Whilst I do not want to get into a pointless flame war over this point I do not think that you can possibly point to a society with a high murder rate and barbaric punishments such as the death penalty as a peak of civilisation. In terms of freedoms and benifits it would appear that the USA is on a par with Europe, but not really ahead in any way. Conditions are not like those in the dark ages over here - you just like to think that so as you can maintain the moral justification to intervene wherever and whenever you like.
As for the "American Dream" - you really think that this is a dream only Americans can/do have. Get real.
Here in Britain it is possible to get bundled Athlon/Duron Socket A chips and MB's for about the same price as similar (clockspeed) Intel bundles: e.g. Athlon T'Bird+Asus A7V for £200 (~£300).
How can you possibly state that we need robotics to guarantee the survival of the human race and then launch into some sort of devisive nationalistic rant about the good ol' US of A needing to get their first. Are you really so arogant as to believe that the USA represents all of humanity, or even all that is good about humanity. If you were trully interested in the fate of the race you would put aside your nationality and support research and humnity, no matter what its location.
Re:Random RISC OS trivia by an ex-user
on
The ROX Desktop
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· Score: 1
The RISCOS desktop was designe to use the mouse. There were standard shotcuts for cut, paste and so on, but like Win9x no direct command for copy this file. By hitting F12 you entered a command line mode. You could enter your single file copy command here.
This may be (and is the case) here in the UK, but what if it is a non-UK company holding the database outside the juristiction of our laws. We are no loger protected by them. What we need is an international agreement on privacy. Although there is the EU declaration, this only holds in the EU. Our privacy can be and is invaded from outside, and there is little we can do about it.
I'm sorry, consumers don't want MD? Sony are the only company who cares? In Britain any student worth there salt has a portable MD recorder. They don't skip, are small, and not all that expensive any more. As for only Sony, my player is a Sharp, and the Aiwa player is just sublime.
Killing people is obviously a bit extreme, but forcing them to be more open and placing greater controls on the companies they are allowed to buy and destroy would be good.
Also they don't only want to have undue influence over the software market, but the hardware market as well. I'm not really talking about the devices they make, but the standards that they force on OEM's to get their coveted MS Windows stickers, and the various directives they have issued, such as instant on.
It would appear that Moterola believe that cable access will be the way forward. Check out this story for details of them buying STB maker General Instruments. I personally think that two way cable connections are a good thing, but here in Britian it is yet to take off. Maybe soon...
Fair enough, but BT are now rolling out ASDL in some areas (£40 for 512kbs). This gives you continuous connection, and at last we can use the internet like our US counterparts.
We have this at our Uni too, but it is a subtle rip-off. Not only can you only use the "cash" in very select places but the bank running the scheme (the Bank of Scotland) makes a fortune. It does this in a way which most people don't notice. You take money out of your account and put it on the card. You no longer earn interest on that money. You don;t spend it for a week, and the bank pockets the cash! Multiply this by the ~20000 students and hey, thats a tidy profit.
A couple of years ago I read a story saying that this sort of technology could be used to power laptops (and other portable electronic devices). Instead of bateries you use loads of nano-drives, attached to nano-turbines to generate electricity. As most fuels store energy in a more efficient way than batteries you get more power for longer. Using the chemical sources described for these devices they could be powered off your body, giving you laptop as much power as you want, you just have to eat more. How long before this is marketed as a slimming device?
The artical implies that these devices are aimed at corporate customers, who will be attempting to reduce costs. This device is going to cost them $600 over five years which, although cheaper than a PC, is still a considerable investment. This does not have 50% of the functionality of a PC, yet costs more then half as much.
The other big problem I see is that coperates tend to like runnning their own custom software packages, and customising the standard ones. IS Sun going to allow these packages to be uploaded to its own execution servers (and provide the necessaryt security), or is it intending that corporates buy their own servers. If the latter is the case then the total cost is not going to be far short of a PC anyway.
As a slightly longer, and more expanative answer no. I was mearly pointing out target market. Java has a limited target market to sell into, Linux is much less limited and is, therefore, much more likely to be able to gain users.
Sad, but true. At the moment Windows is the better platform in the consumer world. Everyone knows how to use it, the apps they know and curse run on it, and it's from a name they (dis-)trust. Yet Linux is getting better, and in a very short time will be able to present a real alternative to the most inbred of users. This can be readily seen by the fact the PC-World (the biggest retailer of systems in Britain) already offer Linux in theior software section (Red hat and one other I think) and have just introduced a PC with Linux and Star-Office pre-installed instead of Windows. No-one ever offered a Java compiler pre-installed.
This artical contains a lot of good points, and a lot of reasons why Linux may never become a contender to NT, but is this the point. It tries to draw a comparison between Java, a semi-open programming language, and Linux a fully open-sourced kernel/OS. Java has a t best a limited market, aimed at those who write programs. Consumers are not interested in what language a piece of software is written, but in how useable it is, how fast it is, and whether MS produce it. Everyone must use an OS, and the public is becoming a more advanced consumer in this respect. Normal (non-computing) people are questioning whether Windows is right for them. This is where Linux is different from Java. People want it and will, therfore, buy it.
