A good run for their money? American automakers are all perilously close to bankruptcy, struggling with pensions and high healthcare costs. Toyota and Honda are healthier than ever with growing marketshares. Toyota will become the largest automaker in the world by marketshare within the next year. I'd say the Japanese have given US automakers a bit more than just a run for their money.
Crossover could be a terrific tool for web developers. For most web developers, IE6 is the source of many headaches. If you develop on a Mac and want to test on a PC without owning a copy of Windows, without dedicating tons of resources to virtualization, then WINE/Crossover seems like a great solution. Unfortunately for me, I haven't been able to get IE6 to work properly. It will display certain sites but not all sites. I guess this is still Beta software though.
Apple's quality seems to have fallen, at least anecdotally it seems. I've got 4 Blue and White G3 workstations from 1999 that are still rock-solid. They run Panther and Tiger beautifully. Some are on their original hard drives. I've converted some of them to servers so they run 24/7/365 now. Many of the newer Apple machines I've purchased for personal and corporate use have had problems starting with the bad startup switch on the G4 cube, crimped backlight wire in a Titanium Powerbook G4, hard drive that crapped out in an Aluminum Powerbook. To Apple's credit, these problems were all addressed to my satisfaction.
My guess is that the fall in quality is due to two things: (1) Apple sending manufacturing overseas to subcontractors instead of managing it themselves and (2) the fact that computers are just way more complex than they used to be 6 or 7 years ago. More parts, more complex parts, more things that *can* go wrong, more things that *do* go wrong.
Microsoft products are thoroughly tested before public release, in fact I'm writing this post using their voice recognition system right now and as you can see Dear Aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all it performs flawlessly.
I would add->
5. Develop to the standard but with familiarity of common IE rendering bugs and therefore code around those problems, sometimes making design and feature compromises which you would prefer not to make but that is the reality of designing/developing for the web when the dominant browser is borked.
for example: the IE box model does not comply to the W3C standard, therefore: avoid declaring "width" when possible, do not add padding to elements with width declared, instead create the padding with a separate (admittedly non-semantic) element inside the element with width declared. Don't use large blocks of italic text. Don't use PNGs, don't, don't, don't... you get the idea.
Maybe because your heli doesn't have a Core Duo and a hard drive and a graphics sub system throwing off heat in addition to the battery itself? Also, flying around is a pretty good way of cooling something. Quick somebody patent it: novel method for cooling an electronic device...
I'm sorry. I just don't buy the whole concept that there is no market for browsers. Just because Microsoft bundles IE with Windows doesn't mean that it's free. You can download it from Microsoft without cost, but then it only runs on a machine running windows. IE costs money to develop, support, maintain, and market. Companies are not usually in the habit of doing these things if they don't think there are revenue streams directly or indirectly related to those expenditures. Firefox/Mozilla is ostensibly free as well, but in reality the project has expenditures which must be offset with revenues from partnerships with commercial entities like Google. Those revenues come from users in the same way that advertising revenue on television comes from commercial enterprises seeking access to end consumers. You watch TV (broadcast), it is ostensibly free, but your viewing advertisements pays for the costs of programming, production, transmission, etc.
If IE6 were bullet proof from a security standpoint, and Microsoft was losing marketshare to Firefox, I still believe Microsoft would respond with IE7-- controlling how users interact with the web is important now and will be crucial in the future as more applications are delivered through the browser. Google is making pretty good arguments for the operating system being irrelevant soon.
What I learnt: use a website design bureau only to make a site design. Don't allow them anywhere near HTML coding.
Just find yourself a website design company that really codes to standards as opposed to saying they code to standards and then not delivering. There are tons of them out there! Check their portfolio before hiring them and don't pay them unless they deliver what they promised.
Just ask yourself, "do we really want one company defining standards for the entire web?" Especially a company with a documented history of abusive business practices, of using monopoly power to quash competition? Or would we prefer a non-profit organization composed of industry leaders from various backgrounds and occupations developing standards in a transparent, egalitarian fashion?
They've never had any incentive to keep up with open source alternatives. Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop has allowed them to maintain marketshare without developing their browser. Now that Firefox is eating into their marketshare in a noticeable way, we suddenly see IE7 becoming a priority.
