I would think whatever language the presenter chooses would work fine, as long as the thing handles all of the languages anyway. But if they do have to settle for one language, how about that Klingon language? It could be justified because for not showing favoritism to any particular human language and would give a bunch of people who don't get sex something to brag about.
I have been able to walk people through Windows installs over the phone in less than two hours. And I don't remember ever having trouble with a standard mouse plugged into a ps2 port, even with the 16-bit Windows. Maybe you just don't know anything about Windows.
Trouble is, most of your comment is bullshit. Microsoft did not go after the mainstream, Microsoft changed the mainstream, considering they already owned the operating system. Windows is on the vast majority of boxes out there, they installed the browser as part of their OS, and websites changed to keep up with this because they want to the mainstream consumer.
They did go after the mainstream. Yes they tried to force the browser on us, but everybody was still downloading Netscape, even though Internet Explorer had a file size limit so it wouldn't even download Netscape. Owning the operating system was not enough. So they kept making it better. I think the crossover point was when they made it so you could resize the browser as a page was loading, while Netscape would not, and when you resized, it would reload the whole page. They didn't stop making it better until Netscape crapped out completely. Then Firefox came up and now they're trying to put Firefox's most wanted features in Internet Explorer. That would be things like tabbed browsing, anti-phishing, and popup blocking. What I was saying is Microsoft pays attention to what masses like, and tried to appeal to that. Mozilla.org walks the line between appealing to the masses and appealing to fringe groups. I don't have a problem with Fringe groups, as I fall into several of them myself. I'm just saying they won't win like that.
Why should a browser try to emulate this when MS is free to change the rules at any time? Websites may have a reason to do so, but this is terribly time consuming for a rival browser to do.
Because they want to win. I think they want to win, anyway. Microsoft had to emulate Netscape when Netscape changed things. You know, Javascript, Plugins, and whatnot. Microsoft had to make compatible software because Netscape was on top. Now Microsoft is on top.
personally do not advocate the "let's make the browser suck as much shit as IE" idea. Why bother having two browsers in that case, if all you'd like Mozilla to be is a copycat of IE? Plenty of people DO want a secure browser that supports proper CSS and PNG.
Maybe. But all I see are people who go to a website and, if it doesn't work, either use a different browser or go to a different website. If you're making the site, you don't want them going to a different site. If you're making the browser, you don't want them using a different browser. I'm not saying it's right that they do this. But that's how it is.
Mozilla wants to write a good browser. I'm sure many of us out there thank them for that.
If that's what they want then they've accomplished their goal. You use it. I use it. Others use it. But if they want to get everybody to follow their "web standards" then they're going to have to have a huge market share, and that comes from making something that just works no matter how much they don't want to jump through the necessary hoops.
People have been saying that for years and it hasn't worked yet. I think it would benefit the Firefox people greatly if they would apply an organization-wide policy to never respond to (a feature request or complaint) with such phrases as "code it yourself" or "if you don't like it then don't use it". The users are not going to code it themselves and they're going to actually follow the suggestion to not use it. Adding what they want would be the best way to gain new users but if that's too much to ask then you could at least refrain from being an asshole when people make suggestions.
Another thing to think about is the difficulty in following two leaders. They'll have to choose between pleasing the Slashdot/Engadget crowd and pleasing the MySpace/YouTube crowd. Microsoft went for the mainstream group. Mozilla.org went for the fringe group and then started walking the line, trying to hold on to the super nerds while reaching out to grab the "popular" crowd. I realize Microsoft doesn't care about end users and didn't win just by catering to end users but the point of this is they are paying attention to the end users while Firefox is on a campaign to ignore what the end users want and change (what they want) to (what Firefox is).
"No, you don't want a web browser that works with all the websites out there. You want a secure, cross-platform browser that supports proper CSS and PNG." Or, "No, you don't want our browser to work with your website. You want to change your website to work with our browser. Our browser that relatively few people use."
That is no way to steal users away. Now if a Firefox user takes this the wrong way and flamebaits me to hell, at least I'll be able to browse the web because that attitude will have Firefox market share right there with me. But it will still suck because in hell everybody uses nested frames.
