Re:Programmers Make Computers Slower Year by Year
on
Netscape 6 Vs. 4.7x
·
· Score: 1
Tis unforunate that most products don't come in a stripped down version as well as a full featured version. I've wondered if this is more to avoid the hassle of maintaining two products or just a rarely used (anymore) method.
As for new features and performance... I agree with you in principle for most apps. However a large portion of the software that helps drive the hardware upgrade bandwagon doesn't fall into this area. This category is, of course, gaming. Whee what a can of worms that opens up. I think that gaming for the most part, isn't something you can really apply the general rules to.
Personally I think the trend is just poor programmers being churned out of schools. You used to have to care about how big your program was and how fast it ran. Either it was way too slow or didn't fit in RAM. Nowadays thing will run 'fine' (I think we hit a baseline CPU threshhold at about 400-600Mhz) but may require gobs and gobs of RAM and Virtual mem. Programmers rarely know how to profile their code, figure out what routines are costly, or have any idea how basic computer architecture (caching, et) works and so they end up making programs for the abstract 'infinite memory' systems with which they are familiar from school. I don't expet the trend to change anytime soon, maybe a good hard recession would shake out the poorer programmers.
I think you need to get an update on what *routing* actually does. It self stabilizes. If a node goes down it reroutes. If Boston disappears routers eventually delete it from their routing tables. Yes, traffic is reduced, becomes lossy, has longer latencies, but it doesn't necessarily stop. Well, so long as that pipe isn't your only outgoing backbone. At least that's what I've been taught and see from my own limited experience. When I worked at an ISP our router to UUNet decided to go futzy - yes, service sucked, massive packet loss, but traffic still went out and came through on our other backbones. You don't make any consideration of the dynamic nature of routing.
And ironically, cities like Boston, San Francisco, etc... are much more prone to be wiped out than Texas. For one, they're on the shore and since the Earth is 70% covered by water statistically any comet or meteor is much more likely to wipe out a seaside city (Hmm, I suppose that includes Houston). For another, large population centers are decent second or thrid wave targets for things like nuclear strikes.
*sigh* as your friend I don't appreciate being called an idiot. You know better.
I a well aware of the hacking that went on in the DOOM community. I am well aware that id gave no help when the initial map editors were relased. I used several of those editors. I am well aware that modding exploded with Quake and QuakeC and that even then id wasn't always helpful.
I don't see why you feel justified in calling me an idiot. Where do I relate the MOD community with the release of the source code? If anything I point out a *disadvantage* of releasing the source to those games, making it easier to cheat (quoting the original post "...they realized that giving someone knowledge doesn't take it away from you. In fact, in most cases, it will help you."). I also point out that that hacking has a downside, almost invairably the first use of hacking is to *cheat*.
If anything, It looks like you took offense to me putting a bad spin on id releasing their soure and decided to go into "call people idiots" mode.
Now please, instead of starting off with your flamethrower think before you post. You'll at least appear more grown up.
This probably doesn't hold as true for the Indrema but in general the rule is that a console game is guarranteed to sell tens of thousands of copies. That means money in the bank. This is also why many many game companies are making the console their chief delpoyment platform with PC ports as a distant second. You MAKE MORE MONEY with consoles. I don't suppose garage developers would be predisposed to making some nice income.
Oh, and the usual avoidance of compatibility headaches factors in.
On the flip side: the source was released when there was no danger to id software of it being hurt by the source being released. Folks hacking those same games also came up with cheats that ruined the game (see Quake) for other people. Remember, there *is* a downside to almost every issue, particularly hacking. Someone (justly or not) loses out.
Re:Okay so it's fun, but isn't it rather old?
on
Linux Sin Demo
·
· Score: 1
You'll be waiting for several more years (until Linux has a large *paying* user base). I say paying because while, for example, Mac users are a relatively small userbase the vast majority of them are the type of users who have the pay-for-product mentality.
Besides, other than Carmack most developers don't have the time and manpower to put towards a Linux port (well, maybe a game server). With time to market an incredibly important part of the development cycle for gaming you just won't see much effort to do it unless significant monetary gains are a "sure thing".
