The main problem with paralelism for the general application is the current model. The "Event Model" that is used nowadays as the basic processing model for applications specifies that the program will stay idle until the user press a key or moves the mouse (or push buttons).
With this model it is kind of hard to use the multithreading processors. Of course after the user has triggered an action then the program could make use of the threading capability to improve its performance.
Next comes the problem of looking at "how many threads" should one allow in his program... if one allow to many threads and the processors have just 2 it will be bad, also the other way around.
I think the compilers must be done "thread aware", so they can get the program code and efectively use the processing power. Of course if the program is compiled natively (C,C++, Pascal, etc) we would have the same problem of threads numbers, but if there is a virtual machine (Java and.NET technology) or even a interpreter, the middle-layer needs to be thread aware so it can distribute the processes in different threads.
Of course, the first applications that can take advantage of multithreading are games, as their model is active but, then again the compiler MUST be aware of the multithreading capacities and it should be able to fit the different developer wantd threads in the processor.
For the general application I think multithreading must can be used by changing (or extending) the events model window paradigm, so, in one thread the program could wait for the events and other thread could be used to pro-act; this could be achieved by some kind of artificial intelligent development.
Just today I was daydreaming about how to replace the totally old and awkward menu bar standard interface, specifically for OpenOffice, which has 10 menus with 30 or more submenues... this is a thing that could be improved by some kind of proactive behaviour from the computer (imagine something like an agent that could predict the options you where looking for while using the program... [no i am not thinking about the !£%!"£@ "feature" of hiding the menu options from MS Office , windows et al] ).
Another way to use multithreading could be from the Operating System, so the programs [that do not require] multithreading wont have to deal with it BUT the operating system would use the multithreading capacities to schedule the processes execution... in this way we may get [AT LAST] a [REAL] multiprocess OS (and not the illusion we have now by quit process switching).
Haha... That is why I never pay attention to this kind of reviews...
I am sure he started to make the benchmarks and saw that MS Office kicked OOo ass so he just had to come up with some nice numbers and graphs that showed how OOs rul3z and MSOffice sucks...
I stop believing the review when I saw the start times..
Writer Word First 11.02 31.1 Average 4.37 12.47
4.37 MY ASS... if OOo has something fucked is the starting time, I guess you could get the 12.47 of his "Word Average startup" if you turn on the Quick Starter... (that really does not do anything useful occupying a place in my tray icon... WTF do they put a tray icon if it wont do NOTHING?? learn from Acrobat Reader)
I like the OpenOffice Org idea... it is nice but there is still really no comparison... I have been trying to use openoffice for quite some time (I have it installed in fact) but although it apperas to be full featured, when you use it, you just do not find what you need AND there are some things that it has wrong...
As examples: (Open Office 2.o beta) 1. When I insert an picture in OO Writer, after I select it a nice toolbar appears... come on and do it, are you there? ok, after that , try to crop the image from a side... uhhh notice the crop option?? nope there is no crop option.
In fact... when you examine the picture toolbar closely you will see none of the options are useful there is a button called "From File" that gives you the properties of the image (WTF From file???) there is an options that gives you some nice effects, and several other useless options.
So, what do you need to do to crop a small portion of the image?... well click on FORMAT menu, then Picture Option then select the Crop tab.. and then guess the magic numbers relative to the section you need to crop (that is not WYSIGYG).
Ok, another one... Spend some time arranging your toolbars, yes Tools/Customize menu. Add some toolbars (View/Toolbars menu), try to add some arbitrary button to a toolbar (I could not do it). After you finished and are satisfied with you toolbar setup go to the File/Page Preview option and voila, all your toolbar setups will be gone (like showing the drawing toolbar and/or the form design toolbar).
Those are only two... what I wanted to show here is that although the main idea of a full featured office suite is there (in OOo) it still have quite some usuability issues. It just does not feel right and when you are working and need "that" little feature, you lose a considerable amount of time looking for it on the interface... just to see that it is hidden deep inside in those subsubsubsubmenus.
Well, after I have read some comments it seems nobody uses online calendar applications. I find the Yahoo calendar and other MyYahoo services very useful.
You see, once I started to use the Outlook or other calendars but I find them not very useful as the feature that I use a lot is scheduling.