That is a very interesting and possibly very good idea. But if they were to go through with it, my one suggestion would be to not leave it up to just recognized experts to determine how it should go. Any plan to rebuild an entire world probably should have input from as many groups as possible (including people who would like to live a more basic life than the industrialized culture of the 1940's). In fact, a good complement to "In Case of Disaster" might be "To Avoid Another Disaster".
I believe Microsoft has screwed Symantec over like this before. I don't have proof so this is all speculation. But when Windows 98 came out, the defragmenter in Norton Utilities was way better than the Windows defragmenter, and one of the main reasons I kept Norton Utilities around. But when Windows XP came out, the security model didn't give the software the same access so Norton Utilities was just a wrapper for the built-in defragmenter. All the while, the people who made Diskeeper had a deal with Microsoft to make the built-in disk defragmenter. So they did. And of course their paid version was way better than their free version, with absolutely all competition locked out by Microsoft's security model. Again, this is just my speculation based on observation, but if it's true then it's not the first time Microsoft made a security upgrade that screwed Symantec over and gave the competition a monopoly.
Yes. Since Opera's doing it, Firefox is probably going to be doing it a year or two from now and all of these same people are going to argue that it's a good thing. Then seven years from now, Internet Explorer will do it and everybody will criticize them for taking so long to do this. Also, I think it will be possible to turn this feature off too, and if it isn't then I can set the firewall to block connections to Opera's server.
It does seem like a good stepping stone to forcing people to get a license to build a website. If that catches on then surely the United States will do the same thing. They seem good at chipping away at rights until we have none left at all. And it will be a good source of income for them.
It looks to me more like "Microsoft is making Windows no longer compatible with my security software at the same time they're making their own software to compete against me".
If somebody takes something that has been in his ear and tries to put it in my ear, he's going to catch a tazer in a mean place. And if it's a Kelly Clarkson song, he's going to catch the tazer in an even meaner place.
If you went the other way around, you might notice an Open Office problem. I was testing Open Office to see if it could be a suitable Office Suite for some friends who got a used computer without Microsoft Office. I used Open Office to load documents created with MS Office, and vice versa. I also edited and saved the documents, to see if they could still be loaded in the original packages and hadn't lost anything. The only place I found Open Office was lacking was in the OpenOffice.org version of Powerpoint. Some of the animation played way too slowly. So Powerpoint won there. But that was the only thing and I still ended up installing Open Office on the computer because they only needed the word processor anyway. AndO pen Office was much more impressive than it was a few years ago when it crashed as I was saving a file in Suse Linux. Maybe next time around the animation will work too.
It would have been even worse if they accidentally reversed the connectors. They'd never be able to deal with all the incoming jokes like, "In Soviet Russia, video game plays you!"
It depends on who you ask. If you ask an end user, the usefulness and appeal of the software is what makes them great. If you ask the programmers, the efficiency and accurateness of the code is what makes them great. If you ask Slashdot, working for Google makes them great.
If Google did buy out YouTube, it could simply rebrand its Google Video site
with YouTube icons and the MySpace kids wouldn't even notice.
Oh yes they would. You would have to be a hardcore Slashdotter to think differently.
People don't just go to MySpace and YouTube because they're named MySpace and
YouTube. I've been able to find music videos on YouTube that I can't find anywhere
else. When I search for anything on Google, I just find
video samples from people trying to sell video clips, or nothing at all. And
not everybody thinks making a low-resolution video zoom to the size of the
browser window is a good thing. MySpace has people of all cultures marking
each other as friends, complimenting each other's pictures, and sharing their
current favorite songs with people. Google has some half-baked social site
plagued with racism. They make mistakes sometimes. I think they're going to
buy YouTube and try to filter out all of the copyrighted material, and give
it a more Google-like interface. Then it's going to be Google Video and they'll
be back where they are now, with a technologically superior piece of crap in
the eyes of all the users they just bought. I'm not trying to be a troll. I'm
just saying what I see. And I'm not disagreeing with all of what you said.
