Am I the only one who thinks the Big 4 browsers should be supported, and not just FireFox/IE?
YES. Why "big 4"? What makes that arbitrary number important? The standards are what are important. Support those, and we can all benefit, by voting with our feet for browsers that work.
Huh? The repository is just a bunch of packages. Do you mean that some of the mirrors haven't updated when you try to retrieve files? If so, use another, or the main site.
Actually, Linux is quite good at staying up on bad hardware. BadMem patches, hdparm...
BECAUSE of simple rules
on
DNS Complexity
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· Score: 4, Insightful
His point is that large systems can become unimaginably complex, even when they begin with a very simple set of rules. Particularly when those rules are vague.
It might be more accurate to say that systems can become unimaginably complex BECAUSE they have simple rules. The more rules, the more limitations.
Sounds a lot like Debian's idea of "unstable", which other people think of as "stable", or their idea of "stable", which other people think of as "military grade".
There is a very real limit as to how much you can parallelize standard office tasks.
Actually, that's probably untrue, in the way you seem to mean it. Of course there's always a limit, but I think that things like wordprocessing and spreadsheet design could be HIGHLY parallelized.
The problem at the moment is that only one person does the job, and they do it sequentially. It could be done, however, so that many users each write a paragraph, or proof-read a paragraph, or do the layout, etc. This is what's been done for a long time, in more writing-focused commercial ventures, such as publishing: a different workflow allowing parallelization, and many specialised workers, performing the different tasks.
This could be applied to parrallel programming, too -- especially as we're moving more and more towards automated spell-checking, grammar checking, stylesheet application, index generation, typography rendering, etc.
Equally, in spreadsheets, there's no need for one cell to be designed with another cell or spreadsheet already in place. If you know the formula you're entering, someone else could easily complete the other cells later. Workflow is a bottleneck here, but that's arguably because the tools we've used until now haven't provided the opportunity for a different, better workflow.
Beyond that, there are still PLENTY of places where the UI itself could be parallelised: updating thumbnails, loading images, re-rendering at a new DPI, or rendering a different part of the page, drawing widgets on the screen (already partly parallelized by GPUs).
A move to a more event-oriented programming methodology would probably help a LOT of this stuff.
3. Make sure that new developments are always available on Linux first (so that there's a real incentive to switch to Linux).
In reality, it tends to work the other way around. Take the Amiga emulator, UAE, for instance. I think, among other meanings, the U once stood for Unix. Yet, most of the best features are in the Windows version now, and they're developed in a non-cross-platform manner, by people who don't care about OpenGL's standardisation over DirectX, etc. Same with other emulators, and probably lots of other tools.
Unfortunately, Free Software is a victim of its own generosity, when parts of it are ported to windows. Especially given that the initial ports tend to be half-hearted, and half-working compared to the Unix versions, so that people think Free Software sucks, until it's had a while to become windows-ized through its that community.
STILL... it seems obvious to me that something like a usuable, popular, apt for windows could literally beat microsoft's monopoly. When you can browse to the office section of your package manager, and you're immediately presented with a choice (Install OpenOffice now, and lots of extra, compatible software) or run install the wrapper package for Microsoft Office, after buying the CD, proving you didn't steal it with a 98-digit code, etc.)... well, it would really level the playing field.
I actually thought this was the point of Google Pack -- to beat microsoft by taking over and opening up the distribution channel. It's a shame (no, literally, a SHAME) that they didn't do a better job on that, by making apt for windows then. I'd be glad to see a real APT for windows. Unfortunately, I'm not sure it's possible, without the mass of a debian-like project behind it, a very easy and presentable UI, and open, usable APIs that encourage developers to use it. Hint: it has to work as well as apt, but not be half as hard to make packages for. Good luck, I say.
How does that saying go? That the first step to wisdom is knowing what you DON'T know?
I'm sure the judge knew what a website was, as a user of one. Knowing the legal ramifications of running one, and where responsbilities end etc. is an entirely different matter. I for one respect the judge for admitting that he didn't know these things, instead of making up daft laws based on failed analogies with older tech.
This isn't whining. A translation would go like "Oh dear, what are all these scary lights for? I'd rather not read the manual; that would show me just how much I have to learn before I can claim to be competent with this machine I'm employed to use. Best to just pretend the manufacturer spent money putting them there for nothing."
SCO failed Microsoft... so, as the old saying goes, if you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself.
