"This is the single best way to catch bad guys and keep them off the street"
Why is having bad guys roaming the street always listed as a problem? If there are bad guys on the street, then that means they are away from my home. If I have a car, then I can run them over. What's so scary about criminals on the street? Heck, that's where I'd prefer they be... not at home, next door to me.
I've been suffering XP for almost six years now. Is this beta going to define Windows for the NEXT six years? If so, I'm unimpressed.
Don't get me wrong. I welcome a much needed update to Windows. The features of Vista, however, aren't quite wowing me. The performance should be worse than XP given the heaftier requirements. There's still no WinFS, promised back in '96. The Win64 API is pretty bad (I'm a developer). Other than eye candy and clones of the most popular Mac OS features, what will I be getting for my money?
Stability, performance, and enterprise features are what I want... not an updated Minesweeper. Will the Bluetooth protocol stack be less problematic than XP's? I hope so. Will they support WPA2 natively, without 170MB of updates? Will IPV6 be native? How about IPSEC support? Will it actually work this time? How bad is the new Windows shell? Is it close enough to Bash or even csh to be useful? What's Task Manager like? Do I still have to wait seconds for it to appear when a process runs amok? Does the UI remain responsive during heavy calculations (I do a lot of 3D)? Can I install games without worrying about which version of DirectX is installed? Will the new version of Office install things I'll have to disable, like toolbars, fast find, and Word integration into Outlook express? Do I still need to press Ctrl+Alt+Delete to do things?
These reviews rarely touch on any issue that's actually important to me. Yes, it looks pretty and it should dammit. But does it work as well as it looks? That's what really matters. Microsoft keeps pulling features and slipping the release date. I doubt the reviewers remember Cairo.
I beta tested Windows 95 / Chicago and recall how slow that thing was. The production release was hardly much faster, despite the assurances. In fact, the beta versions of Windows 95 ran more stable, IMO. The graphics were even slicker. I ran Win95 beta until Microsoft shipped OSR2. It was a matter of necessity.
When will Ars Technica do a thorough review? That I might be interested in.
Once OSS becomes commonplace in divisons like the IRS, congress will be much less likely to pass bills that jeopardize operations (like tax collection). Their adoption almost ensures continued protections for the GPL and the open source community in general. If only they'd start giving tax breaks to OSS developers for performing a patriotic duty... I can dream, right?
SMS messages, fine. Cellular carriers can fork over the tax and pass it on to consumers. Mobile carriers are equipped to handle taxes. They are all centralized.
How on earth do you tax email? If it were easy to do, I'm sure our own government would be doing it. Many email accounts are anonymous and free providers don't make THAT much money from ad revenues.
Will Italy require users running Sendmail at home to pay taxes? What about corporate users? This plan reaks of failure because it sounds like it was written by people that don't understand the technology that they want to tax. Sending email to grandma does not necessarily make you an expert.
As a developer... the things you listed are super important to me. Not just because they are there, but because Apple gives me the API to add these great features into my own apps. The Apple evangelism that makes for bad / scripted Mac users also makes for great Mac developers. These Mac OS X technologies are easily accessible to *anyone* that cares to support them. Apple shoves their well crafted API's in front of anyone that cares to use them.
Apple even goes further to encourage software engineering disciplines that enable proper coding. Microsoft gave the world MFC! Apple gives the world Cocoa with a unified undo architecture based on the command design pattern. Developing software on Apple computers is so easy; I'm angry that the world doesn't understand.
These features that are taken for granted are what differentiate these platforms. The O/S doesn't define the computer... it's the ability to extend it. Microsoft is trampling on their third-party supporters with Vista. How is this evolution? Microsoft is killing their third-party developers. Apple, however, creates great features that any competent developer can add to their own software. There's no additional licensing needed.
I've been writing software for 20 years. Apple lets me develop faster than anything else out there. If only more people would be willing to pay more for features...
What makes Silicon Valley so special? San Diego, California's second largest economy has almost no tech jobs. It's not just money and education that breeds a Silicon Valley. UCSD is right here, and there's almost no tech jobs (excluding biotech IT). I did work for ONE UCSD spin-off... where are the rest?
I lived in San Francisco proper, which many would argue isn't Silicon Valley, but I assure you... the Silicon Valley types that can afford the lifestyle, do live there. There's no problem finding work, even in the city. My biggest problem is finding a job that I'm not overqualified for. My years of hard work have made me unemployable by any company not seeking the bleeding edge of talent.
