the oval blue logo in the style of the Pfizer logo that says, "Pfired!"
It's been great for people juggling stocks. Valuations went up, people made money, CEO's made speeches
Any of you heard of "patent lawsuits"?
Yup, they went through patents! Hey, little company there, you can't sell our drugs, cuz WE have the patents! We have to make our money! My favourite example: a few years ago, a little company called Andrax sees that the patent for omeprazole (brand name Losec, or Prilosec in the USA) will be expiring soon, so they start developing a generic equivalent, preparing studies for the FDA to show that their generic equivalent is safe and equal to the brand name version. The plan is that, a year later, all the manufacturing equipment and research will be in place and they can start mass producing omeprazole the instant it comes off patent.
What happens? AstraZeneca ("AZ"), owner of the original brand name, sues Andrax for violating the patent. They say that the patent actually
The answer is actually very simple.
Imagine for a moment that you have just been seated at a restaurant serving ethnic food that is new to you --say, for example, that your new girlfriend (who's dying to learn Linux from you) wants to try out that new Thai restaurant with you (replace "Thai" with any type of cuisine with which you are not familiar).
The waiter comes up to you and, instead of handing you a menu, says, "So, what do you want?"
"Well, what do you have?" you ask.
He shrugs. "Anything," he says.
"What do you mean, 'anything'?"
"It means exactly what I said," he answers. "You can order anything you want. We cook hundreds of different dishes, any way you like."
"Okay, I'll have a steak."
"That's not a Thai dish."
"But you said *anything*."
"But this is a Thai restaurant. When I said 'anything', I meant anything *Thai*, of course."
"Okay, I'll have a typical Thai entree dish."
"No such thing as 'Thai entree dish'. You have to tell me which Thai entree dish."
"Well I have no idea."
"Well, order anything. Anything *Thai*," he adds pointedly.
"Such as?"
The waiter becomes exasperated. "Well, you can have Pad See Ew, or Tom Yum Gong, or--"
At this point, your girlfriend wisely cuts in and says, "Could we have a menu?"
The waiter rolls his eyes. "All these newbies wanting to order from a menu! I don't know why you don't just specify what you want. It's a lot faster and a lot more natural to just order directly!"
The point, I'm sure you'll have seen, is that when the command line asks the newbie, "Okay, what do you want to do now?" the newbie has absolutely no idea. There are too many possibilities. Sometimes the newbie will gamely try a command like "check my email" or "email", but the stony response of "bash: email: command not found" quickly puts him in his place. Hell, even *I* forget the ins and outs of some commands with their options (is it "find " or "find "?).
A common mistake, of which I will make yours an example (but you're certainly not alone in this), is that you think the newbie fears text mode. That's why you felt that both apt-get and dselect were command line tools. Now you see the difference? With apt-get, you could type any sequence of characters for a package name and there would be nothing to stop you except some cryptic message, "No such package as 'Thai entree dish'." The "dselect" command limits your options so that it guides you to what you want. You can select packages. It doesn't matter whether the interface is graphical, ncurses, or just "Press 1, 2 or 3". Of course, newbies are more likely to warm up to the GUI, but that's secondary.
I would love to have a tool that showed a menu of choices, either in a GUI or a ncurses text interface, that let me choose common commands, like that confusing "find" command I mentioned earlier. On the "find" window would be a form with a space to fill in "Enter directories to search" and "What filename are you looking for?" with perhaps some radio buttons or checkboxes for various command-line parameters. When you click OK, not only does it execute the comm
I will answer you because I think you really genuinely don't know, although I'd classify this as one of those things that are obvious to a newbie but somehow gets missed by veterans.
Using "apt-get" requires that you know what you want to install. There is no "apt-get install one of the board games I already know but doesn't take too long to play". If you know that the chess game you want to install is called "xboard" and needs the chess engine "crafty", yes, you can do "apt-get install xboard crafty". But, as a newbie, I wanted to see a list of games (or whatever type of program I needed), read through the descriptions, etc. Even if I knew (for example) that I could install xboard and crafty, I wanted to see what alternatives there were. You know, kinda like the way you browse through the menu at a restaurant rather than just ordering as you are seated, "I want a 8-ounce steak medium with potatoes."
(And, no, it wasn't the same browsing through FTP listings of the Debian archive; their web site wasn't as good then as it is now.)
So, in a nutshell, apt-get and dselect serve entirely different purposes.
This is apart from the obvious "newbies don't like the command line" platitude that every veteran should have taped to their computer monitor before asking a newbie, "Why don't you just
There are lively discussions going on in Ubuntu about what can be improved. As I read through the list, I think, "Wait, that's already fixed in Kubuntu. Don't these peopel talk to each other?" To be sure, a lot of the time it's because the KDE system is more tightly integrated than GNOME, but sometimes it's just that the KDE app already has the feature and the GNOME app doesn't. (Didn't I read a Slashdot comment some months earlier wishing for a terminal app that would automatically reflow lines when the window was resized? I've been using one for the past few years.)
For example, this comment in this very thread says:All of these are irrelevant in Kubuntu, which can do recursive renaming in Konqueror, easy one-click synchronize in Krusader (and Konqueror, too, I think), and the awesome file renamer Krename; they were already available in the v6.06 Long-Term Support version.
On the other hand, Kubuntu has some issues that are completely ignored in mainstream GNOME Ubuntu. There's all this hoopla about Meta Tracker being installed --do I understand correctly that it doesn't work with KDE? Instead, Kubuntu has to use Strigi. And there has been a problem with Kopete, which is generally ignored by GNOME users.
Also, the timing of Ubuntu releases like Gutsy are based on GNOME releases, but the newest version of KDE (3.5.8) came out half a month after Gutsy. But that's not what I'm drooling over; I'm waiting for KDE 4 to come out in December. I don't know how long it will take for that to make it into Gutsy, but it should make Kubuntu Hardy Heron a wicked, wicked upgrade. And --imagine, when onlookers say, "Wow, I wish I had that software!" then you can reply, "Ok, here's how to run KDE 4 on Windows." One more pathway to FOSS for those people too insecure to let go of their Windows boxen.
So, I'm starting to see Kubuntu being marginalized, which is a pity, since GNOME and KDE have so much to learn from each other.
Btw, lest you think I'm trying to feed the GNOME/KDE wars here, the #1 reason I use KDE over GNOME is that key bindings are configurable in KDE. <rant>When will GNOME get this? Why do I have to invoke the Paste function with Ctrl-V instead of Alt-Shift-F3 (or any other arbitrary key that I want)? When will Mozilla realize that not everyone wants to go to their home page with Alt-Home? (Yes, I know there's A Firefox Extension available, but that doesn't apply for GnuCash or Grip or any number of GNOME programs.) By contrast, you'd be hard-pressed to find a major KDE program that *doesn't* let you assign two possible keybindings to each command. As I geek, keyboard controls mean everything to me, and until GNOME has this feature, I'll be running KDE. </rant>