Some directory operations (including unlink(2)) are not synchronous on ReiserFS, which can result in data corruption with applications relying heavily on file-based locks (
The funny thing is that, if they project the cost of migration to say 10, 20 or more years, the switching cost will become proportionally lower.
This is because if they stay with the same locked-in products (say, MS Windows and MS Office), they will have to upgrade their versions at least once every 10 years. If the cost of upgrading once is X, the total for 20 years would be 2X.
Whereas, after paying the cost of migrating (Y), they will have to pay very little for "upgrading" every 10 years (pulled from my ass, say 1/2Y).
I am sure there certain amount of time (N) for which N*X > 1/N*Y.
The fact is, if you want to perform information sharing with some other person by sending text (email), images (jpgs), documents (say, doc,xls, etc) or by visiting web pages (looking at some information, say porn, how to make a bomb, your credit card statement, etc) you cannot expect ANY privacy online (unless using some kind of cryptography, and sometimes that only protects you to a certain degree).
People do not seem to understand that when they are sending the google query "nice cute little pussies" or any other information, it passes several third party checkpoints (hubs, switches, routers, bridges, etc) that you do not control.
In addition, your information is in written in the open, with no "envelope" that can be used to detect whether the contents have been read once, twice or any times.
As for your quote:
"Schmidt thinks that your data, in his hands, is HIS data."
I believe that Google or any internet company is providing you with a service. Such service comes with some terms of use. If you use it, you must accept it. It is that simple.
Imagine I knock at your door and tell you that I can find an answer to any question you ask and give you advice on anything. In exchange, every day I bring you the answer to something, it will be on a paper which has several ads related to what you asked. And that I could use your data for other statistical purposes
IIRC Microsoft bought Sysinternals a bit after the Sony Rootkit fiasco, which was put to light by Mark.
When I came to know that Mark was going to Microsoft I was sad. Not because of "the dark side" or whatnot, but because I though the public lost an intelligent, independent and very knowledgable (spell?) public opinion.
It is *very* very very unlikely that Mark would do a similar thing that he did with Sony when he was independent as now his voice and actions are controlled by the MS PR.
The problem with "adding code to paper" is the length of the paper.
I find it is better to submit the actual code into a "publisher repository" which can make it available in a long term basis (as opposed to have it in the researcher's web page, which is closed when they leave the position, or which the researcher himself can remove after some time).
Of course it may be useful to reproduce some snippets of the used algorithm in the article's text, however I won't suggest showing the actual code because not all the audience will know such notation (very likely outside Comp.Sci and Soft Eng. circles).
And in some cases, i'm actually questioning whether the proposed algorithms actually work in practical situations...
The problem is not only the algorithms but their implementation. I have read thesis where you have certain algorithm explaining the dynamics of a simulation and when I actually looked at the code (closed for in-house analysis only) several things were different.
You would not believe the amount and crappy quality of the code performed during "research projects", specially when the research is in a field completely unrelated to Comp. Sci. or Soft. Eng.
I have personally seen software related to Agronomy, Biology (Ecology) and Economics. The problem with a lot of that code is that sometimes researchers want to use the power of computers (say, for simulation) but do not know how to code, they then read a bit about some programming language and implement their program s they are learning.
start their posts in the title? it make it seems as if they do not think what they are going to write.
On topic with the article, I completely agree with this "release the scientific code" position. I am currently working within a EU project in which we are developing ABM*. In my project it was made clear from the beginning that the code license will be GPL.
However the place where I work has some program they have used to conduct simulations, these programs are complete closed (only a handful of people have access to the code, everyone within the institute). Nevertheless, simulations performed with such program has been used for several publications (journals, congresses, symposiums and even PhD thesis!).
And people in my line of work wonder why simulations are not taken more seriously (e.g. accepting papers) by people in more "classical" research fields.
Hey marcan, first let me tip my hat for your work.
Second, I use some of those "oh noes piratz" enhancing mechanisms to copy my legally purchased games to a USB hard disk and play them. Note that I bought my Wii console while living in Britain, I have bought games in Mexico (where I am from) and USA (cheaper to ask a relative to get them from there) AND Germany (where I am currently living and playing games).