When I schedule something I want to have a reminder and, as I do not work on my laptop always, it is nice to have an email sent to me and unless my computer is always turned on I think I can not do it.
So that is one of the reasons I think online calendar is good.
Besides, I can also "use it" in every platform, in every place, I can go to a internet cafe if I do not have my computer handy, etc.
You surely forgot something in your list... Money to BUY the things... if the copyright oponents do not give money to the copyright owners (i.e. do not buy) then it will be difficult for the owners to win...
Anyway, I just found this interesting page, and I think it is kind of on topic with this discussion:
No, I think it is great, the more competitors we have the better the service will be and suddenly one of those companies will come with a kind of service that does not suck (like every service does right now)
Sorry AC but I do not underline it to be pretentious or anything, it is just to try to make people understand that, if they payed (of course, I did not payed as much as someone from the US) to get a CS degree, to learn to develop software (notice the difference between that an mere programming), then why TF would I want to spend the rest of my life as a seller or advocate? or service provider?
This made me remember what a friend of mine told me about the Computer Scientist, or programmers. We as a worker's society failed to protect our market.
You see, when someone is going to make a house, it does not matter if the one that made the sketches (sorry, as I do not know the exact word for the drawings) was an undergraduate which is really good. Those drawings need to be signed by a certified Architect, which will then ask a not so little sum of money, and the guy who did the work would just get some proportional amount (i.e. not too much).
Something similar happens with the Doctors, and lets not talk about the Lawyers which, no matter if their service helped you, they win.
It is something interesting that what we are doing as computer programmers is to develop software in a way that people could use it and not depend in our services. (that is, make software the most user friendly we can).
Those where just some thoughts... we are in this ship now and we like it (I like to program as I said on other comments) and we have to sail.
And also, it is the reason to fire emule instead of Firefox and put "Dream Theater" in the Emule search box instead of the "MSN Music" search box...
So, instead of having to BUY a crippled copy , I can download another with MORE FUNCTIONALITY (added value??) and it wont cost me anything (well, just to the poor guys that happen to live in US...)
Yep, but usually the companies that ask you to make some software ask you for ALL the rights of it.
And, what about selling a company the software and giving them the GPL (something YOU have to do if you are using the GPL as it sates that the software must come with its license).
I wonder what would they say when they discover that the software they are buying at $5000 can be downloaded from sf.net
Or even worst, that their competitors can get it also free.
I would had studied Economy or public relations. Can a programmer with 20+ years of experience make good money with OSS? I do. What a pitty, after your 20+ years of experience in programming what you are doing is being a SELLER... I do not want to end like that I want to DEVELOP SOFTWARE
Although teorethicaly it is possible to sell OSS, it is not proffitable.
Why would someone want to buy something he can download for free in other place?, if people tend to "download for free" something that they CAN NOT (by law) use for free??
Of course, now you will tell me that RedHat, Mandrake, etc etc are making buisness with OSS, but the truth is they are making buisness SELLING SERVICES, not the software.
Now, I am a programmer (well, I was a programmer before I started my PhD), I really like to program, when I was in the University I was a Linux advocate (although when I was in High School I was a FreeBSD advocate... can you imagine I bought FreeBSD without really knowing what was it... then when it arrived I spent like 3 weeks installing it, I was like 13 or something).
But, after I finished the University I had written some programs which I wanted to sell, hell I DO know how to program...
I put them like shareware on the internet, it was cool, but I also wanted to "contribute" to the OSS, in the "real world" (i.e. outside the net in my life) I was trying to get a job, As I lived in Mexico that was no easy task, so all my income was from my shareware programs and some money my parents gave me.
But I WANT to program for a living, and that is NOT possible with OSS, only people who have a name and are at the top position in this "OSS" power hierarchy can do it.
There where possibilites of open sourcing my programs and then proffiting with the "customer" services, of course the money I would get there was going to be a hell less than the money I won with my shareware (which was not a lot of course) and besides I DID NOT studied any kind of administration or client service degree I AM A FUCKING PROGRAMER and I want to program because THAT IS WHAT I KNOW HOW TO DO!!