IMO the biggest problem with AMD to date has been their dependence on foreign chipsets. This has caused motherboard , memory, and peripherals incompatibilties and instability in computer after computer after computer.
I've owned several AMD chips dating back to their 486 dx2 80 Mhz processors and while those were pretty nice everything after that and up to the Athlons has been a nightmare to deal with. As the article points out, until AMD is in charge of their own chipsets or MB manufacturers can reliably churn out the proper implementations of AMDs reference chipsets they will forever be plagued by these problems. The solution I hear about these problems is always, "the newest chipset by XYZ is pretty stable. Anand gave it a good review". Meanwhile we've gone onto the next generation chip/chipset.
To be fair Intel has run into this problem recently with their own 8xx series chipsets, but their TX, LX, BX etc. series from my experience were rock solid and never had a single fault.
I'm about to buy an Athlon system. I need to upgrade. I haven't had to do this much compatibility research (I only buy parts) since you had to check whether RAM was FPM, non-parity or parity or EDO.
You know, Slashdot feels more and more like Windows 9x. I 'have' to use it (or find even less suitable alternatives) but it makes me feel angrier, dirtier, and less prodcutive the longer I use it.
Not only that, they're obviously a bunch of irresponsible. hypocrites. Talk about FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD. Dear lord, someone hand these clowns a cluestick.
...and for my opinion on the signed apps: I've for it, as long as I can turn it off and have different restriction levels. It's an excellent way to protect against virii and trojans.
funny thing is, gamers have known this for ages. well, not the O() and reasoning perhaps but the end effect is there. The more players you have in a p2p network the worse the gameplay until the lower bandwidth users are saturated. This results in jumpy/inconsistent gameplay. I'm rather shocked people didn't see this problem coming from miles away.
AMD doesn't have dual proc systems available.
Motorola does.
Intel does.
Intel has the largest market share.
AMD comes next.
Then Motorola.
Motorola has the lowest Mhz rating (which means jack)
Intel's in the middle.
AMD is tops currently.
Apple (and hence Motorola) systems have increased in sales.
AMD systems are increasing in sales.
Only Intel has any server level product offerings.
Only Intel has Quad boards.
Only Intel has server chips with large cache.
I don't see how anything you've said makes any sense. I've listed my info on the chip world and I can't see how Intel is going into desktop oblivion. Furthermore Motorola is not sliding (problems yes, oblivion, no) in oblivion.
Intel will put out a SMP chipset whenever they feel the need to move from their *already existing* PIII Dual/Quad Xeon products. Intels has problems for sure but to write off a company that just keeps growing and growing is rather shortsighted.
Most people ain't me either, but a company has to live and die by what most people do/think/buy. You fit among those who either don't want Linux used by the masses or gave up on it. However, companies trying to make money off of Linux can't "fuck most people".
Maybe we should all go dig up 6 month+ old articles and try to get Hemos to post them! I'm sure someone could hack together a script and begin remailing the headlines for older stuff. We could check and see how dumb the Slashdot artucle posters really are!
The criticisms are coming from the USERS which is EXACTLY how it should be. Do you think any user even remotely cares that the whole thing was gutted and made a stable multi-OS development platform? No, they care that they didn't have any upgrades and that what did get delivered a year or more late doesn't work well.
So ask yourself, for what other reason is Netscape developed but to be USED by USERS ??? Why there was no 5.x is precisely because Netscape/Mozilla 'forgot' who their users are (or were as is the de facto state now). I take a look at Mozilla ever month or so but I find no compelling reason to make myself use it except to a) support the project and b) make life harder on myself. (I use win32 as my desktop os)
Agreed... but this is *exactly* how Europeans came to inhabit the Americas. That process took several centuries before a permanent resence was felt with people moving premanently and also being born in the 'new' land.
Consider that space is nothing like a 'new' continent and we have to be very patient. I'm expecting several Roanokes before anything truly permanent happens. I also don't expect to be around (or very old) when they finally have people that are truly extra-terrestrial.
(I say 'new' because obviously humans were already in the Americas)
Maybe we don't need to move out beyond 160x160 screens? I'm prefectly happy with mine. A doubling in resolution (not screen size) would be nice but I like my battery life the way it is.
