Maybe it's just because I'm young, but as much as I like playing games, there are other things I'd much rather be doing with my girlfriend than sitting at a computer screen.
In Sweden,.torrent files are not a violation of copyright law, and hosting a tracker is legal. But there are still copyright laws. This means that if the folks behind the Pirate Bay are only tracking and hosting.torrents, then they are in safe water. But if the police uncover any evidence during the raid that the Pirate Bay folks actually downloaded any copyrighted files, then they could get in trouble. If one of the founders downloaded a torrent and then seeded it (even if just for personal use), then the police could make the case that they were also distributing copyrighted materials, and that would be illegal.
My girlfriend is Chinese, and it's really fun to talk to her family about the cultural differences between China and America. For example, they were amazed that in American parks there are ducks and geese that can just walk around, and even go up to people for food. Apparently in China there would be a problem with people trying to catch the ducks, so that in the few places where you can see ducks out in public they stay the hell away from people. The same goes for flowers, which apparently aren't normally grown in parks because people would just pick them all!
This isn't to suggest that in China there isn't a value for the public good. Quite the contrary. Just a few years ago if you went to the Temple of Heaven the big steps that lead into the temple weren't fenced off at all. Specifically, there is a huge relief carving that goes up through the center of the stairs, and people had enough respect and common sense not to abuse that privelege by walking on it, or vandalizing it. All through Beijing there are landmarks that weren't protected at all from the people, because they didn't need to be. Of course, a lot of this has changed recently, and in the past few years some of these things have started to be fenced off.
On the Linux note, her parents view Linux with a kind of mild amusement. They find it somewhat humorous that people would spend so much time and effort to write free software, and think I'm kind of crazy for choosing a career with Linux.
I recently (December) purchased a Thinkpad X40. The number one reason I chose to do so is the fact that 100% of the components in it were supported by Linux. There aren't any mysterious, undocumented revisions with different components. Everything -- and I mean everything -- works perfectly with my laptop, which is saying a lot. As far as I can tell, the same holds with all of the other laptops in the Thinkpad line, with the exception that some of the laptops have ATI video cards that require proprietary drivers to get full acceleration. This holds for the laptops released after the Thinkpad line was purchased by Lenovo as well.
This isn't at all about MSN.com, it's about blocking ads in MSN messenger. MSN messenger fetches the ads from a Microsoft server. A common way to block ads is to set your hosts file to resolve the ads to your local host. Of course you can use a program like Filterset.G to block ads in FF, but how would you propose to block Microsoft ads in other programs? See the Wikipedia article for more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HOSTS#Ad_filtering
If you compile with -Os (compile for size) and only pick the drivers you need, the kernel plus modules is only about a megabyte. The 2.4 kernel is even smaller.
Except Google Desktop only runs on Windows, and although I know people who use Pine (via Putty) on Windows, I'd venture that most Pine users are running another operating system.
Umm, no. Windows CANNOT boot off of a computer that is using EFI without a backwards compatible BIOS mode, because Windows makes direct calls to the BIOS to do its magic. The GRUB bootloader already supports EFI, and it should be trivial to get GRUB onto your new Intel Mac. Once you have GRUB on, it's not any harder to install Windows than it is to install Linux, it's just that Windows still won't be able to boot -- once the bootloader passes control to Windows, Windows simply cannot start without being able to make certain calls to the BIOS.
Since there seems to be some confusion about the i2hub... Internet2 is the name of the network that links a lot of universities, research labs, etc. I2Hub is the name of a Direct Connect* hub that only allowed users who were on the Internet2 network to connecct. So they just shut down the direct connect hub, not the whole network. You can still do everything you could before -- including sharing files using alternative methods -- except connecting to the I2Hub server.
Umm... I'm not a Linux guru, but what you said doesn't really make much sense. Normally an out of the box linux kernel takes a long time to boot because it boots from an initrd. Also, any drivers compiled into the kernel will probably make things faster (assuming you only compile in what you use) because the computer doesn't have to sit around and load modules into memory. If you really have all your modules compiled in, try getting rid of your initrd and setting any modules that are getting loaded up with each boot into an autoload file, so the computer can just load them instead of trying to figure out which modules it needs. Like you said, some distributions make it easy to load the startup scripts in parallel -- this would probably also help you boot faster.
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
The Linux kernel, on the other hand, has a slightly different license. The version of the GPL distributed with the Linux kernel is GPL version 2. Period. You don't get the option to use another version of the GPL.