So no, it is not possible to live selling OSS, it MAY be possible to live selling a service but not by pure development.
And of course it is possible to get hired in a company which develop open source as a branch (IBM, Sun, Mandrake, etc) and you could say that you earn your living with OSS... but the one that is paying you is the company.
Nowadays I am making my PhD outside Mexico (no, not in the US, in Europe). I have a wider view of this OSS, and althouh I understand it is great for acadamey (in fact I OSS it every day) It is NOT right for the commercial developer... And now as I have seen the Programming buisness is very crowded I have decided to enter the academy buisness, that way when I return to my country with a Europe degree I would be able to enter and teach somewhere at least...
And, I will be able to use and create OSS (of course as a side project JUST FOR FUN). At the end, that is why the OSS projects propsere, people do them JUST. FOR. FUN.
People on third world countries (like Indonesia and mine Mexico) tend to buy computers from independent sellers (PC builders, with cheap parts), they are the ones that usually install windows to the end user be it legit or pirate.
So yes, you can install Linux there.
Also when it comes to a goverment contract, THE goverment is the one that specifies the characteristics of the PC's they want to buy, after that, some companies try to offer something similar. The one with better price/setup wins and the goverment will buy from there.
Just for curiosity, you say in the UK you pay £4 for a gallon, Now, 1 imperial gallon is 4.5 liters ok?
That means you are paying like £0.89 per liter right?
Now for the interesting part (for me). This means you are paying like MX$19.866 * £0.89 = MX$17.68 Mexican pesos per liter (see xe.com for prices conversion)
Let me tell you that seems incredibley really fucking expensive... In mexico the price of the gas is from MX$5 to MX$6.00 for liter. (that is like £0.3 x liter
I am living in UK now (Liverpool) and everytime I saw the price in a gas station I just saw this.89 or.9x but I didnt know what was it about, and I was reluctant to believe that it was the price in pences for liter... but now that you confirm this I can conclude that I certainly wont get a car =oS.
I would appreciate if you can confirm my calculations cheers.
from the site: So some wise guy thought that the content on this site was slashdot worthy, submitted us, and we were featured in the daily news in the hardware section. the link to the blurb on us can be found here. and yes we are working on the " spelling issues" I am a computer geek, not a english major... deal with it!
And now some wiser guy submited another story to the main page... hehe
Go into IE and turn off ActiveX, and scripting or (religiously) use the Off By One browser or Lynx which both doesn't understand ActiveX and scripting.
Treat your email and email attachments like 'text files' like I do. I only use Outlook to send email--not receive it.
Use a software firewall and antivirus. I use Agnitum's Outpost and Grisoft's AVG. I also recommended Trend Micro's Sysclean.
A great help would be to surf the internet from behind a hardware router that drops ALL incoming unsolicited connections.
Do you see how cumbersome is to keep the Windows machine free of *ware and viruseseses?
Why bother doing all that when you could just spend 40 minutes installing one of the already user friendly enough Linux distros on the market (Linspire, Xandros, Mandrake, Suse...)???
Maybe, but one thing that is true is that it is the only way to have a "preventing" antivirus instead of a "corrective" one.
In my Uniersity they use the Sophos antivirus, which monitors when files are Open, Read, Write. If it finds a virus it will deny you the access to the file. That way your computer wont be able to get infected.
I think that is a 10000000 times better approach for the end user, instead of having to disinfect your files / computer after it have been infected imagine, when John Sixpack downloads an attachment on his Outlook mail, if he does not have this kind of protection he will get infected and then it is more difficult to disinffect; instead, with the proactive approach he wont be able to open/read the file unless he disable the antivirus...
Slashdot Mirror
The main problem with paralelism for the general application is the current model. The "Event Model" that is used nowadays as the basic processing model for applications specifies that the program will stay idle until the user press a key or moves the mouse (or push buttons).
.NET technology) or even a interpreter, the middle-layer needs to be thread aware so it can distribute the processes in different threads.
With this model it is kind of hard to use the multithreading processors. Of course after the user has triggered an action then the program could make use of the threading capability to improve its performance.
Next comes the problem of looking at "how many threads" should one allow in his program... if one allow to many threads and the processors have just 2 it will be bad, also the other way around.