When I moved to Germany, I refused to take all my CDs/DVDs with me [Laugagge handlers at Lufthansa are a bunch of monkeys.. you should see the state of my bags when they arrived to Germany], therefore I put all the content (serveral music CDs, some DVD movies and several Wii games) into magnetic media and took them with me.
Having said that, I really applaud Nintendo for doing this specific move, and I completely believe that this is the *right* move to combat piracy.
It is not illegal to modify hardware you buy, it is not illegal to play a copy of your purchased media, however, IT IS illegal to distribute such media without copyright permit; and that is what Nintendo prosecuted with this guy.
For what it's worth, I have cleared 100% on Mario Kart and Galaxy, but it WAS HARD. Fine, I suck, I can accept that.
My question would be, was it frustrating?
I do not care about games being hard. What sucks is when a game is frustrating. Putting the "swords and soliders" game as an example: it gets pretty hard at some point, but after you lose you get this feeling that "I am sure next time I can beat it" and try again. Whereas in frustrating games (e.g., for me Battalion Wars 2), you just get frustrated after you fail because of the design of the game (e.g., you have to begin where you were 30 minutes ago).
Have you played the new Super Mario game? Care to name some other Mario games that are harder?
I've played and finished the new SMB Wii game. A game harder than this is notably SMB2;that is,
the original SMB2.
Just because it's easy to get into for newbies does NOT make it unchallenging.
For me, challenging is not the same as difficult. I like games which are easy and interesting to play for the first 1 to 3 hours, yet they are challenging (but not difficult) for the next hours.
I do not care how long or short the games are. For example "House of Death Overkill", quite a short game, easy to play, but challenging enough to deserve my attention until I finished Director's cut story.
And to think that the Kindle and the iPad are complete different devices, designed for two completely different tasks.
I wonder, how many hours will the iPad battery last on *full* brigthness, and how well would the screen image be at direct sunlight.
I am going to buy an eReader, not Kindle but an open one (just waiting for the "cheap" copies to appear). But regarding the iPad, I don't have the need as I currently own a eee PC 1005HE. I find the lack of keyboard in the iPad weird. Then again, I touchtype at about 110wpm...
A better touchscreen interface is the difference between an app being something that you are vaguely aware of but never use vs. something that you use constantly. Your basic input devices are by no means trivial.
If Apple maintains this edge, it will be hard for competitors that are more functional in other areas to get any anywhere.
And that is pretty much the key to Apple success. You see, although a lot of people here think of apple as a hardware company, the truth is that the main Apple selling point is the software (even Jobs said they saw themselves as a software company at D5).
When a computer has X o Y hardware it is OK (say, a Linux computer with a winmodem). When the same computer has Z software which uses such hardware, it is GOOD. But, when the software is made correctly, it will be the difference between the hardware being just a gimmick and changing the way people use the computer.
That was the case for me (in Mexico... an über catholic country)
I went to 12 years of catholic school too. They are called "Marist Brothers". The funny thing was that my parents are both atheists. However, given that the *best* school in the city was catholic, they decided to put me and my brother there.
Sure, we had our religion classes and every last friday of the month we had a mass. But aside of that everything was the same as in other schools.
At the end of secondary school my mother told us that, if we wanted to believe and go to church every sunday and whatnot, she was happy to take us. Of course, both my brother and I decided not to do it =oP.
The nice thing about this type of schools (Marist Brothers or "La Salle" Brothers) is that they think *high* of the human values and virtues; and try to teach them to the kids. Thus, even if you do not believe in god, marry, santa claus and the three wise men, you can see there are still teaching good things.
I see the App Store similar to a DEB repository, only the applications "allowed" by the repository administrator enter such repository and can be downloaded from there.
This raises three questions for me: 1. Is it possible (in the Apple version) to install/run software which was not obtained from the repository? 2. Is it possible to offer software free (or at a very low) cost from the Apple repository? 3. Can I use *any* license (like GPL) for my software offered via App Store?
