1) Contacting the ISP of the obnoxious AC is inappropriate, no matter what he or she posted. The 'anonymous' account is offered under the condition of anonymity for whatever purpose - I seem to recall a thread where someone posted anti-minority and Nazi-like propoganda. In bad taste? Yeah. Something Rob should track down the person for? No. The point at which you start doing that, you are no better than they.
2) Spoofing. Everyone knows what it is, everyone knows how to do it. What if the logs show the comments coming from 'www.hp.com'? What do you propose doing at that point, contacting the upstream provider to yank hp.com's access? I hope not.
3) Moderators are here for a purpose. That purpose happens to be knocking inappropriate messages below a certain threshold so that the majority of users do not have to see them. Rob should be the only one with a complaint here, folks - somebody just inflated the size of his message database by about 5k (whoopie!).
4) This is a _message board_. Come on folks, it's not like somebody just threw rotten eggs at your house or something. Settle down, take a deep breath, and work it out.
I am very pragmatic about platform support - I believe in using the right tool for the job. It sounds like you're looking for mainly gaming support and performance, which I'm sure a Celeron can accomidate. Me, I do numerical analyses and large matrix operations that would probably gag any x86 (and believe me, I've tried). Everything is about location, location, location. The market target for Alpha systems is not really the home user per se, but it may become as speeds increase (~1200Mhz by the end of the year) and prices drop.
Sure, you can find one at http://www.alphalinux.org/ or follow these instructions.
Compile a kernel with UFS support and mount your Digital Unix 4.x media. You need the following files: /etc/sia/[matrix.conf & siainitgood] /etc/svc.conf /sbin/loader /usr/shlib/* All you do is copy these files into the same locations on your Linux filesystem, and you're ready to run Digital Unix 4.x binaries.
"FUD", excuse me? The future of FreeBSD/axp was in jeopardy because of this "FUD" you refer to. Should have known better than to try a rational discussion with a NetBSD bigot. Please go on with your life and forget I even brought up these hideous "FUD" facts.
If you're the same "cjs" I know from elsewhere, maybe you can clear this one up about NetBSD. As I posted in a previous comment, I/think/ the NetBSD alpha port is held up by various copyright "issues" involving CMU - this is why the OpenBSD alpha port is supposibly dead. I do remember a blitzkrieg of flamage on the FreeBSD-axp list a while back when the FBSD crew used source code from NBSD without asking, and two or three people threatened to "call our lawyer friends at CMU" on the issue. What's the real story on this?
Once upon a time, there were a group of about 22 people known as Slashdot moderators. Within the last week, CT decided to give every registered user with a positive score moderator status, too. That added almost 460 new moderators. This first week or two is going to be filled with many more moderated comments, whether moderated correctly or not. Don't think people are intentionally being "censors", but the vast majority of moderators are greenhorns. Just give it time to work itself out.
Totally agree with you there. Marketing will make or break the Alpha architecture, regardless of technological superiourity. The wise consumer will purchase an Alpha no matter what the marketing department spews, but how will that wise consumer know of the technology available unless a good marketing team presents it to him or her? Check out www.alphalinux.org - it's a group dedicated to seeing Linux on the Alpha platform continue into the future.
Well, I'm in the opposite boat (prefer Linux over BSD), but was involved in the BSD world (NetBSD/FreeBSD) for several years alongside Linux.
My system is a PWS 500 with both SRM and AlphaBIOS installed, though the hardware is of course only supported by AlphaBIOS. Here's my understanding of the free BSD "situation" when it comes to Alphas:
There are some copyright issues with CMU which have "tied up" the NetBSD alpha port. I only say this because I witnessed a short "flamefest" on the FreeBSD-axp list in which some NetBSD folks cried foul about some code used, and threatened to call their lawyer friends at CMU about it. What I speak is true - look it up on Dejanews if you care to. I also believe this is the reason OpenBSD "abandoned" their alpha port, see their page for more details.
I think that copyright issue is the one major hinderance to free BSD on the alpha platform. I am, however, very pleased to see the FreeBSD port moving along, and planning to add support for ARC/AlphaBIOS firmware this year. Having worked in a predominately SysV environment for a few years now, I doubt I'd be happy going back to BSD - but I still am very happy to see FreeBSD's progress.
