I expect there's a number of issues the Dell organization has to resolve.
Example: After working for two years, my sound card on my XPS decided to stop working. Hardware problem or software problem?
Answer: The Dell organization has an extensive structure for dealing with such quandaries. In my case it was simple Windows atrophy. Reinstalling the drivers solved the problem. With the speed with which Linux evolves, I suspect Dell is simply worried they won't be able to keep up with the pace of software changes. Windows evolves MUCH MUCH more slowly than Linux does. A slower to evolve OS is cheaper to support for Dell.
Hardware issues caused by defective drivers are not Dell's fault, but they routinely have to eat support costs figuring out which is which.
They'd be fine if they could just rely on boot time hardware inspection tools. Dell Diagnosics boot independently. They could probably really benefit from Linux here. Move Dell Diagnostics to run on a controlled Linux boot CD. If the boot CD runs fine then its the user that has hosed their system and they need to fix their software.
Oh, and don't let me get started about the planned obsolescence items have. In World of Warcraft, not only do items because less useful as you gain levels, but they also do less damage and the spell effects diminish in potency.
I suspect the main appeal would be for laptop owners on public networks where they don't own the router or control them-- rather than just trust their Windows firewall to protect them. It'd be like having your own private router protecting your laptop on a public network. Not be a bad idea.
The device has sex appeal in terms of form factor accomplishments. But the OS level filter driver requirement turns me off. A device like this needs to be totally independent of the OS to be attractive.
Where World of Warcraft has largely failed in my mind is in the end-game. Here the content is, aside from reputation quests, entirely Raid driven and controlled by harsh unforgiving bosses and large time sinks. Blizzard's PVP system isn't really anything to get excited about as it is totally un-interesting outside of arenas.
Essentially, there is no other story line in World of Warcraft other than to kill Illidan and spend a lot of time farming farming farming for reputation. I so miss the innovations that Ultima Online had with housing or seafaring ten years ago.
What does LOTR bring to the table in the end-game that makes it different from other MMOs?
But we like suing people who prefer high quality audio... we would prefer if all online music was 24kbs and required a new DRM key for each play session.
We of the RIAA will resist this thing called "progress" until our lawsuits make us hated more than rush hour traffic. *cough*.. well we might already be there, but there are still 10-year-olds to sue.
Of course, the "closed stuff" is exactly what everyone raises as an objection to Mono. Microsoft doesn't need to give their libraries away but they do need to say "we will not sue anyone that uses a Mono implementation of winforms, asp.net, etc.. etc.. etc.." The fact the CLR is open is peanuts. The issue with.NET as with Java is the libraries. Libraries make or break a platform and they are what people point to with respect to patent violation suits that Microsoft could someday raise against Mono.
Perhaps, but it's narrow minded if thats the case. If Microsoft supported Mono they could point to it for those wanting an open-sourced.NET platform without having to change any of their current proprietary works.
A simple "we will not sue" would be a nice place to start for instance. I can't see how that would be a big risk. Therefore, I can only suspect that the reason it hasn't been done yet is that certain senior management is too pig headed to admit a different strategy is needed. Java is GPLed now. Microsoft is going to need an answer sooner or later. Maybe for once they won't wait until the opposition has a huge head-start. *cough* *cough* *cough*
It's called keeping your options open. A little bit of support now could pay off big time in the future when Microsoft gets fingered for not having an open source.NET solution.
Interesting, in the video it looks like it is keeping its gills crazy-open none-stop. It looks like its desperately trying to get enough water across its gills. Maybe it just died of exhaustion because of the effort? Kind of like what people go through when not used to mountain atmospheres and get out of breath fast.
My free guess: it almost got caught by a fishing net which wounded it. The damage caused the fish to become disoriented. Lack of oxygen further disoriented it and all it could to stay alive was try to get more water across its gills. Eventually it died from exhaustion.
Ralph! Aren't you supposed to be retiring? Stop snorting the cocaine... and somebody take his liquor bottle away.
Harper is PM now... Jean has been gone for a while Ralph. You can stop having nightmares about him. The only plot in Ontario about Western Canada is that we don't want to live there.:)
I don't believe that you really think trash-mafia books are ways for people to get a "hit" of sadism or socio-pathic criminal behavior.
And my point is I don't trust the government to safely and consistently make the distinction you have arrived at in any case whatsoever. I respectfully disagree you with respect to Aristotle: actions emerge from thoughts, but this is not a grounds for concluding that a specific thought must lead to a specific action.
The human mind is what it is and we barely understand ourselves; you would trust others to police yours?
Oh come on. The point of a horror novel is to scare you. The point of a murder drama is to empathize with the victim. The point of trash-mafia books it to make you feel like you are in the gangster culture-- to feel what it's like to be a thug.