Your post reminded me of a funny (in a very geeky sense of the word) story. My sister has a friend who lives in a household (she's in high school) that basically doesn't understand technology and is frightened by it. Their computers are full of spyware and adware, probably lots of viruses. So my sister was over at this friend's house one weekend, and their computer was almost completely unusable. Besides the fact that they get popups every few minutes (even with IE closed), they have an older computer and they're still using dial-up, so all of the spyware, popups, and banners are just making their computer even slower, and probably eating up a lot of their bandwidth. My sister was totally apalled and implored her friend to install Firefox. She tried explaining how they would get less spyware, and you can install extensions that get rid of ads, and be safer against viruses. Her friend totally refused to install it, because she was afraid that it was "probably going to come with lots of spyware and stuff."
In a totally unrelated story, I work in a computing center at school, and its amazing how many people there are who think that "the internet" is built into their "computer" and is only accessed by clicking on the magical blue e. A lot of the time when they're having problems getting things to work in IE, I ask them to use Firefox, and they get totally bewildered at the concept that there's another way to get onto the internet. When I ask them to try accessing the internet, but without clicking the magical blue e, they look at me like I'm dumb.
The thing that I wonder, is how to do you anchor it? Wouldn't the forces be strong enough to just rip the platform you're anchoring it to out of the ground?
Re:In Soviet Russia..
on
Name That Worm
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Can people NOT moderate these as funny? Because really, they're not.
I agree with you that it's a bad thing when people think they don't have to learn. People should be willing, even eager, to learn new things. Knowing more can only help you.
On the other hand, I have to agree with the other posters who have said that most people shouldn't NEED to learn jargon. Most people need to understand a very small subset of all the computer jargon words to do whatever they're being paid to do. You shouldn't need to understand how your car works to drive it, you shouldn't need to understand the what a.m4a file extension means to play a song you bought online, and you shouldn't need to understand what a jpeg image is to open one. The ONLY jargon that you really need to understand is the jargon that's related to your job. If your job is in computer graphics, it's important to know the difference between the different file extensions of image files. In general however, you shouldn't need to know about all the other programs that run on your computer (e.g. the firewall) when you're not being paid to use them.
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe it's just because I'm young, but as much as I like playing games, there are other things I'd much rather be doing with my girlfriend than sitting at a computer screen.
Apparently you don't know what that expression means... or at least completely misunderstood the article.
In Sweden, .torrent files are not a violation of copyright law, and hosting a tracker is legal. But there are still copyright laws. This means that if the folks behind the Pirate Bay are only tracking and hosting .torrents, then they are in safe water. But if the police uncover any evidence during the raid that the Pirate Bay folks actually downloaded any copyrighted files, then they could get in trouble. If one of the founders downloaded a torrent and then seeded it (even if just for personal use), then the police could make the case that they were also distributing copyrighted materials, and that would be illegal.
My girlfriend is Chinese, and it's really fun to talk to her family about the cultural differences between China and America. For example, they were amazed that in American parks there are ducks and geese that can just walk around, and even go up to people for food. Apparently in China there would be a problem with people trying to catch the ducks, so that in the few places where you can see ducks out in public they stay the hell away from people. The same goes for flowers, which apparently aren't normally grown in parks because people would just pick them all!
This isn't to suggest that in China there isn't a value for the public good. Quite the contrary. Just a few years ago if you went to the Temple of Heaven the big steps that lead into the temple weren't fenced off at all. Specifically, there is a huge relief carving that goes up through the center of the stairs, and people had enough respect and common sense not to abuse that privelege by walking on it, or vandalizing it. All through Beijing there are landmarks that weren't protected at all from the people, because they didn't need to be. Of course, a lot of this has changed recently, and in the past few years some of these things have started to be fenced off.
On the Linux note, her parents view Linux with a kind of mild amusement. They find it somewhat humorous that people would spend so much time and effort to write free software, and think I'm kind of crazy for choosing a career with Linux.
Perhaps not... but once upon a time, Microsoft did sell its own variant of Unix.
I recently (December) purchased a Thinkpad X40. The number one reason I chose to do so is the fact that 100% of the components in it were supported by Linux. There aren't any mysterious, undocumented revisions with different components. Everything -- and I mean everything -- works perfectly with my laptop, which is saying a lot. As far as I can tell, the same holds with all of the other laptops in the Thinkpad line, with the exception that some of the laptops have ATI video cards that require proprietary drivers to get full acceleration. This holds for the laptops released after the Thinkpad line was purchased by Lenovo as well.
This isn't at all about MSN.com, it's about blocking ads in MSN messenger. MSN messenger fetches the ads from a Microsoft server. A common way to block ads is to set your hosts file to resolve the ads to your local host. Of course you can use a program like Filterset.G to block ads in FF, but how would you propose to block Microsoft ads in other programs? See the Wikipedia article for more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HOSTS#Ad_filtering
If you compile with -Os (compile for size) and only pick the drivers you need, the kernel plus modules is only about a megabyte. The 2.4 kernel is even smaller.