I think the parent post gets to the heart of the issue. I asked the exact question when I visited Shanghai about a month ago: "Why don't they just open more schools?" And I got pretty much the answer that the parent posted. There are already enough schools, people just want to go to the best schools because by nature they are competitive and the Chinese government and culture re-inforces competitive activity. China a socialist country that doesn't believe in competition? This is not 1975 anymore, China is basically a capitalist society with extensive central government regulation. Americans may not recognize this as their own brand of laissez-faire capitalism, but I assure you, down on the streets, China is capitalism in its most raw and nasty form. The government safety net is gone. There are over a billion people. Some of those people will starve, some will not have good living conditions, working conditions, nutrition, health care, opportunities for their child. A clear path to success is through education, thus the insane competition and cheating.
I think Apple wants users of cheap PCs to be able to run a non-supported, semi-decent version of Mac OS X, find that it is a vastly greater experience than Windows and once they are hooked, they eventually move up to real Apple hardware and an officially sanctioned Mac OS X experience. They will turn a fairly blind eye to cracked versions of x86 OS X I suspect.
Well there seems to be a lot more in the Bible than just a strict historical account of Israel, Judah, Assyria, etc. And just because there is some historical information in the Biblical stories doesn't mean much to me. Ernest Hemingway wrote stories which included historical facts about World War I, doesn't mean that it's not a work of fiction. I agree that the Bible has been studied longer than Evolutionary Biology has, but I don't think that is necessarily the final measure of whether some area of study has value or not. Evolutionary Biology like all other sciences help us explain observable phenomena and predict the likelihood of future events. The Bible in my opinion does neither. It is not a scientific work and better belongs as a text for religious or philosophical studies.
The scientific method it seems to me has been redefining reality for a long time now, if you see my reply to your original post, I for one think that going from a flat earth to a spherical earth is pretty much redefining reality, or discovering that the earth and planets revolve around the sun and the sun does not revolve around the earth is pretty much redefining reality. Those were pretty startling changes for people who believed otherwise prior to those scientific discoveries.
I did not mean to imply that science is only conducted by Agnostics or Atheists. Since the world population is 95% religious, I would estimate that most scientists are in fact religious and believe in some kind of god. I just don't understand why the selectivity amongst scientific fields. Why is physics, chemistry, computer science valid and the work of god's creation but evolutionary biology which follows the same principles of scientific method is evil, distorted or wrong?
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A good run for their money? American automakers are all perilously close to bankruptcy, struggling with pensions and high healthcare costs. Toyota and Honda are healthier than ever with growing marketshares. Toyota will become the largest automaker in the world by marketshare within the next year. I'd say the Japanese have given US automakers a bit more than just a run for their money.
#2. SciFi Fans are few.
Yeah that "Star Wars" thing really went nowhere. There is no marketplace for Sci-Fi entertainment.
Crossover could be a terrific tool for web developers. For most web developers, IE6 is the source of many headaches. If you develop on a Mac and want to test on a PC without owning a copy of Windows, without dedicating tons of resources to virtualization, then WINE/Crossover seems like a great solution. Unfortunately for me, I haven't been able to get IE6 to work properly. It will display certain sites but not all sites. I guess this is still Beta software though.
I'm gonna buy a Porsche, take the engine out and leave it by the side of the road. I just like the cup holders!
Apple's quality seems to have fallen, at least anecdotally it seems. I've got 4 Blue and White G3 workstations from 1999 that are still rock-solid. They run Panther and Tiger beautifully. Some are on their original hard drives. I've converted some of them to servers so they run 24/7/365 now. Many of the newer Apple machines I've purchased for personal and corporate use have had problems starting with the bad startup switch on the G4 cube, crimped backlight wire in a Titanium Powerbook G4, hard drive that crapped out in an Aluminum Powerbook. To Apple's credit, these problems were all addressed to my satisfaction. My guess is that the fall in quality is due to two things: (1) Apple sending manufacturing overseas to subcontractors instead of managing it themselves and (2) the fact that computers are just way more complex than they used to be 6 or 7 years ago. More parts, more complex parts, more things that *can* go wrong, more things that *do* go wrong.
I believe Apple no longer has a live webcast of the WWDC. You can see a text-only live webcast here at MacRumors.
Microsoft products are thoroughly tested before public release, in fact I'm writing this post using their voice recognition system right now and as you can see Dear Aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all it performs flawlessly.
Education. Universal and free till age 18.
How about a blender powered DeLorean? Your post reminds me of "Mr. Fusion".
I would add-> 5. Develop to the standard but with familiarity of common IE rendering bugs and therefore code around those problems, sometimes making design and feature compromises which you would prefer not to make but that is the reality of designing/developing for the web when the dominant browser is borked. for example: the IE box model does not comply to the W3C standard, therefore: avoid declaring "width" when possible, do not add padding to elements with width declared, instead create the padding with a separate (admittedly non-semantic) element inside the element with width declared. Don't use large blocks of italic text. Don't use PNGs, don't, don't, don't... you get the idea.
