Sorry, there are no second chances. Joe user tried it, had a bad experience, and will forevermore avoid Linux. Techie, you lose.
Way back in the day I bought Kylix for Linux, thinking I would be on the wave of a new trend. After three days of intense research and fiddling, I got my notebook computer working, with sound, network, reasonable screen resolution, etc. I then spent about two days contemplating this, and decided that my target market (as an application developer) would not have the time, interest, or technical expertise to make Linux work. I chose not to write Linux applications for the same reason that I chose not to write Sharepoint applications; The user would have to jump through too many hoops before he/she even met the entry requirements to use my software.
Monster.com appears to say Java has taken over the world as much as any technology ever will. Truth be told I find myself more productive in.net, but most companies are in the Java world. Java has also come a long way in the last two or three years.
I went through a short romance with RealBuggy. I'm sorry.
I tried very hard to love it. Like most people, I found it incredibly buggy. It also lacked support for enterprise-level databases. I also found it to be in that strange twilight between object-oriented and procedural code that made it very difficult, for me personally, to construct well-organized projects.
This was under version 5, though. They have new versions available.
I certainly don't mean to imply that its the only thing to worry about.. or even the biggest thing to worry about. And I don't really care to waste much more time on the thought... But its fairly easy to prove feasibility....
I know as absolute fact that the US is/was not the only one working on this from 1992 to 1999. I'd bet it all that they've worked on it since then. Its essentially a race to discover either 1) a viable fuel with higher energy-density than crude oil, or 2) alternative energy sources that are efficient enough to power such a device. It only needs to reach a certain level before it becomes viable. In the case of solar-powered devices, the could simply recognize when they were getting low on energy with sufficient time to find a resting place to recharge. Height would be an excellent criteria; The highest flat surface above 10 or 12 feet is likely to be a roof, top of a utility pole, etc... Neglecting wind, this essentially guarantees an undisterbed recharge.
I agree, to a point. But also consider five things; 1) A destruction of western culture does not necessarily mean a reduction of oil consumption. Western culture is primarily defined by social and religious beliefs, combined with our ability to forcefully reduce the amount and influence of contradictory social and religious beliefs. 2)Hatred often has no rational bounds. How many times have you witnessed someone do something incredibly self-destructive simply out of anger? 3) Without the "West" to strong-arm them, they could likely raise the price of oil to achieve similar profits. Our ability to peruse alternate means of energy make us a less ideal customer, compared to lesser developed nations that do not possess the infrastructure necessary to eliminate their dependence on oil. 4) The thought of running out of oil must have crossed someone's Middle-Eastern mind at some point!! This means that reducing export and increasing profit is a desirable risk-mitigation strategy. 5) Displacement; The "East" tends to buy whatever we don't buy. Historically, if we put a trade embargo on an oil-producing nation and we don't use our military to restrict trade with other nations, that nation's oil-exports are largely unaffected since they just find another buyer... The oil previously supplied to the nation which is now buying the old we refused gets sold to us.... In the end, our refusal to buy oil has very little actual impact.
My comments were coherent. I've have found, though, that my writing tends to require a certain amount of deduction on the part of the reader. I've observed the following general principal; Most people are not exhaustive in their explanations. For instance, most people will not enumerate all of the rationale for getting from thought A to thought C if they believe that the intermediary thought (thought B) is commonly understood or else can be easily deduced. As the discrepancy between the author's intelligence and the reader's intelligence increases, and assuming the literary product is in-fact logically-sound, the reader often becomes uncomfortable with the amount of prerequisite knowledge they are expected to know, and/or what they are expected to deduce. As the intellectual discrepancy increases, the reader's discomfort will correspondingly increase until the reader begins to feel the perception of incoherency.
To assist you in understanding, perhaps it would be best if I summarize; People of limited intelligence have difficulty understanding what I'm saying.
There are a few things that you, the reader, can do reduce the intellectual discrepancy between yourself and the author of this posting. In my educated opinion, the most effective way for you to achieve this would be to increasing the ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6 fatty acids in your diet. Please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_3 for more information. In addition, I recommend searching on various keywords regarding intelligence at online bookstores such as Amazon. There you can find more information that may help you to better process and understand complex thought.