What you are saying would be true if the year were 1995 or 1996. The compiler issue is exactly why I put off buying an Alpha until within the last year. With the progress egcs has made, number crunching code on the Alpha really flies - and it's still not fully optimized! Compaq donated their math library to the Linux community (check www.alphalinux.org for the link to it), which provides at least twice the floating point performance as the GNU libm. I'm using it on almost every math-intense software on my system right now. The only directly Linux on the Alpha platform has is straight ahead. Things are only going to get better, especially in light of the speculated failures of Intel products (Merced).
Beg your pardon? I'm using Netscape 4.51 on an Alpha running Linux right now. Not sure what you mean by a "usable browser", because this is what darn near everyone else is using. It helps if you have the required DEC libraries sitting around (like on Digital Unix media), but there are always ways to get around that.
No way! Check out the site above - the Alpha architecture is moving faster than it ever has before. You think it's hot now, you ought to see what the foundry has in store for the end of 1999.
Or, you could play the game that I am right now. Running Window Maker 0.51.2 (with KDE/Gnome support compiled in) and the panel from Gnome 0.99.something. The KDE panel works just as well with the recent Window Maker releases.
I respectfully disagree with your statement about books not having a source. By the popular definition of source, or source code, you are correct. Like software, the source or inspiration of a book lay within the mind of the author. I've stopped referring to software as a "program" anymore for just this reason - the program is abstract, in the mind of the creator. The implementation is what we find as C, C++, etc. code. Copyright laws make no sense from a philosophical perspective, which leads me to believe that the free software movement is philosophically grounded rather than based on a rebellion against corporate America or hate for authority in general. Think of it this way: As I write this comment, the "sources" for it are my thoughts. My thoughts are free, and it's perfectly acceptable that someone else may have a similar inspiration and write a similar comment. Copyright laws, as currently enforced, attempt to protect the inspiration for something, whether a book or software. To me, this is nonsensical. What they _should_ protect is simply the implementation of ideas, not the inspiration behind the implementation (which could strike another person as well). If I design a software implementation of an algorithm to digital encode audio from my own thoughts, without pirating someone else's implementation, why should I have to fear a lawsuit from a foreign company who also designed a means to encode audio? The copyright laws are tipsy-turvey, and ultimately only serve to protect the jobs of corporate lawyers and line the pockets of pointy-hair types.
Slashdot Mirror
A couple comments on what I've seen thusfar:
1) Contacting the ISP of the obnoxious AC is inappropriate, no matter what he or she posted. The 'anonymous' account is offered under the condition of anonymity for whatever purpose - I seem to recall a thread where someone posted anti-minority and Nazi-like propoganda. In bad taste? Yeah. Something Rob should track down the person for? No. The point at which you start doing that, you are no better than they.
2) Spoofing. Everyone knows what it is, everyone knows how to do it. What if the logs show the comments coming from 'www.hp.com'? What do you propose doing at that point, contacting the upstream provider to yank hp.com's access? I hope not.
3) Moderators are here for a purpose. That purpose happens to be knocking inappropriate messages below a certain threshold so that the majority of users do not have to see them.
Rob should be the only one with a complaint here, folks - somebody just inflated the size of his message database by about 5k (whoopie!).
4) This is a _message board_. Come on folks, it's
not like somebody just threw rotten eggs at your house or something. Settle down, take a deep breath, and work it out.
Olorin.
I am very pragmatic about platform support - I believe in using the right tool for the job. It sounds like you're looking for mainly gaming support and performance, which I'm sure a Celeron can accomidate. Me, I do numerical analyses and large matrix operations that would probably gag any x86 (and believe me, I've tried).
Everything is about location, location, location. The market target for Alpha systems is not really the home user per se, but it may become as speeds increase (~1200Mhz by the end of the year) and prices drop.
Sure, you can find one at http://www.alphalinux.org/ or follow these instructions.
Compile a kernel with UFS support and mount your Digital Unix 4.x media. You need the following
files:
/etc/sia/[matrix.conf & siainitgood]
/etc/svc.conf
/sbin/loader
/usr/shlib/*
All you do is copy these files into the same locations on your Linux filesystem, and you're ready to run Digital Unix 4.x binaries.
> I've replied to the copyright FUD above.
"FUD", excuse me? The future of FreeBSD/axp was in jeopardy because of this "FUD" you refer to.
Should have known better than to try a rational discussion with a NetBSD bigot. Please go on with your life and forget I even brought up these hideous "FUD" facts.
If you're the same "cjs" I know from elsewhere, maybe you can clear this one up about NetBSD. As I posted in a previous comment, I /think/ the
NetBSD alpha port is held up by various copyright "issues" involving CMU - this is why the OpenBSD alpha port is supposibly dead. I do remember a blitzkrieg of flamage on the FreeBSD-axp list a while back when the FBSD crew used source code from NBSD without asking, and two or three people threatened to "call our lawyer friends at CMU" on the issue.
