Pretty much all of the ones that aren't in your field.
[Insert your own response]
OK, yes that was unfair -- (La)TeX is widely used in at least three disciplines, to my knowledge (natural sciences, computer science, and mathematics). That still leaves a hell of a lot of other disciplines... Try submitting an essay on 18th-century German nationalism in LaTeX and see what mark you get.
[Insert your own response]
Yes, there'll always be exceptions. Maybe some prof in the French department at the University of Woollongong happens to accept LaTeX. They're still exceptions.
Try the Beta 2 version of OpenOffice 2.0 - it's much improved over the 1.x releases.
I would except for a couple of regressive bugs which are for me application-killers, and which aren't scheduled to be fixed until 2.0.2 (and schedules can, of course, change). Until then, I'm sticking with 1.1, and so are all my co-workers...
Mod this up! This is exactly the point. Google is at most an accessory, and is acting in good faith on behalf of the libraries.
If someone gives you data and you index it online, and then it turns out that the act of giving you the data was illegal, who's broken the law? Hint: not you.
I actually read a quote by the head of a publisher's organization - she said that they would dearly love to go after libraries, but it wasn't a battle they could win,...
Really it's not clear to me why anyone thinks that Google should be liable in this case, rather than the libraries. After all, what is actually happening is that the libraries in question have effectively commissioned a third party (Google) to digitise and index the books on their behalf, and are then allowing Google access to the data. Here's Google's FAQ on the matter.
Surely it should be manifestly obvious that all responsibility in this matter rests on the libraries and not at all on the company they happen to have commissioned? If the act of supplying the data to Google is illegitimate, I find it hard to see how that's Google's fault.
In short it seems obvious to me that the Authors' Guild (or PIA, as it might become) is acting in grossly bad faith if they go after the accessory, rather than the actual culprit. Sure they can make a case that Google should remove all access to the data they have been given access to, but suing? Surely it's obvious Google is the wrong target.
Touch and smell can enhance pleasure for sure, but why wood? What makes the smell and touch of wood better than the smell and touch of a nice, smooth plastic PDA?
Indeed! Forget wood, calfskin is soooo much better. It's got such a lovely leathery feel (though it always makes me a bit hungry). A layer of wax over a wooden block is just barely acceptable. But best of all is papyrus! Wonderful crinkly criss-crossy texture, and you just can't beat the elegance of having it arranged in a scroll. Some people like clay, but I think that's just old-fashioned -- too heavy to carry around.
You can also undo closing tabs. I can't tell you the number of times this has come in handy.
FWIW you can do this in a default Firefox install too -- take a look in the rarely-used "Go" menu. It's not an obvious solution, though (which of course means it's a bad solution).
OK I think I was too dismissive of the adblock solutions that are available for Opera in my last post - I shouldn't get away with that without providing some reasons. It's basically a usability issue. These posts in this discussion - this one and this one - make it a bit clearer. It should just be a matter of choosing an option, or creating a suitably-wildcarded filter within the Opera interface and then the ad not only gets hidden, it never gets downloaded again. This is important. Some of us are still on dial-up you know!
Opera is a fantastic browser and its innate versatility and configurability boggle the mind. But for a newbie or my partner or my mother I'd still install Firefox-Adblock ahead of Opera.
Wake me up when I can grab code out of a FOSS-licensed browser and sell it as my own product without the slightest attribution or concession. That's "Free as in speech".
Opera has a filter.ini file which can be used to block addresses containing adverts.
Yes, to block an ad, all you need to do in Opera is inspect the html code to check if it's an iframe; copy the url of the ad; go out of Opera; open the filter.ini file; paste; close filter.ini; quit Opera; restart Opera; wait for everything to re-load.
In Firefox, you have to right-click on the ad, and select either "Adblock image" or "Adblock iframe".
Considering that... a HUGE amount of extensions to Firefox/Mozilla are already built into faster/more standards compliant/less resource hungry/more secure Opera...