In Silicon Valley, I had no problems. In Southern California... don't even bother. Stay where the money is. So Cal is the end of you career as far as I'm concerned. Beautiful beaches that you'll rarely visit are hardly reason enough to sacrifice your standard of living. God save me and relocate me to San Jose! They just "get it" up north. Down here... the uneducated wealthy rule supreme. That's my opinion anyway. This is no flaimbait. I just seek understanding. I fly up north monthly to interview for jobs, *because* it's that bad here. Sony, Intuit, and Qualcomm are your biggest employers. I'd die for a Cisco or two... even a beenz.com
What doctors always forget is that placebos work, often, much better than real medication. Anti-psychotics are just as likely to work for heart disease as a sugar pill. Perhaps that's what's happening in this case with the anti-psychotics. Maybe it's not in their head. They might not be psychotic at all. They might just believe that they have been cured... so they are... the same as the patients who have been prescribed the antibiotic cocktails. Maybe neither "cures" the disease, but makes them think it does. It doesn't mean it's in their head. The mind body connection is a weird and mysterious thing. Depressed cancer patients NEVER recover. That is a fact.
If patients feel that they are being taken care of, then they will probably recover. If you tell them that the problem is in their head, then the problem will likely persist. This is reinforced by statistics, efficacy studies, and common sense. Whatever this problem is, even if it's psychosis, it needs to be treated in a way that patients believe is in their best interest. Turning patients away creates an epidemic. I advocate creating a sugar pill that aims to cure this disease. I'll wager my entire year's income on 50% or greater success.
I agree. The responsiveness has been a constant gripe of mine. It's blinding on my Dual G5, but that's not typical hardware.
The thing that impresses me about Aqua is that it gets faster. Every release. Windows never gets faster. Windows 95 was slower than 3.1. NT was slower than 95. XP was slower than NT. And I'm sure Vista is slower than XP. The one exception: Windows 2003 Server does perform better than Windows NT Server.
Okay... granted. To use Photoshop on any computer 1GB RAM is absolutely necessary (minimum). I have 4GB in my home machine (PowerMac), and I honestly need more. Damn Apple for not putting 32 DIMM slots in every desktop.
I doubt that the minimum memory requirement from Microsoft takes third party software into consideration. If Vista can run Photoshop in 1GB just fine, then I'll become a Microsoft convert overnight. I just believe this to be exceptionally unlikely.
But the "features" they are announcing have been in Mac OS X for four years. I'm not seeing anything impressive here... just insane memory and disk space requirements.
If criminals are using crypto to help them break the law... I have this overwhelming feeling that criminals will continue to break the law and fail to turn over their private keys. The only thing that this affects is the privacy of honest citizens. The law is never a deterrent for criminals... otherwise criminals wouldn't regularly break it.
The BlackDog, by Realm systems isn't that bad of an option. It's a portable embedded Linux server with an integrated PPC processor, 64MB RAM, and thumbprint scanner. They should have some new units in a couple of months.
I use it to VPN from any box. There's no install necessary from XP. Plug it in, and your server's running. X11 starts automatically. It's not powerful enough to compile on the device (and flash-based), but it's a great for scripted development.
I use it to show off PHP code running off of local PostgreSQL instances. For me, it's a better alternative than punching a hole in my VPN... and I can text-edit develop. Great for Perl too.
Everyone is familiar with the 1980's failure that was BETA vs. VHS. Few people are familiar with Sony's bad ideas for the CDROM & DVD standards... that were pushed out by larger companies. Some people remember the Mini-Disc that never caught on in the U.S. PSP owners are feeling the death of UMD as a movie format. And now there's Blu-Ray... the PS3 game media.
I guess what I'm trying to say, is that Sony rarely wins format wars. In fact, they consistently fail at them. The PS3 is a pawn in a greater war... control of the global distribution movie market. As a gamer, I could care less and resent the added costs.
While Sony plotted to take over the home video market... Nintendo kept their focus on gameplay. If developers catch on, it's over for traditional sit and stare consoles. Revolution (Wii) truely is... revolutionary. It's not just bigger & faster.
Sony put too many eggs in one basket, IMHO, and it may bite them if they can't react quickly enough. I'm still hoping they succeed. They graphic quality looks incredible... but they need Wii's controller.
I thought what made dolphin bubble rings unique was their surface tension. For thirty seconds, they're pretty indestructable. They bounce, they can be tossed, and they don't have any buyoancy.
Can people make rings like that or will mine float to the top of the water?