If 2 and three are true, then it may be possible to distribute/Libre/ software in the App Store, of course charging just a small amount of money for the download (Say, I port TEH GIMP to the Ipad, could I offer it for $1.00 [of course with all the source, etc])?
The two best search engines are Google and Bing, both owned by mega-corps.
Do you think it's possible for a non-megacorp to build the infrastructure required to index a sizable portion of the web and serve search results in real time to a large audience?
Kind of, I think that would be a feasible task for a University or research institution.
From my point of view, the problem is not that a "Megacorp" is providing the service; the main issue is the way they are making money out of it (e.g. they profit from farming your browsing habits).
I think it should be wise to separate Scientologists in two kinds. The first are the "officers" of the "church", akin to the priest in catholic religion.
IMHO, those are the ones who are engaging in fraudulent and misleading activities. The second type are the "followers"; my belief is that this is desperate and naïve people whose despair has gotten to the point that they choose to approach to this scamming community.
The problem is that the CultoS are so good at what they do that people really follow their orders of "not seeing your family forever!!" and other stupid orders.
Is like the "Flagellants" Christian groups who think hurting yourself is going to help you improve your image against God. Officers who promote this are assholes, followers who put their trust in the officers are naïve, weak and need help.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, you also have vendor lock-in with reiserfs.
Still too soon. His wiki page makes sad reading BTW.
Yeah, I almost drop a tear for this part:
Some directory operations (including unlink(2)) are not synchronous on ReiserFS, which can result in data corruption with applications relying heavily on file-based locks (
Poor data, can you imagine!
The funny thing is that, if they project the cost of migration to say 10, 20 or more years, the switching cost will become proportionally lower.
This is because if they stay with the same locked-in products (say, MS Windows and MS Office), they will have to upgrade their versions at least once every 10 years. If the cost of upgrading once is X, the total for 20 years would be 2X.
Whereas, after paying the cost of migrating (Y), they will have to pay very little for "upgrading" every 10 years (pulled from my ass, say 1/2Y).
I am sure there certain amount of time (N) for which N*X > 1/N*Y.
And the flying cars, dont forget the flying cars.
WGA was the final straw for me and what ultimately forced my hand. I have migrated to Mac and will never look back.
I has a similar situation.
The patriot act was the final straw for me and what ultimately forced my hand. I have migrated to North Korea and will never look back.
Best. Analogy. Ever.
Comparing Apple's control over their platform to North Korea.
Ah, I see. Microsoft has bribed the judges. That was probably a good idea. Seems affective.
Yeah, I have also heard that Microsoft and the Judges have an emotional relationship going on.
The fact is, if you want to perform information sharing with some other person by sending text (email), images (jpgs), documents (say, doc ,xls, etc) or by visiting web pages (looking at some information, say porn, how to make a bomb, your credit card statement, etc) you cannot expect ANY privacy online (unless using some kind of cryptography, and sometimes that only protects you to a certain degree).
People do not seem to understand that when they are sending the google query "nice cute little pussies" or any other information, it passes several third party checkpoints (hubs, switches, routers, bridges, etc) that you do not control.
In addition, your information is in written in the open, with no "envelope" that can be used to detect whether the contents have been read once, twice or any times.
As for your quote:
"Schmidt thinks that your data, in his hands, is HIS data."
I believe that Google or any internet company is providing you with a service. Such service comes with some terms of use. If you use it, you must accept it. It is that simple.
Imagine I knock at your door and tell you that I can find an answer to any question you ask and give you advice on anything. In exchange, every day I bring you the answer to something, it will be on a paper which has several ads related to what you asked. And that I could use your data for other statistical purposes
Would you want that service?
IIRC Microsoft bought Sysinternals a bit after the Sony Rootkit fiasco, which was put to light by Mark.
When I came to know that Mark was going to Microsoft I was sad. Not because of "the dark side" or whatnot, but because I though the public lost an intelligent, independent and very knowledgable (spell?) public opinion.
It is *very* very very unlikely that Mark would do a similar thing that he did with Sony when he was independent as now his voice and actions are controlled by the MS PR.