Really? That's great! Please do tell me how to access the Adblock and Greasemonkey functionality in Opera then, because I'd love to know. Or scratch that, I'd settle for Adblock (with full capabilities, please: none of this nonsense about CSS blocking with these tools, or using proxies, or creating new.ini files to blacklist domains one-by-one).
Adblock is the killer extension that keeps me attached to Firefox like there's no other browser. Yes, Opera is faster, Opera is lighter, Opera is better in practically every other respect, but Adblock is a sine qua non. If it's not there, I'm simply not going to use the browser. Opera's innate, almost infinitely customisable, treatment of cookies is almost as valuable... but I reckon Adblock beats it by a length.
Yes, I do often feel like I'm galumphing about in an iron suit when I'm using Firefox, but its literally infinite extensibility is pretty tough to beat.
Actually modern church Latin is much closer to high classical Latin than it is to mediaeval church Latin -- maybe it was the renaissance that encouraged them to up their standards. A lot of papal encyclicals - under the previous pope, at least - sounded positively Ciceronian (or maybe Augustinian). I haven't looked at any from the present incumbent but I've heard his Latin is better.
I agree with you that Latin is not, in fact, very rational, but you've got the wrong reasons there. As it happens you can't scramble word-order indiscriminately in Latin - e.g. mix words from different clauses, put words like enim in the wrong place, etc etc. If you could, I'd say that really would be a truly rational language, because it would be quite literally syntax-independent.
Much more of a problem is that the inflection system has many, many non-unique identifiers; e.g. you can find an -is ending signifying the 2nd person forms of verbs in several tenses, or signifying the dative plural or ablative plural forms of two types of nouns and adjectives, also signifying the genitive singular of a third type of noun, also the accusative plural of a sub-class of that third type of noun,....
Why is this being asked on Slashdot anyway? It's not as if this place is the place to go for language specialists. Ask a linguistics expert who works in computer translation! I know a couple of people in Europe working on this kind of stuff.
Perhaps somewhat off-topic: just as a matter of interest, I trust you do know that your sig comes from a bureaucrat working in finance and writing about military practice in spite of never having had any direct experience of it? (Vegetius, a 4th-century office drone, in case anyone's interested.)
Agreed. But guess which product will benefit MOST from the wide adoption of OpenDocument. Hint: the only one with a cross-platform, well-developed office suite.
You mean AbiWord? -- which imports and exports both OpenOffice.org and OpenDocument files just fine?
But seriously... if Microsoft were to add filters for the OpenDocument format to Office, I doubt that any product would notice any immediate change in the status quo. Microsoft could probably do a switcheroo and suddenly make all.doc files OpenDocument format, and no one would bat an eyelid unless they read/.
Not any immediate change, anyway. What happens when the existence of competition becomes more obvious is another matter... but oh, heaven forfend that there should be competition in a capitalist society!
Personally I'd like to see other important proprietary office suites start to support OpenDocument. Oh oh oh how I would love to see OpenDocument support in Apple's Pages.
Suppose I have an OpenOffice document I need to edit, but I have to use a friend's computer. They're running Windows and have never heard of OpenOffice. I need the job done really fast, but they have dialup internet. Do I download OpenOffice, install it on their computer (OpenOffice, what the heck is OpenOffice)? And then load my document?
Well, you could always download AbiWord plus plug-ins and install that. That's only about a 5 MB download.
Now, if it's a Microsoft Word v.5 for Mac document... if you don't have Office 2003, you're probably pretty screwed (at least I've never been able to get those suckers to open in any other application).
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Massachusetts isn't using OpenOffice's format, it's using OpenDocument. This is an open format that OOo just happens to use as well. I understand OOo had a hand in creating it, but it's not "their" format.
Indeed -- and Microsoft also had a hand in creating it. Just to be clear, this is the specification for the OpenOffice.org file format; and this is the OASIS OpenDocument specification. (Both in pdf format - I can see why, but there's a certain irony there: in what format do you write the specification of your format?...)