Dolphins communicate by "speaking" their name before every communication, as a way of telling the recipient who said what. Every dolphin has their own name and researchers have known this for ages. I'm surprised that this is "news."
Dolphins can ALSO create rings using their blowhole. They create what is essentially a vortex with perfect buyoncy (sp?). They can be tossed around like toys without "popping" due to the physics of the rings. I've tried to do this with my nose, and I fail every time. This is not a conspiracy.
Dolphins are smart. That's why the Navy hires them.
Do you really want to be charged for services based upon what teens will pay? Tennis shoes will be $100's, IM's $0.25 per message, etc. Markets shouldn't be determined by the least mature and fiscally irresponsible consumer. We will feel the effects of our children's unconstrained spending, when they eventually stop.
..."The fact that this is coming out of a university gives me hope that this technology won't turn out to be just so much vapor"...
Drexel isn't exactly a technological powerhouse. This is like the next breakthrough coming out of Riverside State University. I won't hold my breath. This "water" stuff their talking about is probably vapor.
Since the telephone cash cow has died, I feel like the telecoms aren't coming around. This is great news! They still get to charge you for the connection, usually at a higher price, while someone else provides the service!
More money and less work doesn't seem like it's enough for T-Mobile or Verizon. They want more. They want the right to prevent competition and continue charging customers for services that are completely free on today's Internet. This is so 1990's. I haven't heard an idea this bad since Beenz.
"We need to secure our border between Mexico." Secure your network! dammit!
I can't wait until the feds have every American's personal information in the national id database. You'll probably be able to access it with a web browser... no username... password: "password"
I forsee a future where you cannot criticize Microsoft in podcasts created and streamed using Windows. "Microsoft Sucks", could be considered offensive.
Ahh. Good point... I'm sure many call centers take advantage of caller ID, but not SBC definately doesn't.
I haven't had a home phone for ten years. When I decided to go mobile, I *REALLY* went mobile. All of my experiences with SBC were done with my mobile phone.
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You obviously haven't heard of tin foil hats. Simply build a Faraday cage around your head!
"This is the single best way to catch bad guys and keep them off the street"
Why is having bad guys roaming the street always listed as a problem? If there are bad guys on the street, then that means they are away from my home. If I have a car, then I can run them over. What's so scary about criminals on the street? Heck, that's where I'd prefer they be... not at home, next door to me.
They have senators on their board of directors. Be very scared of this company. What happens for upgrades? Surgery? Ugh.
I've been suffering XP for almost six years now. Is this beta going to define Windows for the NEXT six years? If so, I'm unimpressed.
Don't get me wrong. I welcome a much needed update to Windows. The features of Vista, however, aren't quite wowing me. The performance should be worse than XP given the heaftier requirements. There's still no WinFS, promised back in '96. The Win64 API is pretty bad (I'm a developer). Other than eye candy and clones of the most popular Mac OS features, what will I be getting for my money?
Stability, performance, and enterprise features are what I want... not an updated Minesweeper. Will the Bluetooth protocol stack be less problematic than XP's? I hope so. Will they support WPA2 natively, without 170MB of updates? Will IPV6 be native? How about IPSEC support? Will it actually work this time? How bad is the new Windows shell? Is it close enough to Bash or even csh to be useful? What's Task Manager like? Do I still have to wait seconds for it to appear when a process runs amok? Does the UI remain responsive during heavy calculations (I do a lot of 3D)? Can I install games without worrying about which version of DirectX is installed? Will the new version of Office install things I'll have to disable, like toolbars, fast find, and Word integration into Outlook express? Do I still need to press Ctrl+Alt+Delete to do things?
These reviews rarely touch on any issue that's actually important to me. Yes, it looks pretty and it should dammit. But does it work as well as it looks? That's what really matters. Microsoft keeps pulling features and slipping the release date. I doubt the reviewers remember Cairo.
I beta tested Windows 95 / Chicago and recall how slow that thing was. The production release was hardly much faster, despite the assurances. In fact, the beta versions of Windows 95 ran more stable, IMO. The graphics were even slicker. I ran Win95 beta until Microsoft shipped OSR2. It was a matter of necessity.
When will Ars Technica do a thorough review? That I might be interested in.
Once OSS becomes commonplace in divisons like the IRS, congress will be much less likely to pass bills that jeopardize operations (like tax collection). Their adoption almost ensures continued protections for the GPL and the open source community in general. If only they'd start giving tax breaks to OSS developers for performing a patriotic duty... I can dream, right?
