Older drives do require extra code, because if Vista includes DVD playing software they would be legally (I think? Certainly mandated by DVD consortiums in any case) obliged to write software to enforce the region coding in software, since (as you mention) this is not handled in hardware. Just playing the disc is no more difficult, as you mention, but this is misleading since that's not all they have to do.
But yes, this is all about DRM. I'm not convinced that it's Microsoft's "bad" in this case, though.
I had to hang a floppy drive out of the side of my Shuttle system, it was highly annoying!
Although that said, my attempts to run Linux on the machine ended up in frustration when it turned out that it had no support for the SATA unit whatsoever...
Serious question: Has anyone reported the problem to be with the CPU/GPU? I was under the impression (from all the accounts I've seen, which is admittedly not many) that the PSU is to blame, since it wasn't tested in the sort of environment that it'd be used in, and that the XBox itself was not the overheating unit.
I agree with you to a certain degree — I mean, the music industry is actually attempting to fix their product by crippling it for the paying consumer (while having little or no effect on the illegitimate distribution of files). But while there are artists who are embracing new business models, it is presently completely unclear what the new business models for artists will be, and artists who are already stuck (being treated terribly, in many cases) with the existing giants are in danger of being treated even worse by these companies, while having no immediately obvious way out.
I feel guilty if I pirate music because the artists aren't being paid. I don't buy into music which is DRMed in any way, because I refuse to buy a crippled product for what is typically a completely ridiculous price. But when I can buy a traditional CD, I buy it. I mean to start using an online service which does not implement DRM, but still many artists are left out here, and often by no fault of their own — they're musicians, not businessmen, and this is not something they'd ordinarly be able to get particularly good advice on.
Never stop feeling guilty about pirating music, unless you are still buying it from fairer systems. The fact that some companies use unfair means does not give one free reign over media. The artist deserves to be paid for their work in some way, and there is always fantastic music to find at terms you agree with if you're willing to look.
However, the claim is generally extended that this makes it the only thing suitable for "mission critical" systems, which I consider false - if it's "mission critical" and needs to be proven, complete test coverage will work as a superset of the safety static typing can give you.
This is probably my only disagreement with you —; and it's not even very strong. I realise that one can create a superset using good unit testing, but I feel that static typing allows you to narrow the range of things that need to be checked a unit test environment (the types of your input and output), so it aids your ability to perform more-isolated testing. This isn't a huge complaint though, but I do feel it's pertinent (you're right that Python's less-time-to-develop gives you more-time-to-test, but if there's also more-to-test this cancels out a little of those benefits). Static typesystems allow a little more flexibility with larger teams who are expected to create systems that interact, too, since it's possible to specify more strictly (that is, with words rather than with documentation) the required inputs and outputs.
Above all, though, it's largely a matter of picking the right tool for the right job. I don't think that anyone (sensible) would argue that Java is a better tool than Python for every application, or vice versa.
Again, though, it avoids many classes of errors. The lack of generics in Java before 5 and C# before.NET 2.0 was a fairly serious hindrance, but type systems do add a degree of safety, and narrow the range of errors that can happen in a system, to some degree.
I won't argue that they're the be-all and end-all, but they are helpful. And I wasn't really agreeing with the post you replied to, except in the case of the validity of static typesystems. This does become a bit of a religious debate sometimes though (and it's late, and it was my last day of work before Christmas, and I forgot to go to the shop before they stopped selling beer, so this is not appealing to me right now!).
In real-world terms, though, Python is fine, and in the context of C# and Java a static typesystem is beneficial. Would a static typesystem (even an optional one, for certain contexts) help Python? I don't know — I'm sure I heard talk of adding one at one point, which would be interesting if nothing else.
I think Python is a fine language for such things, don't get the impression that I don't!
You appear to have replied mostly to my post's parent here, but I'd just like to add that a static typesystem does add a degree of provability that isn't present in dynamic systems, although a lot of this (as I either stated in the post you reply to or in some other post on here, some of this can be obtained through less-formal automated tools for dynamic languages, in practical terms).
You have all these disjunct components created by different groups not necessarily designed to be used together.
Arguably, though, that's what projects like TurboGears provide. Ruby and Python both have extensive and consistent base libraries, but they both need an external project (TurboGears or Rails) to provide this extra framework. If TurboGears is done well, there shouldn't be too much of a loss as compared to the more "official" Rails package. Shouldn't.;)
Oh wait, just realised that he was claiming that reflection and the first-class status of functions were the same, which is just nonsense. So he was wrong, but by coincidence semi-right.