I see all these dismissals, as if this is a joke. But might I suggest that the researchers at Google aren't trying to get an acceptable sample-size, as many people here are naively suggesting. It seems much more likely that Google is researching the thought-process of prediction itself. It also seems likely that a number of fairly intelligent industry-insiders also believes they're close to figured out how to create a prediction engine that is accurate (ahref=http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/22 /1229238&tid=109&tid=120&tid=217rel=url2html-6813h ttp://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/22/1229238 &tid=109&tid=120&tid=217>)...
Think about it; If they have enough information (IE the web), they can hone it by feeding it past events to "predict" other past events and then comparing their prediction to what actually occurred. If it's able to predict events that have occurred given what came before those events, then there's a good chance that it will work with current data to predict future events.
Feel free to label me a wacko... Perhaps I've seen "Terminator" too many times. But I've also worked with a number of freakishly intelligent people; the kind that Google has been hiring right-and-left without any apparent reason. I've always said that technology could someday facilitate society's return to bondage... It may seem far fetched, until one considers the sheer breadth of people that hate "western" culture. Given the past as a predictor, I would be inclined to believe that few Middle Eastern leaders would hesitate to use technology to exterminate as much of western culture as they could... Folks, its not unrealistic to recognize the likelihood that technological-advancements will make sudden and drastic changes to our way of life... This ought to give us pause. What balances are essential to our culture? What imbalances will end it? Someday, somewhere, somebody is going to come up with a way to utilize technology to facilitate his/her agenda. Maybe we don't have to worry about Google, since the magnitude of the consequence is, at least in part, proportionate to the magnitude agenda of the individual(s). But things such as this should be cataloged in our brains as evidence that this mode of societal-failure is plausible.
Ok, flame away. But I hope I never have to say I told you so.
Intellectual Property:Since we must accept that companies are evil and greedy, demanding not only fruits delivered durring working hours but all hours, OSS is clearly a violation of the natural laws of civilized society... i.e. The slaves are trying to conspire and thats against the law. Or if its not, it should be.
Conceptual Integrity:OSS poses no advantage over proprietary software since oss does peer reviews and proprietary doesn't, but should. Huh? Am I missing something?
Professionalism:Hackers are unprofessional. I view people that consider the "balance of power" important, such as the authors of the US Constitution, as being hackers. Therefore OSS is unprofessional
Innovation: The only open source I'm aware of is Linux, so lets talk about that. Its not very creative, therefore OSS is not very creative... To summarize, all tree's are vegetable, therefore all vegetables are trees.
Now lets stop talking nonsense and start pointing out how badly OSS would be if it truely functioned the way I perceive that it functioned. I perceive that all companies start with a piece of paper with two checkboxes in it; one for open source and one for closed source. The company, upon making the decision to sell software, cuts the fingers of each employee and places a little of their blood on the little checkbox which states our selection.
Now I need to write a bunch more stuff so my boss thinks I'm doing something useful. I hope he doesn't read this far down in my little article or maybe I'll get another beating. I guess I better get back, MASTUHH needs me!!
I certainly understand why RedHat would see it as a conflict of interest. But I think they need to start thinking about the viability of the Linux community as a whole. There are two MAJOR competitors just now coming up to speed; OpenSolaris and OSX for x86. Then theirs OpenBSD. OpenBSD moves slower than Linux because nobody likes to sit around waiting for quality, but in the Unix race, quality seems to win in the long-haul. So if the leaders in the Linux community can't wrangle things together, I think theres a good chance were just going to see it diverge into obscurity.
That's too bad. Hopefully the vendors themselves will realize the importance, even if just to promote their own distributions, and send in additional intellectual muscle. Until then,... what? A bad standard is better than no standard? I can't decide. I think bad standard is better than none. I'm not sure why the world is getting dumber. Maybe its just the United States..... Maybe we've got a food-culprit... Time to start keeping better track of those preservatives and sugar substitutes.
Symantec, as a corporate whole, did what all people who can't write software do. They switched over to making reports. Since nobody every crashed from reading a defective report, this allows them to hide their incompetence.
Honestly, I'd rather just take Ballmer's word for it rather than relying on Symantec, much like I'd rather have a virus than to let Norton do what it does to PCs its installed on.
I see no clause in the Consolidated Patent Laws document or in the Consolidated Patent Rules document which would suggests something that seems intuitively obvious; A file for Patent which attempts to lay claim to a process which is so trivial as to be the natural and likely inclination of most people, or is so simple as to be unavoidable, are ineligible. It appears to me that the difference between "rules" and "laws" is that rules are determined by the USPTO, whereas laws are legislated by congress. Is this correct? Perhaps there is some other document [uspto.gov] that I am not seeing which specify such an obvious guideline?