They claim 235 patents are infringed by the Open Source Community, but the "Open Source Community" does not exist as a legal entity -- it's not a person, it's not a company, it's not a even group acting under a single, shared motive. Break it down into Open Source and Free Software, and then break those down into companies and volunteers, and then into those who take are professionals vs. those who are just experimenting with a hobby, and you MIGHT have some sort of law suit. Most likely though, you just have FUD. Which is enough for MS, of course --- as long as the average consumer believes they have the one true window, they're happy with their production quality and customer service.
That's one of the two main questions anyone should be asking right now, although I guess it would still be useful in some ways, if it even had the refresh rate of turning a page in a book. The other big question is... what's its resolution?
I mean, come on... "A paper display with a maximum of 4,096 colours"? I can get that with a bit of paper, a robot arm, and 4,096 tins of paint. How about some news FOR NERDS, instead of just PR crap?;)
Home computing arose because it was the right time. If anything, Bill stiffled innovation. As for the money he made... antitrust, unethically trademarking everyday words, producing incompatible "standards"... Yes, he's smart, I don't deny that. But is being smart a good thing in and of itself? Not unless you use it to benefit society rather than to rape it.
All of these approaches are already out of date. They should recognise broadcatching, and move to it, ASAP, if they want to be ahead of the competition. As it is, the competition of small, independent producers is already far ahead of the big guys.
I suspect the problem here was not the robot losing limbs, but that it could potentially make the soldiers realise that they are treated as similarly disposable on a battlefield. Sure, you don't send a well-trained, well-armed soldier to die on a dumb mine in a field when you can send a robot, but when things get too complex for a robot? Yep, soldiers play the same role.
Who declared these people a "think tank"? Most of the people on slashdot think about Open Source/Free Software sometimes. Bill Gates does as well. Is HE an "Open Source Think Tank"?
K-3D *is* a parametric modeller. Blender, in fact, is gaining parametric features, slowly. However, k-3d is quite fully-fledged, with parameters that take inputs from and provide output to other nodes, etc. It looks like a great solution, except... well, it still feels very awkward to model with, for some reason. Maybe I just haven't given it enough of a chance yet. Also, the UI in K-3D has a perfect structure, but is much to space-consuming (see how the node properties panel/toolbar needs around a third of a 1024 pixel-wide screen to show all the widgets at once, for instance!)
p.s.: 3DS Max (at least) and Maya (I think) are also parametric -- it's not just Pro/E etc. Also, don't forget that high-level CAD apps are available as Open Source for Linux, if not as Free Software.
Have you actually looked at blender's code? I haven't seen it in about 18 months, but when I did look through it, interested in adding a feature, it turned out to be a complete mess. I haven't read the post of the person you're replying to, but (s)he might have said "It started to outgrow itself", because it's obvious that the code has had many things tacked on wherever it works, rather than through a cyclic (re)design-document-implement-test-release process.
For instance, the feature I was planning to add was video codec support for input (sequencer, textures, etc.) and output (sequencer, rendering). Now, importing/saving video is essentially a process of loading and saving frames, and there were other video APIs already used in blender on other platforms, such as quicktime on OS X, and directshow (or whatever it's actually using) on Windows. In well-designed code, it would basically be a matter of finding the video modules, copying one, cutting out the quicktime/dshow stuff from the video setup/save frame/load frame methods, and implementing the equivalent methods using the gstreamer API instead. Obviously, it's never going to be quite THAT simple, but it can and should be close.
I looked into the code for doing this, and it was a total mess: the code to output one video format was spread over many files, and the UI stuff (output file type selection, etc.) was spread over some more.
The UI stuff should have been easy, too. If you look at the plugin system of something like 3D Studio Max (or, indeed, K-3D), it's obvious that plugins can create their own "property pages", which just hook into the interface, presenting any new options that plugin might want to offer the user. In blender, I knew this wasn't the case (as plugins tended to have horrible, inconsistent UIs). That was understandable though, as work was actively going on to improve the UI stuff. Note that this still hasn't completed, however: blender 5 is going to work on this again, after blender 3 was supposed to be focused on sorting it out! I've no doubt that the blender coders work hard -- some of the improvements they make in short turnaround times is amazing. BUT, this either means that the code is a mess because things like UI API improvements take so long, or that the code is a mess because lots of things are done quickly without long-term design considerations.
Speaking architecturally, I, for one, would be very happy to see K-3D win out over blender. For the moment though, blender has the huge advantage --- actually being nice to model in (at least up to a certain complexity level, and if you don't need procedural modelling too much). Everything else though... plugin support, material editing, rendering quality, distributed rendering support, video IO, integration with other apps, basic interface usability and discoverability, is seriously hampered by the code, imho.
Slashdot Mirror
YES. Why "big 4"? What makes that arbitrary number important? The standards are what are important. Support those, and we can all benefit, by voting with our feet for browsers that work.