What's the real story on this?
Once upon a time, there were a group of about 22 people known as Slashdot moderators. Within the last week, CT decided to give every registered user with a positive score moderator status, too. That added almost 460 new moderators.
This first week or two is going to be filled with many more moderated comments, whether moderated correctly or not.
Don't think people are intentionally being "censors", but the vast majority of moderators are greenhorns. Just give it time to work itself out.
Totally agree with you there. Marketing will make or break the Alpha architecture, regardless of technological superiourity. The wise consumer will purchase an Alpha no matter what the marketing department spews, but how will that wise consumer know of the technology available unless a good marketing team presents it to him or her?
Check out www.alphalinux.org - it's a group dedicated to seeing Linux on the Alpha platform continue into the future.
Well, I'm in the opposite boat (prefer Linux over BSD), but was involved in the BSD world (NetBSD/FreeBSD) for several years alongside Linux.
My system is a PWS 500 with both SRM and AlphaBIOS installed, though the hardware is of course only supported by AlphaBIOS. Here's my understanding of the free BSD "situation" when it comes to Alphas:
There are some copyright issues with CMU which have "tied up" the NetBSD alpha port. I only say this because I witnessed a short "flamefest" on the FreeBSD-axp list in which some NetBSD folks cried foul about some code used, and threatened to call their lawyer friends at CMU about it. What I speak is true - look it up on Dejanews if you care to. I also believe this is the reason OpenBSD "abandoned" their alpha port, see their page for more details.
I think that copyright issue is the one major hinderance to free BSD on the alpha platform. I am, however, very pleased to see the FreeBSD port moving along, and planning to add support for ARC/AlphaBIOS firmware this year. Having worked in a predominately SysV environment for a few years now, I doubt I'd be happy going back to BSD - but I still am very happy to see FreeBSD's progress.
What you are saying would be true if the year were 1995 or 1996. The compiler issue is exactly why I put off buying an Alpha until within the last year. With the progress egcs has made, number crunching code on the Alpha really flies - and it's still not fully optimized!
Compaq donated their math library to the Linux community (check www.alphalinux.org for the link to it), which provides at least twice the floating point performance as the GNU libm. I'm using it on almost every math-intense software on my system right now.
The only directly Linux on the Alpha platform has is straight ahead. Things are only going to get better, especially in light of the speculated failures of Intel products (Merced).
Beg your pardon? I'm using Netscape 4.51 on an Alpha running Linux right now. Not sure what you mean by a "usable browser", because this is what darn near everyone else is using. It helps if you have the required DEC libraries sitting around (like on Digital Unix media), but there are always ways to get around that.
No way! Check out the site above - the Alpha architecture is moving faster than it ever has before. You think it's hot now, you ought to see what the foundry has in store for the end of 1999.
See http://www.alphalinux.org/.
It's officially funded by Compaq (DEC), and usually has better information than the other places.
Or, you could play the game that I am right now. Running Window Maker 0.51.2 (with KDE/Gnome support compiled in) and the panel from Gnome 0.99.something. The KDE panel works just as well with the recent Window Maker releases.
I respectfully disagree with your statement about books not having a source. By the popular definition of source, or source code, you are correct.
Like software, the source or inspiration of a book lay within the mind of the author. I've stopped referring to software as a "program" anymore for just this reason - the program is abstract, in the mind of the creator. The implementation is what we find as C, C++, etc. code.
Copyright laws make no sense from a philosophical perspective, which leads me to believe that the free software movement is philosophically grounded rather than based on a rebellion against corporate America or hate for authority in general. Think of it this way: As I write this comment, the "sources" for it are my thoughts. My thoughts are free, and it's perfectly acceptable that someone else may have a similar inspiration and write a similar comment.
Copyright laws, as currently enforced, attempt to protect the inspiration for something, whether a book or software. To me, this is nonsensical. What they _should_ protect is simply the implementation of ideas, not the inspiration behind the implementation (which could strike another person as well).
If I design a software implementation of an algorithm to digital encode audio from my own thoughts, without pirating someone else's implementation, why should I have to fear a lawsuit from a foreign company who also designed a means to encode audio? The copyright laws are tipsy-turvey, and ultimately only serve to protect the jobs of corporate lawyers and line the pockets of pointy-hair types.