.... perhaps; Patents which "induce spontaneous laughter by members of the USPTO office and/or members of the general public because of the stupidity and/or ludicrousness of the request" should be legally ineligible.
... I was able to find the following guideline which, to me, clearly suggests that the patent (#6,928,433 btw) should be ineligible:
** 1.43 In case an inventor is insane or otherwise legally incapacitated, the legal representative (guardian, conservator,
etc.) of such inventor may make the necessary
oath or declaration, and apply for and obtain the patent.
[48 FR 2709, Jan. 20, 1983, effective Feb. 27, 1983]
... It seems clear to me that each person attempting to file this patent would trigger this clause, recursively, indefinitely. I can only think of one other reason a person would file this patent; intent to stifle a competitor by subversively manipulating our public legal system with merit-less accusations for purposes of instigating a punishment or restriction which has no legal or ethical basis.
If we cannot do anything legally, then we can vote with our dollars. Creative Technology's patent is un-ethical and, if so many Americans weren't in such a state of philosophical confusion, un-American. This patent may be the straw that broke the camel's back; I'm strongly considering the creation of a grass-roots web resource to round-up those of us left who still have some shred of common-sense so that we can use our collective power to identify and "fiscally balance" those that chose to profiteer from unethical business practices. Anybody interested?
I see no clause in the Consolidated Patent Laws document or in the Consolidated Patent Rules document which would suggests something that seems intuitively obvious; A file for Patent which attempts to lay claim to a process which is so trivial as to be the natural and likely inclination of most people, or is so simple as to be unavoidable, are ineligible. It appears to me that the difference between "rules" and "laws" is that rules are determined by the USPTO, whereas laws are legislated by congress. Is this correct? Perhaps there is some other document that I am not seeing which specify such an obvious guideline?
.... perhaps; Patents which "induce spontaneous laughter by members of the USPTO office and/or members of the general public because of the stupidity and/or ludicrousness of the request" should be legally ineligible.
... I was able to find the following guideline which, to me, clearly suggests that the patent (#6,928,433 btw) should be ineligible:
** 1.43 In case an inventor is insane or otherwise legally incapacitated, the legal representative (guardian, conservator,
etc.) of such inventor may make the necessary
oath or declaration, and apply for and obtain the patent.
[48 FR 2709, Jan. 20, 1983, effective Feb. 27, 1983]
... It seems clear to me that each person attempting to file this patent would trigger this clause, recursively, indefinitely. I can only think of one other reason a person would file this patent; intent to stifle a competitor by subversively manipulating our public legal system with merit-less accusations for purposes of instigating a punishment or restriction which has no legal or ethical basis.
If we cannot do anything legally, then we can vote with our dollars. Creative Technology's patent is un-ethical and, if so many Americans weren't in such a state of philosophical confusion, un-American. This patent may be the straw that broke the camel's back; I'm strongly considering the creation of a grass-roots web resource to round-up those of us left who still have some shred of common-sense so that we can use our collective power to identify and "fiscally balance" those that chose to profiteer from unethical business practices. Anybody interested?
Thanks Jim. I appreciate your time and thought. I realize that I was thinking of the GPL in the wrong way. I understand how GPL is useful in ensuring user's rights. I see that have to balance the ideals of the GPL with my own interest. For me that means making sure I never trap customer data. I can open source certain bits and pieces to increase willingness to use my software. I may even create a license that promises to open source the code withing a certain timeframe by invalidating the license by NOT releasing it... Hey, fun with licensing 101!!!
Thanks Jim. Your response made alot of sense to me. I am currently wrestling with licensing models for software I plan to release. Why would someone choose to release their code as open source at all? My own answer to this question is that an open source framework might bring traffic and a user-base to my technology, which I would leverage by building a commercial application on top of. But outside of this scenario, is there a compelling advantage to releasing my code?
Next question is; if I GPLed my framework, would I, Mr. Original Author Jr., be legally bound to GPL everything I built on top of it, or could I silently exempt myself from my own licensing without legal reprocussions?