Slashdot Mirror
Pretty much all of the ones that aren't in your field.
[Insert your own response]
OK, yes that was unfair -- (La)TeX is widely used in at least three disciplines, to my knowledge (natural sciences, computer science, and mathematics). That still leaves a hell of a lot of other disciplines ... Try submitting an essay on 18th-century German nationalism in LaTeX and see what mark you get.
[Insert your own response]
Yes, there'll always be exceptions. Maybe some prof in the French department at the University of Woollongong happens to accept LaTeX. They're still exceptions.
Er ... this happened a week ago. Good news, to be sure, though.
Note: OOo 1.1.5 can import OpenDocument files, but not export them.
By the way, what's with all the people complaining about how the site looks? I'm using Lynx and it looks totally normal to me.
I would except for a couple of regressive bugs which are for me application-killers, and which aren't scheduled to be fixed until 2.0.2 (and schedules can, of course, change). Until then, I'm sticking with 1.1, and so are all my co-workers ...
Mod this up! This is exactly the point. Google is at most an accessory, and is acting in good faith on behalf of the libraries.
If someone gives you data and you index it online, and then it turns out that the act of giving you the data was illegal, who's broken the law? Hint: not you.
Really it's not clear to me why anyone thinks that Google should be liable in this case, rather than the libraries. After all, what is actually happening is that the libraries in question have effectively commissioned a third party (Google) to digitise and index the books on their behalf, and are then allowing Google access to the data. Here's Google's FAQ on the matter.
Surely it should be manifestly obvious that all responsibility in this matter rests on the libraries and not at all on the company they happen to have commissioned? If the act of supplying the data to Google is illegitimate, I find it hard to see how that's Google's fault.
In short it seems obvious to me that the Authors' Guild (or PIA, as it might become) is acting in grossly bad faith if they go after the accessory, rather than the actual culprit. Sure they can make a case that Google should remove all access to the data they have been given access to, but suing? Surely it's obvious Google is the wrong target.
The libraries own the data produced by Google's efforts. Google uses the data with their permission.
Indeed! Forget wood, calfskin is soooo much better. It's got such a lovely leathery feel (though it always makes me a bit hungry). A layer of wax over a wooden block is just barely acceptable. But best of all is papyrus! Wonderful crinkly criss-crossy texture, and you just can't beat the elegance of having it arranged in a scroll. Some people like clay, but I think that's just old-fashioned -- too heavy to carry around.
Lawyers.
Opera equivalents do indeed exist for most or all of the more important Firefox extensions. But would you get your auntie to use them?
OK, I probably wouldn't install Greasemonkey for my auntie, but Adblock, sure. I wouldn't inflict the Opera equivalents on her though.
FWIW you can do this in a default Firefox install too -- take a look in the rarely-used "Go" menu. It's not an obvious solution, though (which of course means it's a bad solution).
OK I think I was too dismissive of the adblock solutions that are available for Opera in my last post - I shouldn't get away with that without providing some reasons. It's basically a usability issue. These posts in this discussion - this one and this one - make it a bit clearer. It should just be a matter of choosing an option, or creating a suitably-wildcarded filter within the Opera interface and then the ad not only gets hidden, it never gets downloaded again. This is important. Some of us are still on dial-up you know!
Opera is a fantastic browser and its innate versatility and configurability boggle the mind. But for a newbie or my partner or my mother I'd still install Firefox-Adblock ahead of Opera.
Here you go. (Well, close -- BSD licence.)
Yes, to block an ad, all you need to do in Opera is inspect the html code to check if it's an iframe; copy the url of the ad; go out of Opera; open the filter.ini file; paste; close filter.ini; quit Opera; restart Opera; wait for everything to re-load.
In Firefox, you have to right-click on the ad, and select either "Adblock image" or "Adblock iframe".