A well written book draws you into its story and compels you to finish it. I don't read books so I can observe disparately what is going on in the story.
I for one do not want the government to start down the slippery slope of deciding which of my thoughts should be illegal. Thank you very much.
The fight for freedom is not the battle against terrorists. It never was.
The fight for freedom is about the fight for your rights. It should by consequence also be about the fight against government corruption which leads to the tyranny that tramples those rights. Want an example of what that means? Check out this report:
Novell has, in exchange for this money, essentially recognized that its Linux distribution encroaches on Microsoft IP. Doesn't it seem odd that Microsoft is paying Novell to recognize it's IP?
Here's a blurb from the article:
Under the Microsoft-Novell deal, Novell agrees to recognize Microsoft's intellectual property claims. Novell in returns receives a "Covenant Not To Sue".
This is something that Free Software developers have been fastidiously careful not to do - and this insistence formed the basis of the FSF's successful arguments in the European Courts. Free software supporters argued that the techniques were prior art - (the patent is invalid) - or reverse engineered without reference to the original (the patent doesn't apply). Microsoft had argued that F/OSS developers could, and should, license its MCPP protocols. GNU supporters argued that they couldn't. Novell has succeeded in driving a wedge in the movement where previous attempts have failed.
LOL.. I've used Firefox regularly on at least 15 different computers over the years since the first releases (Mozilla and then Firefox). I don't remember crashes but do recall the occasional bad behavior. My experience with IE has been considerably worse but tolerable.
IE7.. got it.. nothing to write home about. Cute upgrade. Still like Firefox a lot more.
Here's something to chew on. I know a whole bunch of people whose machines were seriously pwned because of IE exploits. Thats enough to turn you off a piece of software no matter how pretty they make it.
Of late it's keylogger crap to steal WoW accounts. Know three people who got caught by them. Not statistically worthwhile I agree. But if you knew three people who owned a Ford that exploded on them, chances are you wouldn't be wanting one of the same model not matter what the deal.
There are extremes in everything. Too much Kung-Fu and you'd soon discover the only people you really know wear kimodos.
Life is about doing what you want. In the end nothing matters, we die, become dirt, and people forget us. The only thing you have a chance of taking with you is the lessons you've learned.
In my neck of the woods two people in my family are thinking of a full out change and so are a few of my friends. It's obviously not just because of WGA. It's a lot about a growing feeling of insecurity and anger at a company that just doesn't seem to care a damn.
"Just as powerful" and "harder to learn" in the same sentence is an oxymoron. Windows Access Control Lists APIs are a nightmare to program with that is also badly documented (or was the last time I looked at it).
When you have two APIs that provide/achieve the same thing, the 'simpler' one is by far the most powerful.
Cancelled cable TV three months ago. Sick of the crap on TV and cancelling of the little I still enjoyed viewing. You know what? Don't miss it at all. If the RIAA and MPAA push hard enough people may simply discover that nobody really needs their products and actually prefer spending time building something, starting a business whatever. You don't need the RIAA MPAA or anything else to make your personal time worthwhile.
You can do both with cmd.exe... check the properties of the window and adjust the buffer sizes to your taste. I use 132X9999. Turn on Quick Edit Mode for right-click paste actions. And, if you want, you can also drag a folder from Explorer into the window to copy-paste the path to the command line.
The problem really is visible when you are adventuring in difficult to beat places. You depend on having your team perform to their best ability. It is then so frustrating to be constantly dealing with part of you team getting disconnected or being lagged to the point of ineffectiveness.
My guild is doing MC BWL, ZG and AQ20 right now. It is a regular occurence right now to wait 20 minutes to start a fight because of disconnected people, only to then lose that battle because you lost two priests to a disconnect during it.
The anger may not be at the threshold point yet Blizzard, but it most definitely building fast. The thing about angry customers is that there is a point of no return when they are forever lost. Blizzard has a lot of customers right now, but they would lose them fast if somebody else stepped up with a great game and more reliable game play.
Blizzard, you executed very very well on game content by effectively removing much of the grind that other games are plagued with, but you have failed with customer interaction. Some of your representatives treat your customers with borderline contempt (Tseric) and you fail miserably at explaining properly the multitude of changes you make to the game.
Blizzard, your six million customers are waiting; it's your move, take too much time and you could lose them. Start with being public about your server improvement plans, telling people what you're doing and why and how its going to make things better. Not knowing when things are going to get better is really making people angry.
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I expect there's a number of issues the Dell organization has to resolve.
Example:
After working for two years, my sound card on my XPS decided to stop working. Hardware problem or software problem?
Answer:
The Dell organization has an extensive structure for dealing with such quandaries. In my case it was simple Windows atrophy. Reinstalling the drivers solved the problem. With the speed with which Linux evolves, I suspect Dell is simply worried they won't be able to keep up with the pace of software changes. Windows evolves MUCH MUCH more slowly than Linux does. A slower to evolve OS is cheaper to support for Dell.