Huh? The repository is just a bunch of packages. Do you mean that some of the mirrors haven't updated when you try to retrieve files? If so, use another, or the main site.
Actually, Linux is quite good at staying up on bad hardware. BadMem patches, hdparm...
It might be more accurate to say that systems can become unimaginably complex BECAUSE they have simple rules. The more rules, the more limitations.
Sounds a lot like Debian's idea of "unstable", which other people think of as "stable", or their idea of "stable", which other people think of as "military grade".
Actually, that's probably untrue, in the way you seem to mean it. Of course there's always a limit, but I think that things like wordprocessing and spreadsheet design could be HIGHLY parallelized.
The problem at the moment is that only one person does the job, and they do it sequentially. It could be done, however, so that many users each write a paragraph, or proof-read a paragraph, or do the layout, etc. This is what's been done for a long time, in more writing-focused commercial ventures, such as publishing: a different workflow allowing parallelization, and many specialised workers, performing the different tasks.
This could be applied to parrallel programming, too -- especially as we're moving more and more towards automated spell-checking, grammar checking, stylesheet application, index generation, typography rendering, etc.
Equally, in spreadsheets, there's no need for one cell to be designed with another cell or spreadsheet already in place. If you know the formula you're entering, someone else could easily complete the other cells later. Workflow is a bottleneck here, but that's arguably because the tools we've used until now haven't provided the opportunity for a different, better workflow.
Beyond that, there are still PLENTY of places where the UI itself could be parallelised: updating thumbnails, loading images, re-rendering at a new DPI, or rendering a different part of the page, drawing widgets on the screen (already partly parallelized by GPUs).
A move to a more event-oriented programming methodology would probably help a LOT of this stuff.
In reality, it tends to work the other way around. Take the Amiga emulator, UAE, for instance. I think, among other meanings, the U once stood for Unix. Yet, most of the best features are in the Windows version now, and they're developed in a non-cross-platform manner, by people who don't care about OpenGL's standardisation over DirectX, etc. Same with other emulators, and probably lots of other tools.
Unfortunately, Free Software is a victim of its own generosity, when parts of it are ported to windows. Especially given that the initial ports tend to be half-hearted, and half-working compared to the Unix versions, so that people think Free Software sucks, until it's had a while to become windows-ized through its that community.
STILL... it seems obvious to me that something like a usuable, popular, apt for windows could literally beat microsoft's monopoly. When you can browse to the office section of your package manager, and you're immediately presented with a choice (Install OpenOffice now, and lots of extra, compatible software) or run install the wrapper package for Microsoft Office, after buying the CD, proving you didn't steal it with a 98-digit code, etc.)... well, it would really level the playing field.
I actually thought this was the point of Google Pack -- to beat microsoft by taking over and opening up the distribution channel. It's a shame (no, literally, a SHAME) that they didn't do a better job on that, by making apt for windows then. I'd be glad to see a real APT for windows. Unfortunately, I'm not sure it's possible, without the mass of a debian-like project behind it, a very easy and presentable UI, and open, usable APIs that encourage developers to use it. Hint: it has to work as well as apt, but not be half as hard to make packages for. Good luck, I say.
"want performance from php?
Dump Apache! its the slowest link!"
Then dump php, and get a real webapp tool.
Hey, what's a few billion dollars for a moonbase, when it means you have an actual, physical presence when the Chinese get there?
Indeed so -- and we all know that massively irradiated areas are where all humans like to forage for fungi!
How does that saying go? That the first step to wisdom is knowing what you DON'T know?
I'm sure the judge knew what a website was, as a user of one. Knowing the legal ramifications of running one, and where responsbilities end etc. is an entirely different matter. I for one respect the judge for admitting that he didn't know these things, instead of making up daft laws based on failed analogies with older tech.
I'm sure he was referring to the free boobs with every happy meal at McD's. Well, OK, you probably have to eat more than one.
The way things are going, we'll be needing Skidoos, not trucks or SUVs.
Pictures of pretty girls do not mean that the UI is pretty, or usable. I for one dumped OS X for KDE, because the workflow was better.
This isn't whining. A translation would go like "Oh dear, what are all these scary lights for? I'd rather not read the manual; that would show me just how much I have to learn before I can claim to be competent with this machine I'm employed to use. Best to just pretend the manufacturer spent money putting them there for nothing."
I just misread it as "Bill... who?"