ML has lazy evaluation too. You just need to know the technique. I've seen a small bit of Haskell, and could understand it easily after ML.
Facilities like compile-time type checking for all variables/functions is an amazingly powerfull feature, and it forces you into some good practices. Our Uni also talks up ML's module system, with its interface declarations and automatic checking of interface matching, as well as hiding of implementation from other modules. If only it had a standard visual library for GUI's
I'm writing this from my workplace, between third and fourth years on this very course. I think that the reason it was difficult to pick up was that it was so different. These kids have no pre-conceptions of how a program looks, or what a normal programming style is. They can fo this easily. In response to its syntax being evil, I can;t really comment, but I've got to use it to implement an Agent-O interpreter next year!
As I'm Scottish I don't really know how old a 5th or 6th grader is, but at my school we started programming when we took the (optional) computing course in third year of secondary school. This is at about 15. In second year there was some really basic Logo-style stuff. I think this is too old! Programming concepts can be learnt much younger, and are becoming increasingly important. The younger you teach them, the faster they learn, and teaching good programming is so important. Start at 10.
No, but it shows that the language can cope with highly demanding tasks as well as the mundain duties of teaching without resortng to haky solutions like VB.
This is an important point, and one that is often overlooked. If you teach someone how to program, and how to program well, then they can use these skills in any language. If you teach them a language then they will find life hard out there in the real world. Teach them about good constructs, code re-use and in the end efficiency. That way in fifteen years time we might see less of the needless bloat floating around today.
Although Python is elegant, it was not designed as a beginers language. Almost no languages have been designed in this way, with Basic (and Pascal) being the ones I can think of. But I would not advocate the use of these languages.
My choice would be (although I don't like it for general purpose programming) ML. This has been designed from the ground up to be syntatically and semantically well designed and provide all of the facilities for well formed design and implementation. It can (and is being) be extended to provide a whole specification language with facilities for ensuring that the final code matches the specification. The MLWorks enviroment provides a nice front-end on many platforms. It's also got a really simple syntax, and can be made to do some really powerfull things (like infinite presision arithmetic.)
I said not much difference, but it is still noticable, just. The point I was trying to make is that for most standard consumer apps MP3 has more than acceptable sound quality, and a host of neat user functionality features. Put all of your families music on one central server and access it anywhere in your home (thin clients are comming). Download it onto your palmtop PC (linux is comming to these too). The list is endless.
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Whilst I do not want to get into a pointless flame war over this point I do not think that you can possibly point to a society with a high murder rate and barbaric punishments such as the death penalty as a peak of civilisation. In terms of freedoms and benifits it would appear that the USA is on a par with Europe, but not really ahead in any way. Conditions are not like those in the dark ages over here - you just like to think that so as you can maintain the moral justification to intervene wherever and whenever you like. As for the "American Dream" - you really think that this is a dream only Americans can/do have. Get real.
Here in Britain it is possible to get bundled Athlon/Duron Socket A chips and MB's for about the same price as similar (clockspeed) Intel bundles: e.g. Athlon T'Bird+Asus A7V for £200 (~£300).
How can you possibly state that we need robotics to guarantee the survival of the human race and then launch into some sort of devisive nationalistic rant about the good ol' US of A needing to get their first. Are you really so arogant as to believe that the USA represents all of humanity, or even all that is good about humanity. If you were trully interested in the fate of the race you would put aside your nationality and support research and humnity, no matter what its location.
I don't need a 2Ghz chip for anything I can think of. Why are people going to shell out large amounts of cash for these?
Fopp also operate this policy, and Virgin too.
The RISCOS desktop was designe to use the mouse. There were standard shotcuts for cut, paste and so on, but like Win9x no direct command for copy this file. By hitting F12 you entered a command line mode. You could enter your single file copy command here.
This may be (and is the case) here in the UK, but what if it is a non-UK company holding the database outside the juristiction of our laws. We are no loger protected by them. What we need is an international agreement on privacy. Although there is the EU declaration, this only holds in the EU. Our privacy can be and is invaded from outside, and there is little we can do about it.
I'm sorry, consumers don't want MD? Sony are the only company who cares? In Britain any student worth there salt has a portable MD recorder. They don't skip, are small, and not all that expensive any more. As for only Sony, my player is a Sharp, and the Aiwa player is just sublime.
Killing people is obviously a bit extreme, but forcing them to be more open and placing greater controls on the companies they are allowed to buy and destroy would be good.
Also they don't only want to have undue influence over the software market, but the hardware market as well. I'm not really talking about the devices they make, but the standards that they force on OEM's to get their coveted MS Windows stickers, and the various directives they have issued, such as instant on.
I as considering having ASDL at home as I thought it would be
It would appear that Moterola believe that cable access will be the way forward. Check out this story for details of them buying STB maker General Instruments. I personally think that two way cable connections are a good thing, but here in Britian it is yet to take off. Maybe soon...