Hardware issues caused by defective drivers are not Dell's fault, but they routinely have to eat support costs figuring out which is which.
They'd be fine if they could just rely on boot time hardware inspection tools. Dell Diagnosics boot independently. They could probably really benefit from Linux here. Move Dell Diagnostics to run on a controlled Linux boot CD. If the boot CD runs fine then its the user that has hosed their system and they need to fix their software.
Oh, and don't let me get started about the planned obsolescence items have. In World of Warcraft, not only do items because less useful as you gain levels, but they also do less damage and the spell effects diminish in potency.
It's the biggest load of design cheese ever.
I'm ready for the next good thing in gaming.
I suspect the main appeal would be for laptop owners on public networks where they don't own the router or control them-- rather than just trust their Windows firewall to protect them. It'd be like having your own private router protecting your laptop on a public network. Not be a bad idea.
The device has sex appeal in terms of form factor accomplishments. But the OS level filter driver requirement turns me off.
A device like this needs to be totally independent of the OS to be attractive.
I won't be buying this product.
Where World of Warcraft has largely failed in my mind is in the end-game. Here the content is, aside from reputation quests, entirely Raid driven and controlled by harsh unforgiving bosses and large time sinks. Blizzard's PVP system isn't really anything to get excited about as it is totally un-interesting outside of arenas.
Essentially, there is no other story line in World of Warcraft other than to kill Illidan and spend a lot of time farming farming farming for reputation. I so miss the innovations that Ultima Online had with housing or seafaring ten years ago.
What does LOTR bring to the table in the end-game that makes it different from other MMOs?
But we like suing people who prefer high quality audio ... we would prefer if all online music was 24kbs and required a new DRM key for each play session.
.. well we might already be there, but there are still 10-year-olds to sue.
We of the RIAA will resist this thing called "progress" until our lawsuits make us hated more than rush hour traffic. *cough*
Of course, the "closed stuff" is exactly what everyone raises as an objection to Mono. Microsoft doesn't need to give their libraries away but they do need to say "we will not sue anyone that uses a Mono implementation of winforms, asp.net, etc.. etc.. etc.." The fact the CLR is open is peanuts. The issue with .NET as with Java is the libraries. Libraries make or break a platform and they are what people point to with respect to patent violation suits that Microsoft could someday raise against Mono.
Perhaps, but it's narrow minded if thats the case. If Microsoft supported Mono they could point to it for those wanting an open-sourced .NET platform without having to change any of their current proprietary works.
.NET solution.
A simple "we will not sue" would be a nice place to start for instance. I can't see how that would be a big risk. Therefore, I can only suspect that the reason it hasn't been done yet is that certain senior management is too pig headed to admit a different strategy is needed. Java is GPLed now. Microsoft is going to need an answer sooner or later. Maybe for once they won't wait until the opposition has a huge head-start. *cough* *cough* *cough*
It's called keeping your options open. A little bit of support now could pay off big time in the future when Microsoft gets fingered for not having an open source
Dell doesn't support software. Only hardware.
Interesting, in the video it looks like it is keeping its gills crazy-open none-stop. It looks like its desperately trying to get enough water across its gills. Maybe it just died of exhaustion because of the effort? Kind of like what people go through when not used to mountain atmospheres and get out of breath fast.
My free guess: it almost got caught by a fishing net which wounded it. The damage caused the fish to become disoriented. Lack of oxygen further disoriented it and all it could to stay alive was try to get more water across its gills. Eventually it died from exhaustion.
Ralph! Aren't you supposed to be retiring? Stop snorting the cocaine... and somebody take his liquor bottle away.
:)
Harper is PM now... Jean has been gone for a while Ralph. You can stop having nightmares about him.
The only plot in Ontario about Western Canada is that we don't want to live there.
C# is a compiled language, not an interpreted (dynamic) language and is no different than java in this respect.
I don't believe that you really think trash-mafia books are ways for people to get a "hit" of sadism or socio-pathic criminal behavior.
And my point is I don't trust the government to safely and consistently make the distinction you have arrived at in any case whatsoever. I respectfully disagree you with respect to Aristotle: actions emerge from thoughts, but this is not a grounds for concluding that a specific thought must lead to a specific action.
The human mind is what it is and we barely understand ourselves; you would trust others to police yours?
Oh come on. The point of a horror novel is to scare you. The point of a murder drama is to empathize with the victim. The point of trash-mafia books it to make you feel like you are in the gangster culture-- to feel what it's like to be a thug.
A well written book draws you into its story and compels you to finish it. I don't read books so I can observe disparately what is going on in the story.
I for one do not want the government to start down the slippery slope of deciding which of my thoughts should be illegal. Thank you very much.