I see how the GPL model can be used to force companies to give away their software. This is beneficial to the user. But how is a developer able to receive money for the work he has already done if he gives away his work? Please don't say "Through support services he offers for his work." The reason I ask you not to say that is because I hold the stronge conviction that software SHOULD be able to support itself. I know this is an ideal that has not been reached and is unrealistic for inherently complex applications. But I do belief that software is generally improving. I'm certain that software continues to get easier to use, more capable of self-configuring and self-correcting, and more thoroughly documented. Likewise, user expectations of software continue to rise in all of those respective areas. In my own experience I have chosen to ignore an otherwise appealing application, simply because its installation required me to perform a non-trival amount of prerequisite configuration which I found to be of the routine nature ideally suited for computer automation...
I appologize if this seems repetative, but I seem to be a fundamental inability for me to integrate the open source concept into my own paradigm of how one could reasonably expect to succeed. I understand that there are some companies (and/or individual developers) whom have been wildly successful. But I perceive that this is not the norm. And it comes back to the same question of how to make money off work that you give away.
Your articulate response has given me hope that you can help me to understand this concept. So please; lets be explicit and create a hypothetical;
I have spent the last year of my life writing THE end-all application. My goal is to provide a useful product, of exceptional quality and useability, in exchange for a salary which would provide a standard of living comparable to an average person in my country. I have worked hard to ensure that my product is intuitive and well documented. I anticipate that support will be unnecessary for the majority of my customers and most certainly too trivial for customers to justify paying for. For this example, please assume I have created a viable product that is likely to achieve a userbase the size of products such as AbiWord, or else RealBasic. Here I do not have any actual numbers, so forgive me if they are drastically different. I suppose you could also just categorize my product as being successful but not wildly-so. Assuming I have chosen to make my product open source, what business model(s) will provide an independent software developer (sole proprietor) with approximately the same income as corporate-employed peers (salary of $75,000 - $100,000 per year plus benefits)? If the answer depends on which licensing model is chosen (for brevity, just compare BSD and GPL), please explain how the Business model differs and the reasoning behind those differences.
Yes. Thats what I said, in my head as I was writing my comments of course... Word for word; "throw together a GUI in a few minutes that will work perfectly on all devices."
You should write a book. You could call it, "Making rediculous assumptions about other people's comments and formulating responses that are so intuitively obvious as to be completely useless." Or how about just, "Being Annoying for Dummies?"
In it you could have an appendix which shows how to find the third mouse button on a Macintosh.
Perhaps "making sure" was the wrong phrase. But there is alot of competition when it comes to GUI toolkits. So first and foremost critera, for me, is the quality. But next question is "how many platforms will it run on". I'm well aware that I can re-write my GUI and port ot any platform. But I'm an American. I want it for free and I want it right now. So if I can find a toolkit that appears to offer what Qt can, plus allows me to do a simple recompile on more platforms, then I will choose that toolkit. If, otoh, you can demonstrate that the quality of Qt is superior, then quality trumps # of supported platforms. If I wanted it to run on EVERYTHING, I would choose Swing. It would not surprise me one bit if someone IS working on a Swing port for Commodore 64. But I have decided that I prefer the quality that a native C++ toolkit provides me. I have written great Swing apps, so please no flames. But my critera for choosing a toolkit includes the number of deployment platforms it supports. Why is this invalid? If someone expressed an interest in buying my software for a Palm, why should I lose that sale because I don't have the time to port it to Palm? Just as important, why would I want to spend the time and money to port it to palm if I can find a toolkit of equal quality which does that job for me?
I'm sorry, I don't understand. As a developer, my interest is making sure that the software I write runs on everything. If I'm buying a Trolltech product to develop my application on a Palm, why does Trolltech care? Making their product to work on more platforms will broaden their market and increase their sales. The fact that it runs on more platforms creates a synergistic effect, causing more developers to choose their product on all platforms.
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Sorry, there are no second chances. Joe user tried it, had a bad experience, and will forevermore avoid Linux. Techie, you lose.
Way back in the day I bought Kylix for Linux, thinking I would be on the wave of a new trend. After three days of intense research and fiddling, I got my notebook computer working, with sound, network, reasonable screen resolution, etc. I then spent about two days contemplating this, and decided that my target market (as an application developer) would not have the time, interest, or technical expertise to make Linux work. I chose not to write Linux applications for the same reason that I chose not to write Sharepoint applications; The user would have to jump through too many hoops before he/she even met the entry requirements to use my software.