... and where do you gather that the previous poster was taking a dig at Linux??? I don't see a trace of the word Linux in his post. Your hot button seems to be too touchy.
What you also meant to say was that these extra IPs (because of a 'shortage') cost lots of money to obtain from an ISP. Which is why NAT saves you vast sums of money.
Actually most companies I know of don't use NAT at all, just proxies.
Why limit yourself to just Linux admins? Other operating systems use a combination of NAT and firewalling programs as well. OpenBSD, FreeBSD, I'm sure Solaris as well... even Windows has programs to do NAT.
Additionally, the nature of the system that is compromised is a key factor. For instance (from one of my computer ethics books) an individual used a Boeing computer system as a stepping stone on his 'travels'. After noticing that their system had been compromised Boeing spent over $300,000 verifying that no damage had occured to any of their data. Why? Because the system compromised was part of the development of Boeing planes.
And don't forget that the *only* sure way to secure a box after being cracked is to reinstall the whole system. That means restoring all accounts (with new passwords), restoring backups, downtime for reinstall, etc.
For better or worse what you want will never happen. IM is a gigantic trend that will not die. Besides, for many email is not real-time enough and irc doesn't fit the bill.
Is the whole pager things silly? Or cell phones? Or PDAs? No, they each have their own places. For some even email is too much. Certainly many people either misuse these things or are overwhelmed, but that's no different than overeating, drinking, or procrstinating.
We need to start keeping a track record of the Slashdot posters and see which ones are consistently irresponsible. Granted, they could be posting *precisely* to stir up this kind of 'corrective' response and clarification; but, in the long run it makes them look extremely unprofessional. Frankly, it annoys the hell out of me. Maybe having a list of the misleading, unresearched, or flat out wrong news postings would make them reform a bit. Their standards are incredibly poor for such a large and well-read site.
Slashdot Mirror
Tis unforunate that most products don't come in a stripped down version as well as a full featured version. I've wondered if this is more to avoid the hassle of maintaining two products or just a rarely used (anymore) method.
As for new features and performance... I agree with you in principle for most apps. However a large portion of the software that helps drive the hardware upgrade bandwagon doesn't fall into this area. This category is, of course, gaming. Whee what a can of worms that opens up. I think that gaming for the most part, isn't something you can really apply the general rules to.
Personally I think the trend is just poor programmers being churned out of schools. You used to have to care about how big your program was and how fast it ran. Either it was way too slow or didn't fit in RAM. Nowadays thing will run 'fine' (I think we hit a baseline CPU threshhold at about 400-600Mhz) but may require gobs and gobs of RAM and Virtual mem. Programmers rarely know how to profile their code, figure out what routines are costly, or have any idea how basic computer architecture (caching, et) works and so they end up making programs for the abstract 'infinite memory' systems with which they are familiar from school. I don't expet the trend to change anytime soon, maybe a good hard recession would shake out the poorer programmers.
I think you need to get an update on what *routing* actually does. It self stabilizes. If a node goes down it reroutes. If Boston disappears routers eventually delete it from their routing tables. Yes, traffic is reduced, becomes lossy, has longer latencies, but it doesn't necessarily stop. Well, so long as that pipe isn't your only outgoing backbone. At least that's what I've been taught and see from my own limited experience. When I worked at an ISP our router to UUNet decided to go futzy - yes, service sucked, massive packet loss, but traffic still went out and came through on our other backbones. You don't make any consideration of the dynamic nature of routing.
And ironically, cities like Boston, San Francisco, etc... are much more prone to be wiped out than Texas. For one, they're on the shore and since the Earth is 70% covered by water statistically any comet or meteor is much more likely to wipe out a seaside city (Hmm, I suppose that includes Houston). For another, large population centers are decent second or thrid wave targets for things like nuclear strikes.
I wouldn't call it a 'good' mutation. It would seemingly result in more color blind males.
*sigh* as your friend I don't appreciate being called an idiot. You know better.
I a well aware of the hacking that went on in the DOOM community. I am well aware that id gave no help when the initial map editors were relased. I used several of those editors. I am well aware that modding exploded with Quake and QuakeC and that even then id wasn't always helpful.