They claim 235 patents are infringed by the Open Source Community, but the "Open Source Community" does not exist as a legal entity -- it's not a person, it's not a company, it's not a even group acting under a single, shared motive. Break it down into Open Source and Free Software, and then break those down into companies and volunteers, and then into those who take are professionals vs. those who are just experimenting with a hobby, and you MIGHT have some sort of law suit. Most likely though, you just have FUD. Which is enough for MS, of course --- as long as the average consumer believes they have the one true window, they're happy with their production quality and customer service.
WebOS: Something that sounded like a decent model, until apt came along.
That's one of the two main questions anyone should be asking right now, although I guess it would still be useful in some ways, if it even had the refresh rate of turning a page in a book. The other big question is... what's its resolution?
;)
I mean, come on... "A paper display with a maximum of 4,096 colours"? I can get that with a bit of paper, a robot arm, and 4,096 tins of paint. How about some news FOR NERDS, instead of just PR crap?
Home computing arose because it was the right time. If anything, Bill stiffled innovation. As for the money he made... antitrust, unethically trademarking everyday words, producing incompatible "standards"... Yes, he's smart, I don't deny that. But is being smart a good thing in and of itself? Not unless you use it to benefit society rather than to rape it.
All of these approaches are already out of date. They should recognise broadcatching, and move to it, ASAP, if they want to be ahead of the competition. As it is, the competition of small, independent producers is already far ahead of the big guys.
I suspect the problem here was not the robot losing limbs, but that it could potentially make the soldiers realise that they are treated as similarly disposable on a battlefield. Sure, you don't send a well-trained, well-armed soldier to die on a dumb mine in a field when you can send a robot, but when things get too complex for a robot? Yep, soldiers play the same role.
Who declared these people a "think tank"? Most of the people on slashdot think about Open Source/Free Software sometimes. Bill Gates does as well. Is HE an "Open Source Think Tank"?
K-3D *is* a parametric modeller. Blender, in fact, is gaining parametric features, slowly. However, k-3d is quite fully-fledged, with parameters that take inputs from and provide output to other nodes, etc. It looks like a great solution, except... well, it still feels very awkward to model with, for some reason. Maybe I just haven't given it enough of a chance yet. Also, the UI in K-3D has a perfect structure, but is much to space-consuming (see how the node properties panel/toolbar needs around a third of a 1024 pixel-wide screen to show all the widgets at once, for instance!)
p.s.: 3DS Max (at least) and Maya (I think) are also parametric -- it's not just Pro/E etc. Also, don't forget that high-level CAD apps are available as Open Source for Linux, if not as Free Software.
Have you actually looked at blender's code? I haven't seen it in about 18 months, but when I did look through it, interested in adding a feature, it turned out to be a complete mess. I haven't read the post of the person you're replying to, but (s)he might have said "It started to outgrow itself", because it's obvious that the code has had many things tacked on wherever it works, rather than through a cyclic (re)design-document-implement-test-release process.
For instance, the feature I was planning to add was video codec support for input (sequencer, textures, etc.) and output (sequencer, rendering). Now, importing/saving video is essentially a process of loading and saving frames, and there were other video APIs already used in blender on other platforms, such as quicktime on OS X, and directshow (or whatever it's actually using) on Windows. In well-designed code, it would basically be a matter of finding the video modules, copying one, cutting out the quicktime/dshow stuff from the video setup/save frame/load frame methods, and implementing the equivalent methods using the gstreamer API instead. Obviously, it's never going to be quite THAT simple, but it can and should be close.
I looked into the code for doing this, and it was a total mess: the code to output one video format was spread over many files, and the UI stuff (output file type selection, etc.) was spread over some more.
The UI stuff should have been easy, too. If you look at the plugin system of something like 3D Studio Max (or, indeed, K-3D), it's obvious that plugins can create their own "property pages", which just hook into the interface, presenting any new options that plugin might want to offer the user. In blender, I knew this wasn't the case (as plugins tended to have horrible, inconsistent UIs). That was understandable though, as work was actively going on to improve the UI stuff. Note that this still hasn't completed, however: blender 5 is going to work on this again, after blender 3 was supposed to be focused on sorting it out! I've no doubt that the blender coders work hard -- some of the improvements they make in short turnaround times is amazing. BUT, this either means that the code is a mess because things like UI API improvements take so long, or that the code is a mess because lots of things are done quickly without long-term design considerations.
Speaking architecturally, I, for one, would be very happy to see K-3D win out over blender. For the moment though, blender has the huge advantage --- actually being nice to model in (at least up to a certain complexity level, and if you don't need procedural modelling too much). Everything else though... plugin support, material editing, rendering quality, distributed rendering support, video IO, integration with other apps, basic interface usability and discoverability, is seriously hampered by the code, imho.