SMS messages, fine. Cellular carriers can fork over the tax and pass it on to consumers. Mobile carriers are equipped to handle taxes. They are all centralized.
How on earth do you tax email? If it were easy to do, I'm sure our own government would be doing it. Many email accounts are anonymous and free providers don't make THAT much money from ad revenues.
Will Italy require users running Sendmail at home to pay taxes? What about corporate users? This plan reaks of failure because it sounds like it was written by people that don't understand the technology that they want to tax. Sending email to grandma does not necessarily make you an expert.
Thanks for the bite.
As a developer... the things you listed are super important to me. Not just because they are there, but because Apple gives me the API to add these great features into my own apps. The Apple evangelism that makes for bad / scripted Mac users also makes for great Mac developers. These Mac OS X technologies are easily accessible to *anyone* that cares to support them. Apple shoves their well crafted API's in front of anyone that cares to use them.
Apple even goes further to encourage software engineering disciplines that enable proper coding. Microsoft gave the world MFC! Apple gives the world Cocoa with a unified undo architecture based on the command design pattern. Developing software on Apple computers is so easy; I'm angry that the world doesn't understand.
These features that are taken for granted are what differentiate these platforms. The O/S doesn't define the computer... it's the ability to extend it. Microsoft is trampling on their third-party supporters with Vista. How is this evolution? Microsoft is killing their third-party developers. Apple, however, creates great features that any competent developer can add to their own software. There's no additional licensing needed.
I've been writing software for 20 years. Apple lets me develop faster than anything else out there. If only more people would be willing to pay more for features...
What makes Silicon Valley so special? San Diego, California's second largest economy has almost no tech jobs. It's not just money and education that breeds a Silicon Valley. UCSD is right here, and there's almost no tech jobs (excluding biotech IT). I did work for ONE UCSD spin-off... where are the rest?
I lived in San Francisco proper, which many would argue isn't Silicon Valley, but I assure you... the Silicon Valley types that can afford the lifestyle, do live there. There's no problem finding work, even in the city. My biggest problem is finding a job that I'm not overqualified for. My years of hard work have made me unemployable by any company not seeking the bleeding edge of talent.
In Silicon Valley, I had no problems. In Southern California... don't even bother. Stay where the money is. So Cal is the end of you career as far as I'm concerned. Beautiful beaches that you'll rarely visit are hardly reason enough to sacrifice your standard of living. God save me and relocate me to San Jose! They just "get it" up north. Down here... the uneducated wealthy rule supreme. That's my opinion anyway. This is no flaimbait. I just seek understanding. I fly up north monthly to interview for jobs, *because* it's that bad here. Sony, Intuit, and Qualcomm are your biggest employers. I'd die for a Cisco or two... even a beenz.com
What doctors always forget is that placebos work, often, much better than real medication. Anti-psychotics are just as likely to work for heart disease as a sugar pill. Perhaps that's what's happening in this case with the anti-psychotics. Maybe it's not in their head. They might not be psychotic at all. They might just believe that they have been cured... so they are... the same as the patients who have been prescribed the antibiotic cocktails. Maybe neither "cures" the disease, but makes them think it does. It doesn't mean it's in their head. The mind body connection is a weird and mysterious thing. Depressed cancer patients NEVER recover. That is a fact.
If patients feel that they are being taken care of, then they will probably recover. If you tell them that the problem is in their head, then the problem will likely persist. This is reinforced by statistics, efficacy studies, and common sense. Whatever this problem is, even if it's psychosis, it needs to be treated in a way that patients believe is in their best interest. Turning patients away creates an epidemic. I advocate creating a sugar pill that aims to cure this disease. I'll wager my entire year's income on 50% or greater success.
I agree. The responsiveness has been a constant gripe of mine. It's blinding on my Dual G5, but that's not typical hardware. The thing that impresses me about Aqua is that it gets faster. Every release. Windows never gets faster. Windows 95 was slower than 3.1. NT was slower than 95. XP was slower than NT. And I'm sure Vista is slower than XP. The one exception: Windows 2003 Server does perform better than Windows NT Server.
Okay... granted. To use Photoshop on any computer 1GB RAM is absolutely necessary (minimum). I have 4GB in my home machine (PowerMac), and I honestly need more. Damn Apple for not putting 32 DIMM slots in every desktop. I doubt that the minimum memory requirement from Microsoft takes third party software into consideration. If Vista can run Photoshop in 1GB just fine, then I'll become a Microsoft convert overnight. I just believe this to be exceptionally unlikely.