Again, what? All functional languages support reflection because functions are first class objects.
Riiiggghhht. So let me just compile this code here, and then have this program I wrote a few months back over here automatically investigate the functions and run them.
He might have you there. Some functional languages had reflection before Java. Not really comparable though, since they were not, and generally are not, used for the sort of things that Java is.
You've got him on the rest of the counts though, no question.
This was the answer I was expecting, which is why I specifically stated "as compared to Ruby". An interesting language for this is Boo, a Python-like.NET language which has a static typesystem.
Another issue that I have personally encountered concerns reference counts. Python extension modules are written in C.
To be completely fair, just writing in C presents this. However, just because extension modules can be written in C, does not mean they have to be. It is quite dangerous, but most langauges (Java, C#, I assume Ruby, Haskell through GHC, etc.) allow linking into unsafe code in some way or another. It just seems a pity that the reference implementation of Python is written so largely in C (although some would argue this is a matter of practicality). I like the look of the PyPy project, which is implementing Python in Python, in order to get around these problems though.
Starting a Python program may take a few seconds at 100% CPU, because the interpreter needs to process all imported modules. This also disqualifies it for some purposes.
...but not many, to be fair — JIT compilation of any kind carries similar problems though. I believe it may be more pronounced in Python, but I'm really not sure.
Dynamically typed languages like Python can be really useful for scripting and prototyping, but I wouldn't rely on them for mission-critical applications. You can quickly create a simple program but it is hard to be sure that it is really stable.
I essentially agree with this — in particular, it does always feel unsafe to me to program in such a language. There is a great many automated checks one can do without a typechecker though, which can greatly improve the reliability of a system. Another point is that with the sort of applications that Python and Ruby are used for, reliability is not always priority number one, particularly when the systems are built on top of a proven framework.
That's a non-issue, in real terms. I'll give you that it takes a little longer to get used to than perhaps Ruby does, however. I don't think that whitespace delimitation is a serious problem beyond the first, say, week, though.
If software engineers are causing bugs with this sort of problem, they probably shouldn't be trusted with curly brackets either. The biggest problem I've seen with the whitespace system is the difference between tabs and spaces, which should be covered by in-house coding standards and (if importing outside code) a simple spaces->tabs (or vice versa) filter.
What's more error-prone about Python as compared to Ruby? I'm curious because I've read a lot of discussions on the differences between the languages, and it's never been an issue that's come up once.
Since you seem to know a bit about this, have you any idea how this modularisation interacts with the package modularisation of the Xorg server that was done by the Ubuntu project? Does it help them, hinder them, or are the two modularisation movements completely distinct?
The more sensible solution is to properly modularise and only run the segments which need hardware access with hardware access. This is more of a microkernel-ish design decision — the monolithic kernel of Linux makes it look more like this is running as another "layer", but that may just be necessary.
I'm not sure whether this new release heralds a move toward this design though (I freely admit knowing nothing about Linux internals), or whether it is just going to be a more componentised design that still requires to be run as one whole.
The jams where caused when you typed over a certain speed (albeit a slow speed) so the "myth" does hold some truth.
Yes, but the changes increased the speed that could be typed without jamming the typewriter, rather than reducing the speed that people typed normally (this would be a temporary effect, at best).
Prove to me there is no God. Prove to me that everything science measures and describes was not created by God.
Science can't do that, so far as we know. Which is just part of the reason that God is not taught about in Science class!
People have believed in God since the start of time. What makes scientists today so much more certain than scientists of 100 years ago?
More knowledge. The science of today is built upon the science of the past. We're more sure, but science doesn't strive for a "full" understanding, just a better and better one as time goes on.
Scientists are not sure that there is no God, which seems to be your assertion. They simply see no evidence to suggest strongly that there is a God, so it's not a part of scientific theory. Science is about interpreting the evidence, and to build up a better understanding through this process. Science will not give up on this approach and squeeze the beliefs of a single group into the parts it has not yet fully explained just because extremist members of that group thinks that's how science works.
I do agree, however, that your parent's post was overly harsh. Beliefs are acceptable. I do not agree that the majority of the district wanted ID to be taught, however, the immediate voting out of those who mandated its teaching and voting in of a board hostile to the movement is testament to that.
To be fair, MS's actions of late haven't followed this pattern. Look at the meeting they held with the other major browser creators of late, encouraging people to use their "risk level" visibility system so that people can have a consistent view of security on the web.