I think the compilers must be done "thread aware", so they can get the program code and efectively use the processing power. Of course if the program is compiled natively (C,C++, Pascal, etc) we would have the same problem of threads numbers, but if there is a virtual machine (Java and
Of course, the first applications that can take advantage of multithreading are games, as their model is active but, then again the compiler MUST be aware of the multithreading capacities and it should be able to fit the different developer wantd threads in the processor.
For the general application I think multithreading must can be used by changing (or extending) the events model window paradigm, so, in one thread the program could wait for the events and other thread could be used to pro-act; this could be achieved by some kind of artificial intelligent development.
Just today I was daydreaming about how to replace the totally old and awkward menu bar standard interface, specifically for OpenOffice, which has 10 menus with 30 or more submenues... this is a thing that could be improved by some kind of proactive behaviour from the computer (imagine something like an agent that could predict the options you where looking for while using the program... [no i am not thinking about the !£%!"£@ "feature" of hiding the menu options from MS Office , windows et al] ).
Another way to use multithreading could be from the Operating System, so the programs [that do not require] multithreading wont have to deal with it BUT the operating system would use the multithreading capacities to schedule the processes execution... in this way we may get [AT LAST] a [REAL] multiprocess OS (and not the illusion we have now by quit process switching).
Haha... That is why I never pay attention to this kind of reviews...
I am sure he started to make the benchmarks and saw that MS Office kicked OOo ass so he just had to come up with some nice numbers and graphs that showed how OOs rul3z and MSOffice sucks...
I stop believing the review when I saw the start times..
Writer Word
First 11.02 31.1
Average 4.37 12.47
4.37 MY ASS... if OOo has something fucked is the starting time, I guess you could get the 12.47 of his "Word Average startup" if you turn on the Quick Starter... (that really does not do anything useful occupying a place in my tray icon... WTF do they put a tray icon if it wont do NOTHING?? learn from Acrobat Reader)
I like the OpenOffice Org idea... it is nice but there is still really no comparison... I have been trying to use openoffice for quite some time (I have it installed in fact) but although it apperas to be full featured, when you use it, you just do not find what you need AND there are some things that it has wrong...
As examples: (Open Office 2.o beta)
1. When I insert an picture in OO Writer, after I select it a nice toolbar appears... come on and do it, are you there? ok, after that , try to crop the image from a side... uhhh notice the crop option?? nope there is no crop option.
In fact... when you examine the picture toolbar closely you will see none of the options are useful there is a button called "From File" that gives you the properties of the image (WTF From file???) there is an options that gives you some nice effects, and several other useless options.
So, what do you need to do to crop a small portion of the image?... well click on FORMAT menu, then Picture Option then select the Crop tab.. and then guess the magic numbers relative to the section you need to crop (that is not WYSIGYG).
Ok, another one... Spend some time arranging your toolbars, yes Tools/Customize menu. Add some toolbars (View/Toolbars menu), try to add some arbitrary button to a toolbar (I could not do it). After you finished and are satisfied with you toolbar setup go to the File/Page Preview option and voila, all your toolbar setups will be gone (like showing the drawing toolbar and/or the form design toolbar).
Those are only two... what I wanted to show here is that although the main idea of a full featured office suite is there (in OOo) it still have quite some usuability issues. It just does not feel right and when you are working and need "that" little feature, you lose a considerable amount of time looking for it on the interface... just to see that it is hidden deep inside in those subsubsubsubmenus.
now burn karma burn!!!!
Well, after I have read some comments it seems nobody uses online calendar applications. I find the Yahoo calendar and other MyYahoo services very useful.
You see, once I started to use the Outlook or other calendars but I find them not very useful as the feature that I use a lot is scheduling.
When I schedule something I want to have a reminder and, as I do not work on my laptop always, it is nice to have an email sent to me and unless my computer is always turned on I think I can not do it.
So that is one of the reasons I think online calendar is good.
Besides, I can also "use it" in every platform, in every place, I can go to a internet cafe if I do not have my computer handy, etc.
You surely forgot something in your list... Money to BUY the things... if the copyright oponents do not give money to the copyright owners (i.e. do not buy) then it will be difficult for the owners to win...