Monster.com appears to say Java has taken over the world as much as any technology ever will. Truth be told I find myself more productive in .net, but most companies are in the Java world. Java has also come a long way in the last two or three years.
I went through a short romance with RealBuggy. I'm sorry.
The licensing will stop it cold in its tracks.
I tried very hard to love it. Like most people, I found it incredibly buggy. It also lacked support for enterprise-level databases. I also found it to be in that strange twilight between object-oriented and procedural code that made it very difficult, for me personally, to construct well-organized projects. This was under version 5, though. They have new versions available.
I certainly don't mean to imply that its the only thing to worry about.. or even the biggest thing to worry about. And I don't really care to waste much more time on the thought... But its fairly easy to prove feasibility....
We have governments that spend billions on "defense" initiatives (You know, the kind that invade other countries in a so-called "proactive" defense); http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22defense+spendi ng%22&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&fl=0&x=wrt"
We have the technology to build extremely small devices which fly; http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22mechanical+fli es%22&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&fl=0&x=wrt
We have miniaturization of audio and video capture; http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22camera+on+a+ch ip%22&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&fl=0&x=wrt
We have peer-to-peer wireless communications; http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22peer+to+peer+w ireless+network%22&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t&fl=0&x =wrt
We have Global positioning sattelites.
I know as absolute fact that the US is/was not the only one working on this from 1992 to 1999. I'd bet it all that they've worked on it since then. Its essentially a race to discover either 1) a viable fuel with higher energy-density than crude oil, or 2) alternative energy sources that are efficient enough to power such a device. It only needs to reach a certain level before it becomes viable. In the case of solar-powered devices, the could simply recognize when they were getting low on energy with sufficient time to find a resting place to recharge. Height would be an excellent criteria; The highest flat surface above 10 or 12 feet is likely to be a roof, top of a utility pole, etc... Neglecting wind, this essentially guarantees an undisterbed recharge.
I agree, to a point. But also consider five things; 1) A destruction of western culture does not necessarily mean a reduction of oil consumption. Western culture is primarily defined by social and religious beliefs, combined with our ability to forcefully reduce the amount and influence of contradictory social and religious beliefs. 2)Hatred often has no rational bounds. How many times have you witnessed someone do something incredibly self-destructive simply out of anger? 3) Without the "West" to strong-arm them, they could likely raise the price of oil to achieve similar profits. Our ability to peruse alternate means of energy make us a less ideal customer, compared to lesser developed nations that do not possess the infrastructure necessary to eliminate their dependence on oil. 4) The thought of running out of oil must have crossed someone's Middle-Eastern mind at some point!! This means that reducing export and increasing profit is a desirable risk-mitigation strategy. 5) Displacement; The "East" tends to buy whatever we don't buy. Historically, if we put a trade embargo on an oil-producing nation and we don't use our military to restrict trade with other nations, that nation's oil-exports are largely unaffected since they just find another buyer... The oil previously supplied to the nation which is now buying the old we refused gets sold to us.... In the end, our refusal to buy oil has very little actual impact.
My comments were coherent. I've have found, though, that my writing tends to require a certain amount of deduction on the part of the reader. I've observed the following general principal; Most people are not exhaustive in their explanations. For instance, most people will not enumerate all of the rationale for getting from thought A to thought C if they believe that the intermediary thought (thought B) is commonly understood or else can be easily deduced. As the discrepancy between the author's intelligence and the reader's intelligence increases, and assuming the literary product is in-fact logically-sound, the reader often becomes uncomfortable with the amount of prerequisite knowledge they are expected to know, and/or what they are expected to deduce. As the intellectual discrepancy increases, the reader's discomfort will correspondingly increase until the reader begins to feel the perception of incoherency.
To assist you in understanding, perhaps it would be best if I summarize; People of limited intelligence have difficulty understanding what I'm saying.
There are a few things that you, the reader, can do reduce the intellectual discrepancy between yourself and the author of this posting. In my educated opinion, the most effective way for you to achieve this would be to increasing the ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6 fatty acids in your diet. Please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_3 for more information. In addition, I recommend searching on various keywords regarding intelligence at online bookstores such as Amazon. There you can find more information that may help you to better process and understand complex thought.