You mean like they removed WinFS (Promised for Cairo, and never added to WinNT as promised)? I've waited for that feature for more than a decade.
But the "features" they are announcing have been in Mac OS X for four years. I'm not seeing anything impressive here... just insane memory and disk space requirements.
If criminals are using crypto to help them break the law... I have this overwhelming feeling that criminals will continue to break the law and fail to turn over their private keys. The only thing that this affects is the privacy of honest citizens. The law is never a deterrent for criminals... otherwise criminals wouldn't regularly break it.
I ported the Mac OS X networking driver... so it now also works on Tiger (PowerPC).
Maybe not what you're looking for, but something to keep in mind:
http://www.projectblackdog.com/
The BlackDog, by Realm systems isn't that bad of an option. It's a portable embedded Linux server with an integrated PPC processor, 64MB RAM, and thumbprint scanner. They should have some new units in a couple of months.
I use it to VPN from any box. There's no install necessary from XP. Plug it in, and your server's running. X11 starts automatically. It's not powerful enough to compile on the device (and flash-based), but it's a great for scripted development.
I use it to show off PHP code running off of local PostgreSQL instances. For me, it's a better alternative than punching a hole in my VPN... and I can text-edit develop. Great for Perl too.
Everyone is familiar with the 1980's failure that was BETA vs. VHS. Few people are familiar with Sony's bad ideas for the CDROM & DVD standards... that were pushed out by larger companies. Some people remember the Mini-Disc that never caught on in the U.S. PSP owners are feeling the death of UMD as a movie format. And now there's Blu-Ray... the PS3 game media.
I guess what I'm trying to say, is that Sony rarely wins format wars. In fact, they consistently fail at them. The PS3 is a pawn in a greater war... control of the global distribution movie market. As a gamer, I could care less and resent the added costs.
While Sony plotted to take over the home video market... Nintendo kept their focus on gameplay. If developers catch on, it's over for traditional sit and stare consoles. Revolution (Wii) truely is... revolutionary. It's not just bigger & faster.
Sony put too many eggs in one basket, IMHO, and it may bite them if they can't react quickly enough. I'm still hoping they succeed. They graphic quality looks incredible... but they need Wii's controller.
I thought what made dolphin bubble rings unique was their surface tension. For thirty seconds, they're pretty indestructable. They bounce, they can be tossed, and they don't have any buyoancy.
Can people make rings like that or will mine float to the top of the water?
Dolphins communicate by "speaking" their name before every communication, as a way of telling the recipient who said what. Every dolphin has their own name and researchers have known this for ages. I'm surprised that this is "news."
Dolphins can ALSO create rings using their blowhole. They create what is essentially a vortex with perfect buyoncy (sp?). They can be tossed around like toys without "popping" due to the physics of the rings. I've tried to do this with my nose, and I fail every time. This is not a conspiracy.
Dolphins are smart. That's why the Navy hires them.
Bubble ring link: http://www.earthtrust.org/delrings.html
Do you really want to be charged for services based upon what teens will pay? Tennis shoes will be $100's, IM's $0.25 per message, etc. Markets shouldn't be determined by the least mature and fiscally irresponsible consumer. We will feel the effects of our children's unconstrained spending, when they eventually stop.
..."The fact that this is coming out of a university gives me hope that this technology won't turn out to be just so much vapor"...
Drexel isn't exactly a technological powerhouse. This is like the next breakthrough coming out of Riverside State University. I won't hold my breath. This "water" stuff their talking about is probably vapor.
Since the telephone cash cow has died, I feel like the telecoms aren't coming around. This is great news! They still get to charge you for the connection, usually at a higher price, while someone else provides the service!
More money and less work doesn't seem like it's enough for T-Mobile or Verizon. They want more. They want the right to prevent competition and continue charging customers for services that are completely free on today's Internet. This is so 1990's. I haven't heard an idea this bad since Beenz.
"We need to secure our border between Mexico." Secure your network! dammit!
I can't wait until the feds have every American's personal information in the national id database. You'll probably be able to access it with a web browser... no username... password: "password"
I forsee a future where you cannot criticize Microsoft in podcasts created and streamed using Windows. "Microsoft Sucks", could be considered offensive.
Ahh. Good point... I'm sure many call centers take advantage of caller ID, but not SBC definately doesn't.
I haven't had a home phone for ten years. When I decided to go mobile, I *REALLY* went mobile. All of my experiences with SBC were done with my mobile phone.