The Firefox team realise that a unified symbol is of benefit to everyone, and happily allowed MS to use the logo.
Re:i want conference mode and pocketpc voice clien
on
Google, Jabber, and Jingle
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
The main Gaim developer was hired by Google and given the low-down on the Jingle project some time ago, and it'll be added to the Gaim-vv system that's apparently coming in Gaim 2.0.
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I guess that's one way of looking at it. I'm not sure that they, legally, have another choice though, and it's not really their fight to fight.
Older drives do require extra code, because if Vista includes DVD playing software they would be legally (I think? Certainly mandated by DVD consortiums in any case) obliged to write software to enforce the region coding in software, since (as you mention) this is not handled in hardware. Just playing the disc is no more difficult, as you mention, but this is misleading since that's not all they have to do.
But yes, this is all about DRM. I'm not convinced that it's Microsoft's "bad" in this case, though.
I had to hang a floppy drive out of the side of my Shuttle system, it was highly annoying!
Although that said, my attempts to run Linux on the machine ended up in frustration when it turned out that it had no support for the SATA unit whatsoever...
Yep, and they're free to not support as much or as little of it as possible. Good to see you're on their side with this one.
Serious question: Has anyone reported the problem to be with the CPU/GPU? I was under the impression (from all the accounts I've seen, which is admittedly not many) that the PSU is to blame, since it wasn't tested in the sort of environment that it'd be used in, and that the XBox itself was not the overheating unit.
Anyone? Apologies if this has been asked already.
Bravo, sir. Bravo.
Unfortunately often true, but it does theoretically reduce the amount they owe!
I agree with you to a certain degree — I mean, the music industry is actually attempting to fix their product by crippling it for the paying consumer (while having little or no effect on the illegitimate distribution of files). But while there are artists who are embracing new business models, it is presently completely unclear what the new business models for artists will be, and artists who are already stuck (being treated terribly, in many cases) with the existing giants are in danger of being treated even worse by these companies, while having no immediately obvious way out.
I feel guilty if I pirate music because the artists aren't being paid. I don't buy into music which is DRMed in any way, because I refuse to buy a crippled product for what is typically a completely ridiculous price. But when I can buy a traditional CD, I buy it. I mean to start using an online service which does not implement DRM, but still many artists are left out here, and often by no fault of their own — they're musicians, not businessmen, and this is not something they'd ordinarly be able to get particularly good advice on.
Never stop feeling guilty about pirating music, unless you are still buying it from fairer systems. The fact that some companies use unfair means does not give one free reign over media. The artist deserves to be paid for their work in some way, and there is always fantastic music to find at terms you agree with if you're willing to look.
And yet, somehow, they're still around. God forbid that more than one business model exist.
This is probably my only disagreement with you —; and it's not even very strong. I realise that one can create a superset using good unit testing, but I feel that static typing allows you to narrow the range of things that need to be checked a unit test environment (the types of your input and output), so it aids your ability to perform more-isolated testing. This isn't a huge complaint though, but I do feel it's pertinent (you're right that Python's less-time-to-develop gives you more-time-to-test, but if there's also more-to-test this cancels out a little of those benefits). Static typesystems allow a little more flexibility with larger teams who are expected to create systems that interact, too, since it's possible to specify more strictly (that is, with words rather than with documentation) the required inputs and outputs.
Above all, though, it's largely a matter of picking the right tool for the right job. I don't think that anyone (sensible) would argue that Java is a better tool than Python for every application, or vice versa.
Again, though, it avoids many classes of errors. The lack of generics in Java before 5 and C# before .NET 2.0 was a fairly serious hindrance, but type systems do add a degree of safety, and narrow the range of errors that can happen in a system, to some degree.
I won't argue that they're the be-all and end-all, but they are helpful. And I wasn't really agreeing with the post you replied to, except in the case of the validity of static typesystems. This does become a bit of a religious debate sometimes though (and it's late, and it was my last day of work before Christmas, and I forgot to go to the shop before they stopped selling beer, so this is not appealing to me right now!).
In real-world terms, though, Python is fine, and in the context of C# and Java a static typesystem is beneficial. Would a static typesystem (even an optional one, for certain contexts) help Python? I don't know — I'm sure I heard talk of adding one at one point, which would be interesting if nothing else.
I think Python is a fine language for such things, don't get the impression that I don't!