I see all these dismissals, as if this is a joke. But might I suggest that the researchers at Google aren't trying to get an acceptable sample-size, as many people here are naively suggesting. It seems much more likely that Google is researching the thought-process of prediction itself. It also seems likely that a number of fairly intelligent industry-insiders also believes they're close to figured out how to create a prediction engine that is accurate (ahref=http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/22 /1229238&tid=109&tid=120&tid=217rel=url2html-6813h ttp://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/22/1229238 &tid=109&tid=120&tid=217>)...
Think about it; If they have enough information (IE the web), they can hone it by feeding it past events to "predict" other past events and then comparing their prediction to what actually occurred. If it's able to predict events that have occurred given what came before those events, then there's a good chance that it will work with current data to predict future events.
Feel free to label me a wacko... Perhaps I've seen "Terminator" too many times. But I've also worked with a number of freakishly intelligent people; the kind that Google has been hiring right-and-left without any apparent reason. I've always said that technology could someday facilitate society's return to bondage... It may seem far fetched, until one considers the sheer breadth of people that hate "western" culture. Given the past as a predictor, I would be inclined to believe that few Middle Eastern leaders would hesitate to use technology to exterminate as much of western culture as they could... Folks, its not unrealistic to recognize the likelihood that technological-advancements will make sudden and drastic changes to our way of life... This ought to give us pause. What balances are essential to our culture? What imbalances will end it? Someday, somewhere, somebody is going to come up with a way to utilize technology to facilitate his/her agenda. Maybe we don't have to worry about Google, since the magnitude of the consequence is, at least in part, proportionate to the magnitude agenda of the individual(s). But things such as this should be cataloged in our brains as evidence that this mode of societal-failure is plausible.
Ok, flame away. But I hope I never have to say I told you so.
Here's a partial summary (before I lost interest)
Intellectual Property:Since we must accept that companies are evil and greedy, demanding not only fruits delivered durring working hours but all hours, OSS is clearly a violation of the natural laws of civilized society... i.e. The slaves are trying to conspire and thats against the law. Or if its not, it should be.
Conceptual Integrity:OSS poses no advantage over proprietary software since oss does peer reviews and proprietary doesn't, but should. Huh? Am I missing something?
Professionalism:Hackers are unprofessional. I view people that consider the "balance of power" important, such as the authors of the US Constitution, as being hackers. Therefore OSS is unprofessional
Innovation: The only open source I'm aware of is Linux, so lets talk about that. Its not very creative, therefore OSS is not very creative... To summarize, all tree's are vegetable, therefore all vegetables are trees.
Now lets stop talking nonsense and start pointing out how badly OSS would be if it truely functioned the way I perceive that it functioned. I perceive that all companies start with a piece of paper with two checkboxes in it; one for open source and one for closed source. The company, upon making the decision to sell software, cuts the fingers of each employee and places a little of their blood on the little checkbox which states our selection.
Now I need to write a bunch more stuff so my boss thinks I'm doing something useful. I hope he doesn't read this far down in my little article or maybe I'll get another beating. I guess I better get back, MASTUHH needs me!!
OMG, I just thought something horrible. Could you imagine the horror of having to endure Ballmer's "told you so" speech?
I certainly understand why RedHat would see it as a conflict of interest. But I think they need to start thinking about the viability of the Linux community as a whole. There are two MAJOR competitors just now coming up to speed; OpenSolaris and OSX for x86. Then theirs OpenBSD. OpenBSD moves slower than Linux because nobody likes to sit around waiting for quality, but in the Unix race, quality seems to win in the long-haul. So if the leaders in the Linux community can't wrangle things together, I think theres a good chance were just going to see it diverge into obscurity.
That's too bad. Hopefully the vendors themselves will realize the importance, even if just to promote their own distributions, and send in additional intellectual muscle. Until then,... what? A bad standard is better than no standard? I can't decide. I think bad standard is better than none. I'm not sure why the world is getting dumber. Maybe its just the United States..... Maybe we've got a food-culprit... Time to start keeping better track of those preservatives and sugar substitutes.
Symantec, as a corporate whole, did what all people who can't write software do. They switched over to making reports. Since nobody every crashed from reading a defective report, this allows them to hide their incompetence.
Honestly, I'd rather just take Ballmer's word for it rather than relying on Symantec, much like I'd rather have a virus than to let Norton do what it does to PCs its installed on.
Wow. I'm very happy. LSB might actually make Linux useful for those of us trying to make a living off of software development...
Exactly; Who would make a $$$ machine that looks like such ass.