That is what really made me sad.
xtracto
The problem with "adding code to paper" is the length of the paper.
I find it is better to submit the actual code into a "publisher repository" which can make it available in a long term basis (as opposed to have it in the researcher's web page, which is closed when they leave the position, or which the researcher himself can remove after some time).
Of course it may be useful to reproduce some snippets of the used algorithm in the article's text, however I won't suggest showing the actual code because not all the audience will know such notation (very likely outside Comp.Sci and Soft Eng. circles).
Should there be a universal language,
It is called Z notation. I have seen it used in several articles and at least a book on multi-agent systems.
And in some cases, i'm actually questioning whether the proposed algorithms actually work in practical situations...
The problem is not only the algorithms but their implementation. I have read thesis where you have certain algorithm explaining the dynamics of a simulation and when I actually looked at the code (closed for in-house analysis only) several things were different.
Agreed 100%.
You would not believe the amount and crappy quality of the code performed during "research projects", specially when the research is in a field completely unrelated to Comp. Sci. or Soft. Eng.
I have personally seen software related to Agronomy, Biology (Ecology) and Economics. The problem with a lot of that code is that sometimes researchers want to use the power of computers (say, for simulation) but do not know how to code, they then read a bit about some programming language and implement their program s they are learning.
The result? you can imagine.
start their posts in the title? it make it seems as if they do not think what they are going to write.
On topic with the article, I completely agree with this "release the scientific code" position. I am currently working within a EU project in which we are developing ABM*. In my project it was made clear from the beginning that the code license will be GPL.
However the place where I work has some program they have used to conduct simulations, these programs are complete closed (only a handful of people have access to the code, everyone within the institute). Nevertheless, simulations performed with such program has been used for several publications (journals, congresses, symposiums and even PhD thesis!).
And people in my line of work wonder why simulations are not taken more seriously (e.g. accepting papers) by people in more "classical" research fields.
Hey marcan, first let me tip my hat for your work.
Second, I use some of those "oh noes piratz" enhancing mechanisms to copy my legally purchased games to a USB hard disk and play them. Note that I bought my Wii console while living in Britain, I have bought games in Mexico (where I am from) and USA (cheaper to ask a relative to get them from there) AND Germany (where I am currently living and playing games).
When I moved to Germany, I refused to take all my CDs/DVDs with me [Laugagge handlers at Lufthansa are a bunch of monkeys.. you should see the state of my bags when they arrived to Germany], therefore I put all the content (serveral music CDs, some DVD movies and several Wii games) into magnetic media and took them with me.
Having said that, I really applaud Nintendo for doing this specific move, and I completely believe that this is the *right* move to combat piracy.
It is not illegal to modify hardware you buy, it is not illegal to play a copy of your purchased media, however, IT IS illegal to distribute such media without copyright permit; and that is what Nintendo prosecuted with this guy.
Yup,
Being plenty of other options aside of OO.o they had to go with the most propertary one.
Geez, it would have better for them to use a Microsoft Office version with Wine (at least, you control the program and your data).
Of course because Google is teh goodzor and Microsoft is teh Evilz, the typical anti-propertary slashdotters are getting warm feelings
Fortunately (for us) women tend to live longer than men =o)
For what it's worth, I have cleared 100% on Mario Kart and Galaxy, but it WAS HARD. Fine, I suck, I can accept that.
My question would be, was it frustrating?
I do not care about games being hard. What sucks is when a game is frustrating. Putting the "swords and soliders" game as an example: it gets pretty hard at some point, but after you lose you get this feeling that "I am sure next time I can beat it" and try again. Whereas in frustrating games (e.g., for me Battalion Wars 2), you just get frustrated after you fail because of the design of the game (e.g., you have to begin where you were 30 minutes ago).
Have you played the new Super Mario game? Care to name some other Mario games that are harder?
I've played and finished the new SMB Wii game.
A game harder than this is notably SMB2;that is,
the original SMB2.
Just because it's easy to get into for newbies does NOT make it unchallenging.
For me, challenging is not the same as difficult. I like games which are easy and interesting to play for the first 1 to 3 hours, yet they are challenging (but not difficult) for the next hours.