Except Google Desktop only runs on Windows, and although I know people who use Pine (via Putty) on Windows, I'd venture that most Pine users are running another operating system.
You mean like this? http://www.osxbook.com/book/bonus/misc/knoppix/
Or perhaps this? http://www.mactel-linux.org/wiki/Main_Page
Apple uses the BSD utilities, not the GNU utilities.
Umm, no. Windows CANNOT boot off of a computer that is using EFI without a backwards compatible BIOS mode, because Windows makes direct calls to the BIOS to do its magic. The GRUB bootloader already supports EFI, and it should be trivial to get GRUB onto your new Intel Mac. Once you have GRUB on, it's not any harder to install Windows than it is to install Linux, it's just that Windows still won't be able to boot -- once the bootloader passes control to Windows, Windows simply cannot start without being able to make certain calls to the BIOS.
You know what the funny thing is? The gene makes you score lower on IQ tests, not higher. Ironic, isn't it? Maybe you should RTFA next time.
Every once in a while you run across a Slashdot story that just makes you wonder WTF?!?! This, ladies (?) and gentleman, is one of those stories.
Since there seems to be some confusion about the i2hub... Internet2 is the name of the network that links a lot of universities, research labs, etc. I2Hub is the name of a Direct Connect* hub that only allowed users who were on the Internet2 network to connecct. So they just shut down the direct connect hub, not the whole network. You can still do everything you could before -- including sharing files using alternative methods -- except connecting to the I2Hub server.
* Direct Connect is a file sharing protocol
Umm... I'm not a Linux guru, but what you said doesn't really make much sense. Normally an out of the box linux kernel takes a long time to boot because it boots from an initrd. Also, any drivers compiled into the kernel will probably make things faster (assuming you only compile in what you use) because the computer doesn't have to sit around and load modules into memory. If you really have all your modules compiled in, try getting rid of your initrd and setting any modules that are getting loaded up with each boot into an autoload file, so the computer can just load them instead of trying to figure out which modules it needs. Like you said, some distributions make it easy to load the startup scripts in parallel -- this would probably also help you boot faster.
Your post reminded me of a funny (in a very geeky sense of the word) story. My sister has a friend who lives in a household (she's in high school) that basically doesn't understand technology and is frightened by it. Their computers are full of spyware and adware, probably lots of viruses. So my sister was over at this friend's house one weekend, and their computer was almost completely unusable. Besides the fact that they get popups every few minutes (even with IE closed), they have an older computer and they're still using dial-up, so all of the spyware, popups, and banners are just making their computer even slower, and probably eating up a lot of their bandwidth. My sister was totally apalled and implored her friend to install Firefox. She tried explaining how they would get less spyware, and you can install extensions that get rid of ads, and be safer against viruses. Her friend totally refused to install it, because she was afraid that it was "probably going to come with lots of spyware and stuff."
In a totally unrelated story, I work in a computing center at school, and its amazing how many people there are who think that "the internet" is built into their "computer" and is only accessed by clicking on the magical blue e. A lot of the time when they're having problems getting things to work in IE, I ask them to use Firefox, and they get totally bewildered at the concept that there's another way to get onto the internet. When I ask them to try accessing the internet, but without clicking the magical blue e, they look at me like I'm dumb.
How does a question get moderated as insightful? Interesting maybe, but not insightful.
The thing that I wonder, is how to do you anchor it? Wouldn't the forces be strong enough to just rip the platform you're anchoring it to out of the ground?
Can people NOT moderate these as funny? Because really, they're not.
I agree with you that it's a bad thing when people think they don't have to learn. People should be willing, even eager, to learn new things. Knowing more can only help you.
.m4a file extension means to play a song you bought online, and you shouldn't need to understand what a jpeg image is to open one. The ONLY jargon that you really need to understand is the jargon that's related to your job. If your job is in computer graphics, it's important to know the difference between the different file extensions of image files. In general however, you shouldn't need to know about all the other programs that run on your computer (e.g. the firewall) when you're not being paid to use them.
On the other hand, I have to agree with the other posters who have said that most people shouldn't NEED to learn jargon. Most people need to understand a very small subset of all the computer jargon words to do whatever they're being paid to do. You shouldn't need to understand how your car works to drive it, you shouldn't need to understand the what a
To make it that much better, they even misspelled "Excel."
You may be interested in the Unison project. More info can be found here: http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/
Good idea ;)