Anyway, I just found this interesting page, and I think it is kind of on topic with this discussion:
Some thoughs about piracy. It is better than I state here, have a look
Or the more legal like www.allofmp3.com
What? it is not legal? for whom? for me? or for you?
No, I think it is great, the more competitors we have the better the service will be and suddenly one of those companies will come with a kind of service that does not suck (like every service does right now)
Mod parent funny :)
Sorry AC but I do not underline it to be pretentious or anything, it is just to try to make people understand that, if they payed (of course, I did not payed as much as someone from the US) to get a CS degree, to learn to develop software (notice the difference between that an mere programming), then why TF would I want to spend the rest of my life as a seller or advocate? or service provider?
This made me remember what a friend of mine told me about the Computer Scientist, or programmers. We as a worker's society failed to protect our market.
You see, when someone is going to make a house, it does not matter if the one that made the sketches (sorry, as I do not know the exact word for the drawings) was an undergraduate which is really good. Those drawings need to be signed by a certified Architect, which will then ask a not so little sum of money, and the guy who did the work would just get some proportional amount (i.e. not too much).
Something similar happens with the Doctors, and lets not talk about the Lawyers which, no matter if their service helped you, they win.
It is something interesting that what we are doing as computer programmers is to develop software in a way that people could use it and not depend in our services. (that is, make software the most user friendly we can).
Those where just some thoughts... we are in this ship now and we like it (I like to program as I said on other comments) and we have to sail.
And also, it is the reason to fire emule instead of Firefox and put "Dream Theater" in the Emule search box instead of the "MSN Music" search box...
So, instead of having to BUY a crippled copy , I can download another with MORE FUNCTIONALITY (added value??) and it wont cost me anything (well, just to the poor guys that happen to live in US...)
Yep, but usually the companies that ask you to make some software ask you for ALL the rights of it.
And, what about selling a company the software and giving them the GPL (something YOU have to do if you are using the GPL as it sates that the software must come with its license).
I wonder what would they say when they discover that the software they are buying at $5000 can be downloaded from sf.net
Or even worst, that their competitors can get it also free.
I would had studied Economy or public relations.
Can a programmer with 20+ years of experience make good money with OSS? I do.
What a pitty, after your 20+ years of experience in programming what you are doing is being a SELLER... I do not want to end like that I want to DEVELOP SOFTWARE
But then again, you are making money by SELLING A SERVICE not by making a program.
I dit not spend my 4 Unviersity years learning how to rightly develop computer systems just to go out and be a seller... or a service provider.
I would had studied Economy or public relations.
No... in Soviet america I thank YOU.
thanks for dodgeit as it is really useful.
Although teorethicaly it is possible to sell OSS, it is not proffitable.
Why would someone want to buy something he can download for free in other place?, if people tend to "download for free" something that they CAN NOT (by law) use for free??
Of course, now you will tell me that RedHat, Mandrake, etc etc are making buisness with OSS, but the truth is they are making buisness SELLING SERVICES, not the software.
Now, I am a programmer (well, I was a programmer before I started my PhD), I really like to program, when I was in the University I was a Linux advocate (although when I was in High School I was a FreeBSD advocate... can you imagine I bought FreeBSD without really knowing what was it... then when it arrived I spent like 3 weeks installing it, I was like 13 or something).
But, after I finished the University I had written some programs which I wanted to sell, hell I DO know how to program...
I put them like shareware on the internet, it was cool, but I also wanted to "contribute" to the OSS, in the "real world" (i.e. outside the net in my life) I was trying to get a job, As I lived in Mexico that was no easy task, so all my income was from my shareware programs and some money my parents gave me.
But I WANT to program for a living, and that is NOT possible with OSS, only people who have a name and are at the top position in this "OSS" power hierarchy can do it.
There where possibilites of open sourcing my programs and then proffiting with the "customer" services, of course the money I would get there was going to be a hell less than the money I won with my shareware (which was not a lot of course) and besides I DID NOT studied any kind of administration or client service degree I AM A FUCKING PROGRAMER and I want to program because THAT IS WHAT I KNOW HOW TO DO!!
So no, it is not possible to live selling OSS, it MAY be possible to live selling a service but not by pure development.