I don't see why you feel justified in calling me an idiot. Where do I relate the MOD community with the release of the source code? If anything I point out a *disadvantage* of releasing the source to those games, making it easier to cheat (quoting the original post "...they realized that giving someone knowledge doesn't take it away from you. In fact, in most cases, it will help you."). I also point out that that hacking has a downside, almost invairably the first use of hacking is to *cheat*.
If anything, It looks like you took offense to me putting a bad spin on id releasing their soure and decided to go into "call people idiots" mode.
Now please, instead of starting off with your flamethrower think before you post. You'll at least appear more grown up.
This probably doesn't hold as true for the Indrema but in general the rule is that a console game is guarranteed to sell tens of thousands of copies. That means money in the bank. This is also why many many game companies are making the console their chief delpoyment platform with PC ports as a distant second. You MAKE MORE MONEY with consoles. I don't suppose garage developers would be predisposed to making some nice income.
Oh, and the usual avoidance of compatibility headaches factors in.
On the flip side: the source was released when there was no danger to id software of it being hurt by the source being released. Folks hacking those same games also came up with cheats that ruined the game (see Quake) for other people. Remember, there *is* a downside to almost every issue, particularly hacking. Someone (justly or not) loses out.
You'll be waiting for several more years (until Linux has a large *paying* user base). I say paying because while, for example, Mac users are a relatively small userbase the vast majority of them are the type of users who have the pay-for-product mentality.
Besides, other than Carmack most developers don't have the time and manpower to put towards a Linux port (well, maybe a game server). With time to market an incredibly important part of the development cycle for gaming you just won't see much effort to do it unless significant monetary gains are a "sure thing".
IMO the biggest problem with AMD to date has been their dependence on foreign chipsets. This has caused motherboard , memory, and peripherals incompatibilties and instability in computer after computer after computer.
I've owned several AMD chips dating back to their 486 dx2 80 Mhz processors and while those were pretty nice everything after that and up to the Athlons has been a nightmare to deal with. As the article points out, until AMD is in charge of their own chipsets or MB manufacturers can reliably churn out the proper implementations of AMDs reference chipsets they will forever be plagued by these problems. The solution I hear about these problems is always, "the newest chipset by XYZ is pretty stable. Anand gave it a good review". Meanwhile we've gone onto the next generation chip/chipset.
To be fair Intel has run into this problem recently with their own 8xx series chipsets, but their TX, LX, BX etc. series from my experience were rock solid and never had a single fault.
I'm about to buy an Athlon system. I need to upgrade. I haven't had to do this much compatibility research (I only buy parts) since you had to check whether RAM was FPM, non-parity or parity or EDO.
RANT:
You know, Slashdot feels more and more like Windows 9x. I 'have' to use it (or find even less suitable alternatives) but it makes me feel angrier, dirtier, and less prodcutive the longer I use it.
Not only that, they're obviously a bunch of irresponsible. hypocrites. Talk about FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD FUD. Dear lord, someone hand these clowns a cluestick.
...and for my opinion on the signed apps: I've for it, as long as I can turn it off and have different restriction levels. It's an excellent way to protect against virii and trojans.
funny thing is, gamers have known this for ages. well, not the O() and reasoning perhaps but the end effect is there. The more players you have in a p2p network the worse the gameplay until the lower bandwidth users are saturated. This results in jumpy/inconsistent gameplay. I'm rather shocked people didn't see this problem coming from miles away.
Here's an example to use, I read it somewhere in regards to goverment security certifications.
Suppose I have top secret clearance but you only have secret clearance. There is no mechanism to *prevent me* from giving you top secret information.
AMD doesn't have dual proc systems available.
Motorola does.
Intel does.
Intel has the largest market share.
AMD comes next.
Then Motorola.
Motorola has the lowest Mhz rating (which means jack)
Intel's in the middle.
AMD is tops currently.
Apple (and hence Motorola) systems have increased in sales.
AMD systems are increasing in sales.
Only Intel has any server level product offerings.
Only Intel has Quad boards.
Only Intel has server chips with large cache.