The fight for freedom is not the battle against terrorists. It never was.
v ideo_of_tyranny_in_china/
The fight for freedom is about the fight for your rights. It should by consequence also be about the fight against government corruption which leads to the tyranny that tramples those rights. Want an example of what that means? Check out this report:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/299695/underground_
We have lost of sight of what freedom is and need to be reminded of what the loss of it means.
The Register has an interesting article on the damage this deal might do.
o vell_analysis/
http://www.theregister.com/2006/11/06/microsoft_n
Novell has, in exchange for this money, essentially recognized that its Linux distribution encroaches on Microsoft IP. Doesn't it seem odd that Microsoft is paying Novell to recognize it's IP?
Here's a blurb from the article:
Under the Microsoft-Novell deal, Novell agrees to recognize Microsoft's intellectual property claims. Novell in returns receives a "Covenant Not To Sue".
This is something that Free Software developers have been fastidiously careful not to do - and this insistence formed the basis of the FSF's successful arguments in the European Courts. Free software supporters argued that the techniques were prior art - (the patent is invalid) - or reverse engineered without reference to the original (the patent doesn't apply). Microsoft had argued that F/OSS developers could, and should, license its MCPP protocols. GNU supporters argued that they couldn't. Novell has succeeded in driving a wedge in the movement where previous attempts have failed.
LOL.. I've used Firefox regularly on at least 15 different computers over the years since the first releases (Mozilla and then Firefox). I don't remember crashes but do recall the occasional bad behavior. My experience with IE has been considerably worse but tolerable.
IE7.. got it.. nothing to write home about. Cute upgrade. Still like Firefox a lot more.
Here's something to chew on. I know a whole bunch of people whose machines were seriously pwned because of IE exploits. Thats enough to turn you off a piece of software no matter how pretty they make it.
Of late it's keylogger crap to steal WoW accounts. Know three people who got caught by them. Not statistically worthwhile I agree. But if you knew three people who owned a Ford that exploded on them, chances are you wouldn't be wanting one of the same model not matter what the deal.
There are extremes in everything. Too much Kung-Fu and you'd soon discover the only people you really know wear kimodos.
Life is about doing what you want. In the end nothing matters, we die, become dirt, and people forget us.
The only thing you have a chance of taking with you is the lessons you've learned.
WGA -> Would've Got an Apple if I knew then.
In my neck of the woods two people in my family are thinking of a full out change and so are a few of my friends. It's obviously not just because of WGA. It's a lot about a growing feeling of insecurity and anger at a company that just doesn't seem to care a damn.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5430343841 227974645
... A Warcraft animated musical.
"The Internet Is For Porn"
(very funny)
You forgot: ._World of Warcraft
"Just as powerful" and "harder to learn" in the same sentence is an oxymoron. Windows Access Control Lists APIs are a nightmare to program with that is also badly documented (or was the last time I looked at it).
When you have two APIs that provide/achieve the same thing, the 'simpler' one is by far the most powerful.
This kind of litigation is all the innovation we can expect patents to deliver these days.
Cancelled cable TV three months ago. Sick of the crap on TV and cancelling of the little I still enjoyed viewing. You know what? Don't miss it at all. If the RIAA and MPAA push hard enough people may simply discover that nobody really needs their products and actually prefer spending time building something, starting a business whatever. You don't need the RIAA MPAA or anything else to make your personal time worthwhile.
You can do both with cmd.exe ... check the properties of the window and adjust the buffer sizes to your taste. I use 132X9999. Turn on Quick Edit Mode for right-click paste actions. And, if you want, you can also drag a folder from Explorer into the window to copy-paste the path to the command line.
The problem really is visible when you are adventuring in difficult to beat places. You depend on having your team perform to their best ability. It is then so frustrating to be constantly dealing with part of you team getting disconnected or being lagged to the point of ineffectiveness.
My guild is doing MC BWL, ZG and AQ20 right now. It is a regular occurence right now to wait 20 minutes to start a fight because of disconnected people, only to then lose that battle because you lost two priests to a disconnect during it.
The anger may not be at the threshold point yet Blizzard, but it most definitely building fast. The thing about angry customers is that there is a point of no return when they are forever lost. Blizzard has a lot of customers right now, but they would lose them fast if somebody else stepped up with a great game and more reliable game play.
Blizzard, you executed very very well on game content by effectively removing much of the grind that other games are plagued with, but you have failed with customer interaction. Some of your representatives treat your customers with borderline contempt (Tseric) and you fail miserably at explaining properly the multitude of changes you make to the game.
Blizzard, your six million customers are waiting; it's your move, take too much time and you could lose them. Start with being public about your server improvement plans, telling people what you're doing and why and how its going to make things better. Not knowing when things are going to get better is really making people angry.