I see no clause in the Consolidated Patent Laws document or in the Consolidated Patent Rules document which would suggests something that seems intuitively obvious; A file for Patent which attempts to lay claim to a process which is so trivial as to be the natural and likely inclination of most people, or is so simple as to be unavoidable, are ineligible. It appears to me that the difference between "rules" and "laws" is that rules are determined by the USPTO, whereas laws are legislated by congress. Is this correct? Perhaps there is some other document [uspto.gov] that I am not seeing which specify such an obvious guideline?
.... perhaps; Patents which "induce spontaneous laughter by members of the USPTO office and/or members of the general public because of the stupidity and/or ludicrousness of the request" should be legally ineligible.
... I was able to find the following guideline which, to me, clearly suggests that the patent (#6,928,433 btw) should be ineligible:
** 1.43 In case an inventor is insane or otherwise legally incapacitated, the legal representative (guardian, conservator, etc.) of such inventor may make the necessary oath or declaration, and apply for and obtain the patent. [48 FR 2709, Jan. 20, 1983, effective Feb. 27, 1983]
... It seems clear to me that each person attempting to file this patent would trigger this clause, recursively, indefinitely. I can only think of one other reason a person would file this patent; intent to stifle a competitor by subversively manipulating our public legal system with merit-less accusations for purposes of instigating a punishment or restriction which has no legal or ethical basis.
If we cannot do anything legally, then we can vote with our dollars. Creative Technology's patent is un-ethical and, if so many Americans weren't in such a state of philosophical confusion, un-American. This patent may be the straw that broke the camel's back; I'm strongly considering the creation of a grass-roots web resource to round-up those of us left who still have some shred of common-sense so that we can use our collective power to identify and "fiscally balance" those that chose to profiteer from unethical business practices. Anybody interested?
I see no clause in the Consolidated Patent Laws document or in the Consolidated Patent Rules document which would suggests something that seems intuitively obvious; A file for Patent which attempts to lay claim to a process which is so trivial as to be the natural and likely inclination of most people, or is so simple as to be unavoidable, are ineligible. It appears to me that the difference between "rules" and "laws" is that rules are determined by the USPTO, whereas laws are legislated by congress. Is this correct? Perhaps there is some other document that I am not seeing which specify such an obvious guideline?
.... perhaps; Patents which "induce spontaneous laughter by members of the USPTO office and/or members of the general public because of the stupidity and/or ludicrousness of the request" should be legally ineligible.
... I was able to find the following guideline which, to me, clearly suggests that the patent (#6,928,433 btw) should be ineligible:
** 1.43 In case an inventor is insane or otherwise legally incapacitated, the legal representative (guardian, conservator, etc.) of such inventor may make the necessary oath or declaration, and apply for and obtain the patent. [48 FR 2709, Jan. 20, 1983, effective Feb. 27, 1983]
... It seems clear to me that each person attempting to file this patent would trigger this clause, recursively, indefinitely. I can only think of one other reason a person would file this patent; intent to stifle a competitor by subversively manipulating our public legal system with merit-less accusations for purposes of instigating a punishment or restriction which has no legal or ethical basis.
If we cannot do anything legally, then we can vote with our dollars. Creative Technology's patent is un-ethical and, if so many Americans weren't in such a state of philosophical confusion, un-American. This patent may be the straw that broke the camel's back; I'm strongly considering the creation of a grass-roots web resource to round-up those of us left who still have some shred of common-sense so that we can use our collective power to identify and "fiscally balance" those that chose to profiteer from unethical business practices. Anybody interested?
Oh yes. Clearly Perl, Ruby, Lisp, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Scheme and Python all whomp over Java when it comes to speed.
I'm one as well. I use VS 2003 when I must, and Eclipse otherwise. Eclipse is faster on the same hardware, more robust, and has better features.
Luck only matters if you plan to give up after just one try.
Thanks Jim. I appreciate your time and thought. I realize that I was thinking of the GPL in the wrong way. I understand how GPL is useful in ensuring user's rights. I see that have to balance the ideals of the GPL with my own interest. For me that means making sure I never trap customer data. I can open source certain bits and pieces to increase willingness to use my software. I may even create a license that promises to open source the code withing a certain timeframe by invalidating the license by NOT releasing it... Hey, fun with licensing 101!!!
Anyhow, thanks again.