Just that one line is driving me crazy as a YouTube and MySpace user.
Slashdot Mirror
Tell that to people who have died over racism. This is a much bigger deal to the primary victims of racism.
I would think whatever language the presenter chooses would work fine, as long as the thing handles all of the languages anyway. But if they do have to settle for one language, how about that Klingon language? It could be justified because for not showing favoritism to any particular human language and would give a bunch of people who don't get sex something to brag about.
I have been able to walk people through Windows installs over the phone in less than two hours. And I don't remember ever having trouble with a standard mouse plugged into a ps2 port, even with the 16-bit Windows. Maybe you just don't know anything about Windows.
They did go after the mainstream. Yes they tried to force the browser on us, but everybody was still downloading Netscape, even though Internet Explorer had a file size limit so it wouldn't even download Netscape. Owning the operating system was not enough. So they kept making it better. I think the crossover point was when they made it so you could resize the browser as a page was loading, while Netscape would not, and when you resized, it would reload the whole page. They didn't stop making it better until Netscape crapped out completely. Then Firefox came up and now they're trying to put Firefox's most wanted features in Internet Explorer. That would be things like tabbed browsing, anti-phishing, and popup blocking. What I was saying is Microsoft pays attention to what masses like, and tried to appeal to that. Mozilla.org walks the line between appealing to the masses and appealing to fringe groups. I don't have a problem with Fringe groups, as I fall into several of them myself. I'm just saying they won't win like that.
Because they want to win. I think they want to win, anyway. Microsoft had to emulate Netscape when Netscape changed things. You know, Javascript, Plugins, and whatnot. Microsoft had to make compatible software because Netscape was on top. Now Microsoft is on top.
Maybe. But all I see are people who go to a website and, if it doesn't work, either use a different browser or go to a different website. If you're making the site, you don't want them going to a different site. If you're making the browser, you don't want them using a different browser. I'm not saying it's right that they do this. But that's how it is.
If that's what they want then they've accomplished their goal. You use it. I use it. Others use it. But if they want to get everybody to follow their "web standards" then they're going to have to have a huge market share, and that comes from making something that just works no matter how much they don't want to jump through the necessary hoops.
People have been saying that for years and it hasn't worked yet. I think it would benefit the Firefox people greatly if they would apply an organization-wide policy to never respond to (a feature request or complaint) with such phrases as "code it yourself" or "if you don't like it then don't use it". The users are not going to code it themselves and they're going to actually follow the suggestion to not use it. Adding what they want would be the best way to gain new users but if that's too much to ask then you could at least refrain from being an asshole when people make suggestions.
Another thing to think about is the difficulty in following two leaders. They'll have to choose between pleasing the Slashdot/Engadget crowd and pleasing the MySpace/YouTube crowd. Microsoft went for the mainstream group. Mozilla.org went for the fringe group and then started walking the line, trying to hold on to the super nerds while reaching out to grab the "popular" crowd. I realize Microsoft doesn't care about end users and didn't win just by catering to end users but the point of this is they are paying attention to the end users while Firefox is on a campaign to ignore what the end users want and change (what they want) to (what Firefox is).
"No, you don't want a web browser that works with all the websites out there. You want a secure, cross-platform browser that supports proper CSS and PNG." Or, "No, you don't want our browser to work with your website. You want to change your website to work with our browser. Our browser that relatively few people use."
That is no way to steal users away. Now if a Firefox user takes this the wrong way and flamebaits me to hell, at least I'll be able to browse the web because that attitude will have Firefox market share right there with me. But it will still suck because in hell everybody uses nested frames.
Girls like guys with big tabs.
Patent the trillion dollar idea and make them pay half a trillion for it. It's not like they're against patents.
That is a very interesting and possibly very good idea. But if they were to go through with it, my one suggestion would be to not leave it up to just recognized experts to determine how it should go. Any plan to rebuild an entire world probably should have input from as many groups as possible (including people who would like to live a more basic life than the industrialized culture of the 1940's). In fact, a good complement to "In Case of Disaster" might be "To Avoid Another Disaster".