I don't see how anything you've said makes any sense. I've listed my info on the chip world and I can't see how Intel is going into desktop oblivion. Furthermore Motorola is not sliding (problems yes, oblivion, no) in oblivion.
Intel will put out a SMP chipset whenever they feel the need to move from their *already existing* PIII Dual/Quad Xeon products. Intels has problems for sure but to write off a company that just keeps growing and growing is rather shortsighted.
Most people ain't me either, but a company has to live and die by what most people do/think/buy. You fit among those who either don't want Linux used by the masses or gave up on it. However, companies trying to make money off of Linux can't "fuck most people".
Maybe we should all go dig up 6 month+ old articles and try to get Hemos to post them! I'm sure someone could hack together a script and begin remailing the headlines for older stuff. We could check and see how dumb the Slashdot artucle posters really are!
I want to point out that the GPL is not the only way to ensure this.
The criticisms are coming from the USERS which is EXACTLY how it should be. Do you think any user even remotely cares that the whole thing was gutted and made a stable multi-OS development platform? No, they care that they didn't have any upgrades and that what did get delivered a year or more late doesn't work well.
So ask yourself, for what other reason is Netscape developed but to be USED by USERS ??? Why there was no 5.x is precisely because Netscape/Mozilla 'forgot' who their users are (or were as is the de facto state now). I take a look at Mozilla ever month or so but I find no compelling reason to make myself use it except to a) support the project and b) make life harder on myself. (I use win32 as my desktop os)
Agreed... but this is *exactly* how Europeans came to inhabit the Americas. That process took several centuries before a permanent resence was felt with people moving premanently and also being born in the 'new' land.
Consider that space is nothing like a 'new' continent and we have to be very patient. I'm expecting several Roanokes before anything truly permanent happens. I also don't expect to be around (or very old) when they finally have people that are truly extra-terrestrial.
(I say 'new' because obviously humans were already in the Americas)
Maybe we don't need to move out beyond 160x160 screens? I'm prefectly happy with mine. A doubling in resolution (not screen size) would be nice but I like my battery life the way it is.
... and where do you gather that the previous poster was taking a dig at Linux??? I don't see a trace of the word Linux in his post. Your hot button seems to be too touchy.
1. Uh, a Playstation 2...?
2. A Playstation 2 and a few games?
3. A Playstation 2 and tons of games?
What you also meant to say was that these extra IPs (because of a 'shortage') cost lots of money to obtain from an ISP. Which is why NAT saves you vast sums of money.
Actually most companies I know of don't use NAT at all, just proxies.
Why limit yourself to just Linux admins? Other operating systems use a combination of NAT and firewalling programs as well. OpenBSD, FreeBSD, I'm sure Solaris as well... even Windows has programs to do NAT.
While I agree with your assessment about bugs you might want to take a look at the guy's resume (which of course may be falsified).
http://www.chc-3.com/resume.htm
Additionally, the nature of the system that is compromised is a key factor. For instance (from one of my computer ethics books) an individual used a Boeing computer system as a stepping stone on his 'travels'. After noticing that their system had been compromised Boeing spent over $300,000 verifying that no damage had occured to any of their data. Why? Because the system compromised was part of the development of Boeing planes.
And don't forget that the *only* sure way to secure a box after being cracked is to reinstall the whole system. That means restoring all accounts (with new passwords), restoring backups, downtime for reinstall, etc.
For better or worse what you want will never happen. IM is a gigantic trend that will not die. Besides, for many email is not real-time enough and irc doesn't fit the bill.
Is the whole pager things silly? Or cell phones? Or PDAs? No, they each have their own places. For some even email is too much. Certainly many people either misuse these things or are overwhelmed, but that's no different than overeating, drinking, or procrstinating.
We need to start keeping a track record of the Slashdot posters and see which ones are consistently irresponsible. Granted, they could be posting *precisely* to stir up this kind of 'corrective' response and clarification; but, in the long run it makes them look extremely unprofessional. Frankly, it annoys the hell out of me. Maybe having a list of the misleading, unresearched, or flat out wrong news postings would make them reform a bit. Their standards are incredibly poor for such a large and well-read site.