I do not care how long or short the games are. For example "House of Death Overkill", quite a short game, easy to play, but challenging enough to deserve my attention until I finished Director's cut story.
And to think that the Kindle and the iPad are complete different devices, designed for two completely different tasks.
I wonder, how many hours will the iPad battery last on *full* brigthness, and how well would the screen image be at direct sunlight.
I am going to buy an eReader, not Kindle but an open one (just waiting for the "cheap" copies to appear). But regarding the iPad, I don't have the need as I currently own a eee PC 1005HE. I find the lack of keyboard in the iPad weird. Then again, I touchtype at about 110wpm...
You wife doesn't need an iPad, she rather needs an iGun.
A better touchscreen interface is the difference between an app being something that you are vaguely aware of but never use vs.
something that you use constantly. Your basic input devices are by no means trivial.
If Apple maintains this edge, it will be hard for competitors that are more functional in other areas to get any anywhere.
And that is pretty much the key to Apple success. You see, although a lot of people here think of apple as a hardware company, the truth is that the main Apple selling point is the software (even Jobs said they saw themselves as a software company at D5).
When a computer has X o Y hardware it is OK (say, a Linux computer with a winmodem). When the same computer has Z software which uses such hardware, it is GOOD. But, when the software is made correctly, it will be the difference between the hardware being just a gimmick and changing the way people use the computer.
Just a quick comment. I said "going bubble" because that is the fast English translation I thought when writing my comment.
I play the game in Spanish and thus what we say is more like "hazte burbuja" instead of "burbujéate"...
Yah I know, this is stupid and I should just leave it alone but meh!
BTW, why "bubble up" and not "bubble down" :P
That was the case for me (in Mexico... an über catholic country)
I went to 12 years of catholic school too. They are called "Marist Brothers". The funny thing was that my parents are both atheists. However, given that the *best* school in the city was catholic, they decided to put me and my brother there.
Sure, we had our religion classes and every last friday of the month we had a mass. But aside of that everything was the same as in other schools.
At the end of secondary school my mother told us that, if we wanted to believe and go to church every sunday and whatnot, she was happy to take us. Of course, both my brother and I decided not to do it =oP.
The nice thing about this type of schools (Marist Brothers or "La Salle" Brothers) is that they think *high* of the human values and virtues; and try to teach them to the kids. Thus, even if you do not believe in god, marry, santa claus and the three wise men, you can see there are still teaching good things.
I see the App Store similar to a DEB repository, only the applications "allowed" by the repository administrator enter such repository and can be downloaded from there.
This raises three questions for me:
1. Is it possible (in the Apple version) to install/run software which was not obtained from the repository?
2. Is it possible to offer software free (or at a very low) cost from the Apple repository?
3. Can I use *any* license (like GPL) for my software offered via App Store?
If 2 and three are true, then it may be possible to distribute /Libre/ software in the App Store, of course charging just a small amount of money for the download (Say, I port TEH GIMP to the Ipad, could I offer it for $1.00 [of course with all the source, etc])?
The two best search engines are Google and Bing, both owned by mega-corps.
Do you think it's possible for a non-megacorp to build the infrastructure required to index a sizable portion of the web and serve search results in real time to a large audience?
Kind of, I think that would be a feasible task for a University or research institution.
From my point of view, the problem is not that a "Megacorp" is providing the service; the main issue is the way they are making money out of it (e.g. they profit from farming your browsing habits).
I think it should be wise to separate Scientologists in two kinds. The first are the "officers" of the "church", akin to the priest in catholic religion.
IMHO, those are the ones who are engaging in fraudulent and misleading activities. The second type are the "followers"; my belief is that this is desperate and naïve people whose despair has gotten to the point that they choose to approach to this scamming community.
The problem is that the CultoS are so good at what they do that people really follow their orders of "not seeing your family forever!!" and other stupid orders.
Is like the "Flagellants" Christian groups who think hurting yourself is going to help you improve your image against God. Officers who promote this are assholes, followers who put their trust in the officers are naïve, weak and need help.