And of course it is possible to get hired in a company which develop open source as a branch (IBM, Sun, Mandrake, etc) and you could say that you earn your living with OSS... but the one that is paying you is the company.
Nowadays I am making my PhD outside Mexico (no, not in the US, in Europe). I have a wider view of this OSS, and althouh I understand it is great for acadamey (in fact I OSS it every day) It is NOT right for the commercial developer... And now as I have seen the Programming buisness is very crowded I have decided to enter the academy buisness, that way when I return to my country with a Europe degree I would be able to enter and teach somewhere at least...
And, I will be able to use and create OSS (of course as a side project JUST FOR FUN). At the end, that is why the OSS projects propsere, people do them JUST. FOR. FUN.
People on third world countries (like Indonesia and mine Mexico) tend to buy computers from independent sellers (PC builders, with cheap parts), they are the ones that usually install windows to the end user be it legit or pirate.
So yes, you can install Linux there.
Also when it comes to a goverment contract, THE goverment is the one that specifies the characteristics of the PC's they want to buy, after that, some companies try to offer something similar. The one with better price/setup wins and the goverment will buy from there.
So, they could enforce to buy free software.
Just for curiosity, you say in the UK you pay £4 for a gallon, Now, 1 imperial gallon is 4.5 liters ok?
.89 or .9x but I didnt know what was it about, and I was reluctant to believe that it was the price in pences for liter... but now that you confirm this I can conclude that I certainly wont get a car =oS.
That means you are paying like £0.89 per liter right?
Now for the interesting part (for me). This means you are paying like MX$19.866 * £0.89 = MX$17.68 Mexican pesos per liter (see xe.com for prices conversion)
Let me tell you that seems incredibley really fucking expensive... In mexico the price of the gas is from MX$5 to MX$6.00 for liter. (that is like £0.3 x liter
I am living in UK now (Liverpool) and everytime I saw the price in a gas station I just saw this
I would appreciate if you can confirm my calculations
cheers.
You are welcomed in Mexico! you are still near of your loved ones and you do not have to worry about the Draconian goverment laws!
Americans, vote with your feet and move away of your country.
That will show the goverment. And you are quite welcomed in other countries! (I at least like Americans (not the goverment)
Dad, is that you?
Or, use something like dodgeit or mailinator
Keep my web service running too, since it's on the same machine.
/. front page?
You try to do this by submiting a story to
from the site:
So some wise guy thought that the content on this site was slashdot worthy, submitted us, and we were featured in the daily news in the hardware section. the link to the blurb on us can be found here. and yes we are working on the " spelling issues" I am a computer geek, not a english major... deal with it!
And now some wiser guy submited another story to the main page... hehe
I agree with you, is like saying that Britney's Baby One could compete versus Beethoven's First Symphony.
How could they compete?
Because:
Free as in Freedom.
Free as in Beer.
Go into IE and turn off ActiveX, and scripting or (religiously) use the Off By One browser or Lynx which both doesn't understand ActiveX and scripting.
Treat your email and email attachments like 'text files' like I do. I only use Outlook to send email--not receive it.
Use a software firewall and antivirus. I use Agnitum's Outpost and Grisoft's AVG. I also recommended Trend Micro's Sysclean.
A great help would be to surf the internet from behind a hardware router that drops ALL incoming unsolicited connections.
Do you see how cumbersome is to keep the Windows machine free of *ware and viruseseses?
Why bother doing all that when you could just spend 40 minutes installing one of the already user friendly enough Linux distros on the market (Linspire, Xandros, Mandrake, Suse...)???
Maybe, but one thing that is true is that it is the only way to have a "preventing" antivirus instead of a "corrective" one.
In my Uniersity they use the Sophos antivirus, which monitors when files are Open, Read, Write. If it finds a virus it will deny you the access to the file. That way your computer wont be able to get infected.
I think that is a 10000000 times better approach for the end user, instead of having to disinfect your files / computer after it have been infected imagine, when John Sixpack downloads an attachment on his Outlook mail, if he does not have this kind of protection he will get infected and then it is more difficult to disinffect; instead, with the proactive approach he wont be able to open/read the file unless he disable the antivirus...