Every competitor except IE, Mr. +5 Informative.
I believe Microsoft has screwed Symantec over like this before. I don't have proof so this is all speculation. But when Windows 98 came out, the defragmenter in Norton Utilities was way better than the Windows defragmenter, and one of the main reasons I kept Norton Utilities around. But when Windows XP came out, the security model didn't give the software the same access so Norton Utilities was just a wrapper for the built-in defragmenter. All the while, the people who made Diskeeper had a deal with Microsoft to make the built-in disk defragmenter. So they did. And of course their paid version was way better than their free version, with absolutely all competition locked out by Microsoft's security model. Again, this is just my speculation based on observation, but if it's true then it's not the first time Microsoft made a security upgrade that screwed Symantec over and gave the competition a monopoly.
Yes. Since Opera's doing it, Firefox is probably going to be doing it a year or two from now and all of these same people are going to argue that it's a good thing. Then seven years from now, Internet Explorer will do it and everybody will criticize them for taking so long to do this. Also, I think it will be possible to turn this feature off too, and if it isn't then I can set the firewall to block connections to Opera's server.
It does seem like a good stepping stone to forcing people to get a license to build a website. If that catches on then surely the United States will do the same thing. They seem good at chipping away at rights until we have none left at all. And it will be a good source of income for them.
Because this is Slashdot and everything is China's fault.
Maybe they can rename it to something with a weasel in it.
It looks to me more like "Microsoft is making Windows no longer compatible with my security software at the same time they're making their own software to compete against me".
That's funny but fuck you anyway.
If somebody takes something that has been in his ear and tries to put it in my ear, he's going to catch a tazer in a mean place. And if it's a Kelly Clarkson song, he's going to catch the tazer in an even meaner place.
I think an "audiophile" would say all portable music players are bullshit before listening to any of them.
If you went the other way around, you might notice an Open Office problem. I was testing Open Office to see if it could be a suitable Office Suite for some friends who got a used computer without Microsoft Office. I used Open Office to load documents created with MS Office, and vice versa. I also edited and saved the documents, to see if they could still be loaded in the original packages and hadn't lost anything. The only place I found Open Office was lacking was in the OpenOffice.org version of Powerpoint. Some of the animation played way too slowly. So Powerpoint won there. But that was the only thing and I still ended up installing Open Office on the computer because they only needed the word processor anyway. AndO pen Office was much more impressive than it was a few years ago when it crashed as I was saving a file in Suse Linux. Maybe next time around the animation will work too.
If you're going to take that point of view then why is this news? Thunderbird already exists.
It would have been even worse if they accidentally reversed the connectors. They'd never be able to deal with all the incoming jokes like, "In Soviet Russia, video game plays you!"
It depends on who you ask. If you ask an end user, the usefulness and appeal of the software is what makes them great. If you ask the programmers, the efficiency and accurateness of the code is what makes them great. If you ask Slashdot, working for Google makes them great.
If YouTube had the content and popularity of Google Video, it would be loading fast too.
I just hope they don't screw it up, making it super efficient but no fun.
Oh yes they would. You would have to be a hardcore Slashdotter to think differently. People don't just go to MySpace and YouTube because they're named MySpace and YouTube. I've been able to find music videos on YouTube that I can't find anywhere else. When I search for anything on Google, I just find video samples from people trying to sell video clips, or nothing at all. And not everybody thinks making a low-resolution video zoom to the size of the browser window is a good thing. MySpace has people of all cultures marking each other as friends, complimenting each other's pictures, and sharing their current favorite songs with people. Google has some half-baked social site plagued with racism. They make mistakes sometimes. I think they're going to buy YouTube and try to filter out all of the copyrighted material, and give it a more Google-like interface. Then it's going to be Google Video and they'll be back where they are now, with a technologically superior piece of crap in the eyes of all the users they just bought. I'm not trying to be a troll. I'm just saying what I see. And I'm not disagreeing with all of what you said. Just that one line is driving me crazy as a YouTube and MySpace user.