You appear to have replied mostly to my post's parent here, but I'd just like to add that a static typesystem does add a degree of provability that isn't present in dynamic systems, although a lot of this (as I either stated in the post you reply to or in some other post on here, some of this can be obtained through less-formal automated tools for dynamic languages, in practical terms).
Arguably, though, that's what projects like TurboGears provide. Ruby and Python both have extensive and consistent base libraries, but they both need an external project (TurboGears or Rails) to provide this extra framework. If TurboGears is done well, there shouldn't be too much of a loss as compared to the more "official" Rails package. Shouldn't. ;)
Oh wait, just realised that he was claiming that reflection and the first-class status of functions were the same, which is just nonsense. So he was wrong, but by coincidence semi-right.
He might have you there. Some functional languages had reflection before Java. Not really comparable though, since they were not, and generally are not, used for the sort of things that Java is.
You've got him on the rest of the counts though, no question.
This was the answer I was expecting, which is why I specifically stated "as compared to Ruby". An interesting language for this is Boo, a Python-like .NET language which has a static typesystem.
To be completely fair, just writing in C presents this. However, just because extension modules can be written in C, does not mean they have to be. It is quite dangerous, but most langauges (Java, C#, I assume Ruby, Haskell through GHC, etc.) allow linking into unsafe code in some way or another. It just seems a pity that the reference implementation of Python is written so largely in C (although some would argue this is a matter of practicality). I like the look of the PyPy project, which is implementing Python in Python, in order to get around these problems though.
...but not many, to be fair — JIT compilation of any kind carries similar problems though. I believe it may be more pronounced in Python, but I'm really not sure.
I essentially agree with this — in particular, it does always feel unsafe to me to program in such a language. There is a great many automated checks one can do without a typechecker though, which can greatly improve the reliability of a system. Another point is that with the sort of applications that Python and Ruby are used for, reliability is not always priority number one, particularly when the systems are built on top of a proven framework.
That's a non-issue, in real terms. I'll give you that it takes a little longer to get used to than perhaps Ruby does, however. I don't think that whitespace delimitation is a serious problem beyond the first, say, week, though.
If software engineers are causing bugs with this sort of problem, they probably shouldn't be trusted with curly brackets either. The biggest problem I've seen with the whitespace system is the difference between tabs and spaces, which should be covered by in-house coding standards and (if importing outside code) a simple spaces->tabs (or vice versa) filter.
What's more error-prone about Python as compared to Ruby? I'm curious because I've read a lot of discussions on the differences between the languages, and it's never been an issue that's come up once.
Since you seem to know a bit about this, have you any idea how this modularisation interacts with the package modularisation of the Xorg server that was done by the Ubuntu project? Does it help them, hinder them, or are the two modularisation movements completely distinct?
The more sensible solution is to properly modularise and only run the segments which need hardware access with hardware access. This is more of a microkernel-ish design decision — the monolithic kernel of Linux makes it look more like this is running as another "layer", but that may just be necessary.
I'm not sure whether this new release heralds a move toward this design though (I freely admit knowing nothing about Linux internals), or whether it is just going to be a more componentised design that still requires to be run as one whole.
Yes, but the changes increased the speed that could be typed without jamming the typewriter, rather than reducing the speed that people typed normally (this would be a temporary effect, at best).
Science can't do that, so far as we know. Which is just part of the reason that God is not taught about in Science class!
More knowledge. The science of today is built upon the science of the past. We're more sure, but science doesn't strive for a "full" understanding, just a better and better one as time goes on.
Scientists are not sure that there is no God, which seems to be your assertion. They simply see no evidence to suggest strongly that there is a God, so it's not a part of scientific theory. Science is about interpreting the evidence, and to build up a better understanding through this process. Science will not give up on this approach and squeeze the beliefs of a single group into the parts it has not yet fully explained just because extremist members of that group thinks that's how science works.
I do agree, however, that your parent's post was overly harsh. Beliefs are acceptable. I do not agree that the majority of the district wanted ID to be taught, however, the immediate voting out of those who mandated its teaching and voting in of a board hostile to the movement is testament to that.
To be fair, MS's actions of late haven't followed this pattern. Look at the meeting they held with the other major browser creators of late, encouraging people to use their "risk level" visibility system so that people can have a consistent view of security on the web.
The Firefox team realise that a unified symbol is of benefit to everyone, and happily allowed MS to use the logo.
The main Gaim developer was hired by Google and given the low-down on the Jingle project some time ago, and it'll be added to the Gaim-vv system that's apparently coming in Gaim 2.0.