Hmm, tough decision.
Really? That's great! Please do tell me how to access the Adblock and Greasemonkey functionality in Opera then, because I'd love to know. Or scratch that, I'd settle for Adblock (with full capabilities, please: none of this nonsense about CSS blocking with these tools, or using proxies, or creating new .ini files to blacklist domains one-by-one).
Adblock is the killer extension that keeps me attached to Firefox like there's no other browser. Yes, Opera is faster, Opera is lighter, Opera is better in practically every other respect, but Adblock is a sine qua non. If it's not there, I'm simply not going to use the browser. Opera's innate, almost infinitely customisable, treatment of cookies is almost as valuable ... but I reckon Adblock beats it by a length.
Yes, I do often feel like I'm galumphing about in an iron suit when I'm using Firefox, but its literally infinite extensibility is pretty tough to beat.
You must be new here. Take a look at this and this. And that's just from today.
Then I recommend Opera to you; in Opera you have the choice of the keyboard or a drop-down menu.
Up-mod self-parent double-plus-informative!
Actually modern church Latin is much closer to high classical Latin than it is to mediaeval church Latin -- maybe it was the renaissance that encouraged them to up their standards. A lot of papal encyclicals - under the previous pope, at least - sounded positively Ciceronian (or maybe Augustinian). I haven't looked at any from the present incumbent but I've heard his Latin is better.
I agree with you that Latin is not, in fact, very rational, but you've got the wrong reasons there. As it happens you can't scramble word-order indiscriminately in Latin - e.g. mix words from different clauses, put words like enim in the wrong place, etc etc. If you could, I'd say that really would be a truly rational language, because it would be quite literally syntax-independent.
Much more of a problem is that the inflection system has many, many non-unique identifiers; e.g. you can find an -is ending signifying the 2nd person forms of verbs in several tenses, or signifying the dative plural or ablative plural forms of two types of nouns and adjectives, also signifying the genitive singular of a third type of noun, also the accusative plural of a sub-class of that third type of noun, ....
Why is this being asked on Slashdot anyway? It's not as if this place is the place to go for language specialists. Ask a linguistics expert who works in computer translation! I know a couple of people in Europe working on this kind of stuff.
Perhaps somewhat off-topic: just as a matter of interest, I trust you do know that your sig comes from a bureaucrat working in finance and writing about military practice in spite of never having had any direct experience of it? (Vegetius, a 4th-century office drone, in case anyone's interested.)
Hear, hear. Mind you, it has to be said that that's probably one reason why people like you and me are now using OpenOffice ...
You mean AbiWord? -- which imports and exports both OpenOffice.org and OpenDocument files just fine?
But seriously ... if Microsoft were to add filters for the OpenDocument format to Office, I doubt that any product would notice any immediate change in the status quo. Microsoft could probably do a switcheroo and suddenly make all .doc files OpenDocument format, and no one would bat an eyelid unless they read /.
Not any immediate change, anyway. What happens when the existence of competition becomes more obvious is another matter ... but oh, heaven forfend that there should be competition in a capitalist society!
Personally I'd like to see other important proprietary office suites start to support OpenDocument. Oh oh oh how I would love to see OpenDocument support in Apple's Pages.
Well, you could always download AbiWord plus plug-ins and install that. That's only about a 5 MB download.
Now, if it's a Microsoft Word v.5 for Mac document ... if you don't have Office 2003, you're probably pretty screwed (at least I've never been able to get those suckers to open in any other application).
How is it not in residents' interests to know that in 2025 they will still definitely be able to access documents created now?
Indeed -- and Microsoft also had a hand in creating it. Just to be clear, this is the specification for the OpenOffice.org file format; and this is the OASIS OpenDocument specification. (Both in pdf format - I can see why, but there's a certain irony there: in what format do you write the specification of your format? ...)
Photogenic memory? What an intriguing concept. Something like this, perhaps?