Here is some evidence that Mac users are more "elite", whatever that connotes...
d _top
http://news.com.com/2100-1040-943519.html?tag=f
Maybe because your heli doesn't have a Core Duo and a hard drive and a graphics sub system throwing off heat in addition to the battery itself? Also, flying around is a pretty good way of cooling something. Quick somebody patent it: novel method for cooling an electronic device...
I'm sorry. I just don't buy the whole concept that there is no market for browsers. Just because Microsoft bundles IE with Windows doesn't mean that it's free. You can download it from Microsoft without cost, but then it only runs on a machine running windows. IE costs money to develop, support, maintain, and market. Companies are not usually in the habit of doing these things if they don't think there are revenue streams directly or indirectly related to those expenditures. Firefox/Mozilla is ostensibly free as well, but in reality the project has expenditures which must be offset with revenues from partnerships with commercial entities like Google. Those revenues come from users in the same way that advertising revenue on television comes from commercial enterprises seeking access to end consumers. You watch TV (broadcast), it is ostensibly free, but your viewing advertisements pays for the costs of programming, production, transmission, etc.
If IE6 were bullet proof from a security standpoint, and Microsoft was losing marketshare to Firefox, I still believe Microsoft would respond with IE7-- controlling how users interact with the web is important now and will be crucial in the future as more applications are delivered through the browser. Google is making pretty good arguments for the operating system being irrelevant soon.
Just find yourself a website design company that really codes to standards as opposed to saying they code to standards and then not delivering. There are tons of them out there! Check their portfolio before hiring them and don't pay them unless they deliver what they promised.
Just ask yourself, "do we really want one company defining standards for the entire web?" Especially a company with a documented history of abusive business practices, of using monopoly power to quash competition? Or would we prefer a non-profit organization composed of industry leaders from various backgrounds and occupations developing standards in a transparent, egalitarian fashion?
They've never had any incentive to keep up with open source alternatives. Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop has allowed them to maintain marketshare without developing their browser. Now that Firefox is eating into their marketshare in a noticeable way, we suddenly see IE7 becoming a priority.
Up until recently (release of Tiger 10.4) all macs shipped with both Safari and IE5 pre-installed.
I think the parent post gets to the heart of the issue. I asked the exact question when I visited Shanghai about a month ago: "Why don't they just open more schools?" And I got pretty much the answer that the parent posted. There are already enough schools, people just want to go to the best schools because by nature they are competitive and the Chinese government and culture re-inforces competitive activity. China a socialist country that doesn't believe in competition? This is not 1975 anymore, China is basically a capitalist society with extensive central government regulation. Americans may not recognize this as their own brand of laissez-faire capitalism, but I assure you, down on the streets, China is capitalism in its most raw and nasty form. The government safety net is gone. There are over a billion people. Some of those people will starve, some will not have good living conditions, working conditions, nutrition, health care, opportunities for their child. A clear path to success is through education, thus the insane competition and cheating.
No. Sony is going down like a futomaki at a cherry blossom festival.
The Master Control program would like to see you immediately, refusal to comply will result in your being de-resed.
word. sports radio 660WFAN, financial news 1130 Bloomberg Radio. 1010 wins, WABC Yankees baseball broadcasts.
I think Apple wants users of cheap PCs to be able to run a non-supported, semi-decent version of Mac OS X, find that it is a vastly greater experience than Windows and once they are hooked, they eventually move up to real Apple hardware and an officially sanctioned Mac OS X experience. They will turn a fairly blind eye to cracked versions of x86 OS X I suspect.
If only it could receive AM radio also, how will I listen to the Yankees?
They already invented that, it's called a girlfriend. Whoops, wrong crowd.../*ducks behind large friend*/
The scientific method it seems to me has been redefining reality for a long time now, if you see my reply to your original post, I for one think that going from a flat earth to a spherical earth is pretty much redefining reality, or discovering that the earth and planets revolve around the sun and the sun does not revolve around the earth is pretty much redefining reality. Those were pretty startling changes for people who believed otherwise prior to those scientific discoveries.
I did not mean to imply that science is only conducted by Agnostics or Atheists. Since the world population is 95% religious, I would estimate that most scientists are in fact religious and believe in some kind of god. I just don't understand why the selectivity amongst scientific fields. Why is physics, chemistry, computer science valid and the work of god's creation but evolutionary biology which follows the same principles of scientific method is evil, distorted or wrong?