Fair enough, but BT are now rolling out ASDL in some areas (£40 for 512kbs). This gives you continuous connection, and at last we can use the internet like our US counterparts.
We have this at our Uni too, but it is a subtle rip-off. Not only can you only use the "cash" in very select places but the bank running the scheme (the Bank of Scotland) makes a fortune. It does this in a way which most people don't notice. You take money out of your account and put it on the card. You no longer earn interest on that money. You don;t spend it for a week, and the bank pockets the cash! Multiply this by the ~20000 students and hey, thats a tidy profit.
A couple of years ago I read a story saying that this sort of technology could be used to power laptops (and other portable electronic devices). Instead of bateries you use loads of nano-drives, attached to nano-turbines to generate electricity. As most fuels store energy in a more efficient way than batteries you get more power for longer. Using the chemical sources described for these devices they could be powered off your body, giving you laptop as much power as you want, you just have to eat more. How long before this is marketed as a slimming device?
The artical implies that these devices are aimed at corporate customers, who will be attempting to reduce costs. This device is going to cost them $600 over five years which, although cheaper than a PC, is still a considerable investment. This does not have 50% of the functionality of a PC, yet costs more then half as much.
The other big problem I see is that coperates tend to like runnning their own custom software packages, and customising the standard ones. IS Sun going to allow these packages to be uploaded to its own execution servers (and provide the necessaryt security), or is it intending that corporates buy their own servers. If the latter is the case then the total cost is not going to be far short of a PC anyway.
In short no.
As a slightly longer, and more expanative answer no. I was mearly pointing out target market. Java has a limited target market to sell into, Linux is much less limited and is, therefore, much more likely to be able to gain users.
Sad, but true. At the moment Windows is the better platform in the consumer world. Everyone knows how to use it, the apps they know and curse run on it, and it's from a name they (dis-)trust. Yet Linux is getting better, and in a very short time will be able to present a real alternative to the most inbred of users. This can be readily seen by the fact the PC-World (the biggest retailer of systems in Britain) already offer Linux in theior software section (Red hat and one other I think) and have just introduced a PC with Linux and Star-Office pre-installed instead of Windows. No-one ever offered a Java compiler pre-installed.
This artical contains a lot of good points, and a lot of reasons why Linux may never become a contender to NT, but is this the point. It tries to draw a comparison between Java, a semi-open programming language, and Linux a fully open-sourced kernel/OS. Java has a t best a limited market, aimed at those who write programs. Consumers are not interested in what language a piece of software is written, but in how useable it is, how fast it is, and whether MS produce it. Everyone must use an OS, and the public is becoming a more advanced consumer in this respect. Normal (non-computing) people are questioning whether Windows is right for them. This is where Linux is different from Java. People want it and will, therfore, buy it.
ML has lazy evaluation too. You just need to know the technique. I've seen a small bit of Haskell, and could understand it easily after ML.
Facilities like compile-time type checking for all variables/functions is an amazingly powerfull feature, and it forces you into some good practices. Our Uni also talks up ML's module system, with its interface declarations and automatic checking of interface matching, as well as hiding of implementation from other modules. If only it had a standard visual library for GUI's
I'm writing this from my workplace, between third and fourth years on this very course. I think that the reason it was difficult to pick up was that it was so different. These kids have no pre-conceptions of how a program looks, or what a normal programming style is. They can fo this easily. In response to its syntax being evil, I can;t really comment, but I've got to use it to implement an Agent-O interpreter next year!
As I'm Scottish I don't really know how old a 5th or 6th grader is, but at my school we started programming when we took the (optional) computing course in third year of secondary school. This is at about 15. In second year there was some really basic Logo-style stuff. I think this is too old! Programming concepts can be learnt much younger, and are becoming increasingly important. The younger you teach them, the faster they learn, and teaching good programming is so important. Start at 10.
No, but it shows that the language can cope with highly demanding tasks as well as the mundain duties of teaching without resortng to haky solutions like VB.
This is an important point, and one that is often overlooked. If you teach someone how to program, and how to program well, then they can use these skills in any language. If you teach them a language then they will find life hard out there in the real world. Teach them about good constructs, code re-use and in the end efficiency. That way in fifteen years time we might see less of the needless bloat floating around today.
Although Python is elegant, it was not designed as a beginers language. Almost no languages have been designed in this way, with Basic (and Pascal) being the ones I can think of. But I would not advocate the use of these languages.
My choice would be (although I don't like it for general purpose programming) ML. This has been designed from the ground up to be syntatically and semantically well designed and provide all of the facilities for well formed design and implementation. It can (and is being) be extended to provide a whole specification language with facilities for ensuring that the final code matches the specification. The MLWorks enviroment provides a nice front-end on many platforms. It's also got a really simple syntax, and can be made to do some really powerfull things (like infinite presision arithmetic.)
I said not much difference, but it is still noticable, just. The point I was trying to make is that for most standard consumer apps MP3 has more than acceptable sound quality, and a host of neat user functionality features. Put all of your families music on one central server and access it anywhere in your home (thin clients are comming). Download it onto your palmtop PC (linux is comming to these too). The list is endless.