Thanks Jim. Your response made alot of sense to me. I am currently wrestling with licensing models for software I plan to release. Why would someone choose to release their code as open source at all? My own answer to this question is that an open source framework might bring traffic and a user-base to my technology, which I would leverage by building a commercial application on top of. But outside of this scenario, is there a compelling advantage to releasing my code?
Next question is; if I GPLed my framework, would I, Mr. Original Author Jr., be legally bound to GPL everything I built on top of it, or could I silently exempt myself from my own licensing without legal reprocussions?
I see how the GPL model can be used to force companies to give away their software. This is beneficial to the user. But how is a developer able to receive money for the work he has already done if he gives away his work? Please don't say "Through support services he offers for his work." The reason I ask you not to say that is because I hold the stronge conviction that software SHOULD be able to support itself. I know this is an ideal that has not been reached and is unrealistic for inherently complex applications. But I do belief that software is generally improving. I'm certain that software continues to get easier to use, more capable of self-configuring and self-correcting, and more thoroughly documented. Likewise, user expectations of software continue to rise in all of those respective areas. In my own experience I have chosen to ignore an otherwise appealing application, simply because its installation required me to perform a non-trival amount of prerequisite configuration which I found to be of the routine nature ideally suited for computer automation...
I appologize if this seems repetative, but I seem to be a fundamental inability for me to integrate the open source concept into my own paradigm of how one could reasonably expect to succeed. I understand that there are some companies (and/or individual developers) whom have been wildly successful. But I perceive that this is not the norm. And it comes back to the same question of how to make money off work that you give away.
Your articulate response has given me hope that you can help me to understand this concept. So please; lets be explicit and create a hypothetical;
I have spent the last year of my life writing THE end-all application. My goal is to provide a useful product, of exceptional quality and useability, in exchange for a salary which would provide a standard of living comparable to an average person in my country. I have worked hard to ensure that my product is intuitive and well documented. I anticipate that support will be unnecessary for the majority of my customers and most certainly too trivial for customers to justify paying for. For this example, please assume I have created a viable product that is likely to achieve a userbase the size of products such as AbiWord, or else RealBasic. Here I do not have any actual numbers, so forgive me if they are drastically different. I suppose you could also just categorize my product as being successful but not wildly-so. Assuming I have chosen to make my product open source, what business model(s) will provide an independent software developer (sole proprietor) with approximately the same income as corporate-employed peers (salary of $75,000 - $100,000 per year plus benefits)? If the answer depends on which licensing model is chosen (for brevity, just compare BSD and GPL), please explain how the Business model differs and the reasoning behind those differences.
Thank you for your time and thoughts.
Yes. Thats what I said, in my head as I was writing my comments of course... Word for word; "throw together a GUI in a few minutes that will work perfectly on all devices."
You should write a book. You could call it, "Making rediculous assumptions about other people's comments and formulating responses that are so intuitively obvious as to be completely useless." Or how about just, "Being Annoying for Dummies?"
In it you could have an appendix which shows how to find the third mouse button on a Macintosh.
Perhaps "making sure" was the wrong phrase. But there is alot of competition when it comes to GUI toolkits. So first and foremost critera, for me, is the quality. But next question is "how many platforms will it run on". I'm well aware that I can re-write my GUI and port ot any platform. But I'm an American. I want it for free and I want it right now. So if I can find a toolkit that appears to offer what Qt can, plus allows me to do a simple recompile on more platforms, then I will choose that toolkit. If, otoh, you can demonstrate that the quality of Qt is superior, then quality trumps # of supported platforms. If I wanted it to run on EVERYTHING, I would choose Swing. It would not surprise me one bit if someone IS working on a Swing port for Commodore 64. But I have decided that I prefer the quality that a native C++ toolkit provides me. I have written great Swing apps, so please no flames. But my critera for choosing a toolkit includes the number of deployment platforms it supports. Why is this invalid? If someone expressed an interest in buying my software for a Palm, why should I lose that sale because I don't have the time to port it to Palm? Just as important, why would I want to spend the time and money to port it to palm if I can find a toolkit of equal quality which does that job for me?
I'm sorry, I don't understand. As a developer, my interest is making sure that the software I write runs on everything. If I'm buying a Trolltech product to develop my application on a Palm, why does Trolltech care? Making their product to work on more platforms will broaden their market and increase their sales. The fact that it runs on more platforms creates a synergistic effect, causing more developers to choose their product on all platforms.