Complaints and Contrstuctive Criticism are often the same thing.
Complaints are demands, or just flat out insults. Constructive criticism is simply politely pointing out any issues or problems, and moving on if your request doesn't get implemented.
Complaining / bitching simply gets you ignored. Nobody wants to deal with asshats, and considering these people are working on their own free time, they don't have to.
There's a difference between constructive criticism and complaining.
If you receive something for free, then you are within your rights to offer criticism for the project. However, you have no right to complain unless you are giving something back to the project. If you hire some developers then you have every right to complain that they are not meeting your requirements.
It really doesn't matter if it beats out Windows. Honestly, who cares?
If people are willing to subject themselves to the pains of Windows licence restrictions, then that's their own problem. It is not the problem of OSS developers.
It's useful to those working on it, and people willing to put in a little effort. That is all that matters.
The end-users are still getting something for free, meaning they have lost their right to bitch. If they don't like it they are welcome to make suggestions - not demands. If they still don't like it, then nobody is forcing them to run Ubuntu.
There is a difference between listening and implementing everything people want. They certainly listen - you can talk to them, and be heard. Some suggestions are implemented. Most are not.
OF COURSE he has the right to complain. Ubuntu is supposed to be an END-USER-DISTRO. NOT a programmer's distro.
They haven't paid for anything. They are benefitting from the hard work of others at no expense of their own.
Don't like something? Then pay a developer to fix it, or fix it yourself. Unless you've actually invested something into the project, constant bitching makes you nothing more than both a beggar and a chooser.
You are welcome to make suggestions of course, and there is a good chance a programmer will take your suggestion to heart and implement it. But seeing as you've invested nothing, if they choose not to impliment it then you have little reason to complain.
You seem to be of the opinion that OSS owes you something. You are mistaken; they owe you nothing. If you should happen to find OSS offerings useful, then good. If you don't, then tough luck.
And any other company/individual can get that code, reverse engineer/disassemble/decompile it, and post the source code for all to see. It's a lot of work, but we have a lot of people on our side. Voila, what was closed is now (somewhat) open. When the next version of the commercial program comes out, reverse engineer the new features and add them to the open source version too. Pretty soon they'll realize they're not hiding anything.
Reverse engineering is not that simple. Completely reverse engineering large projects is not viable in most situations.
Many projects are so complex that they are very difficult to expand and modify, even with the source code and documentation available.
Take something like AutoCAD, which is the result of years and years of piling on addons and extensions. Something like that is simply too complex to completely reverse engineer.
Just a small correction - buffer overflows usually don't overwrite any code. Typically they overwrite the return address stored on the stack from the last CALL, so when the current function RETurns it jumps into the buffer itself, which is then executed. This is typically possible because the stack on x86 machines grows downwards - higher memory addresses (in relation to the stack pointer) point to data pushed previously on to the stack, and when a buffer is overflowed it leaks into higher memory locations then the buffer it was destined for.
'True love' is not magic; like every other state of mind it is nothing more than the result of electrochemical reactions in your brain. It is not insusceptible to external influence.
You are mistaken. Everything you have listed can be learned by:
A) Reading
and
B) Working on personal/OSS projects.
All the knowledge is out there for free.
Some of the worst programmers I have seen have come out of College, and some of the best taught themselves. This is not the norm, of course, but an intelligent person simply does not need to be taught.
that's a governments ONLY job, or did you forget that?
No, it isn't. Happiness is not some ultimate goal; it is nothing more than a biological system evolved to encourage people to do things beneficial to the race.
However, any high-level development or analysis work does require a college degree, specifically in computer science. There are just too many things that computer science teaches that you can not pick up in the workplace.
Any dedicated programmer will spend a great deal of his free time studying CS. Not just specific programming languages and algorithm implementations, but CS theory as well. You do not require a degree for this - just a willingness to sacrifice a fair bit of your social life for something far more enjoyable and rewarding.
When it comes to CS, College offers nothing that cannot be learned by a dedicated individual on his own time.
Sure. This is a good point, actually. Your manner with others is what protects you from such charges. If you're a jerk, a liar and shady, people might say "Hmm, well he was a bit weird."
Accusations make not fact.
It doesn't matter if it is fact or not.
Enough bad press and the vast majority of society will consider an individual a terrible person. For the average Joe, this is not something that can be overcome.
Natural rights are rights shared by everyone at birth. Some people believe a creator granted them, others believe they come from an inside moral fiber or just from being human.
Provide logic and reasoning.
What grants those rights? There is nothing in the physical universe that we understand that in any way indicates that there is such thing as a natural right.
The concept of 'rights' is merely something we have created for the good of society. They don't really exist.
No, one cannot. Freedom of speech is simply not an issue in this incident. The student still has full rights to say (post) what he pleases.
The school should not have its right to select students as it sees fit infringed on.
The school in question is a private institution; there is absolutely no reason (legal or otherwise) that the faculty should be forced to retain a student they do not want there.
I disagree. They are still citizens of the U. S. and are covered by the First Amendment allowing free speech. One of these will get to the Supreme Court and free speech will win.
True, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand.
The students still retain their rights to free speech - the private school is merely making use of its right to select its student as it sees fit.
It is no different than, say, a messageboard administrator banning a user for saying something that administrator disagrees with. The server is the property of the administrator, and he is allowed to control who may interface with it and in what manner.
Slashdot Mirror
Complaints are demands, or just flat out insults. Constructive criticism is simply politely pointing out any issues or problems, and moving on if your request doesn't get implemented.
Complaining / bitching simply gets you ignored. Nobody wants to deal with asshats, and considering these people are working on their own free time, they don't have to.
There's a difference between constructive criticism and complaining.
If you receive something for free, then you are within your rights to offer criticism for the project. However, you have no right to complain unless you are giving something back to the project. If you hire some developers then you have every right to complain that they are not meeting your requirements.
Will you please read what I write?
Reading books in addition to working on your own / OSS projects. In addition, you illiterate wonder!
No college will ever compete with learning and practicing yourself, be it programming, mathmatics, or computer engineering.
Only idiots need others to teach them. Intelligent people are perfectly capable of learning on their own.
It really doesn't matter if it beats out Windows. Honestly, who cares?
If people are willing to subject themselves to the pains of Windows licence restrictions, then that's their own problem. It is not the problem of OSS developers.
It's useful to those working on it, and people willing to put in a little effort. That is all that matters.
The end-users are still getting something for free, meaning they have lost their right to bitch. If they don't like it they are welcome to make suggestions - not demands. If they still don't like it, then nobody is forcing them to run Ubuntu.
There is a difference between listening and implementing everything people want. They certainly listen - you can talk to them, and be heard. Some suggestions are implemented. Most are not.
s/OSS owes/OSS developers owe/ s/impliment/implement/
They haven't paid for anything. They are benefitting from the hard work of others at no expense of their own.
Don't like something? Then pay a developer to fix it, or fix it yourself. Unless you've actually invested something into the project, constant bitching makes you nothing more than both a beggar and a chooser.
You are welcome to make suggestions of course, and there is a good chance a programmer will take your suggestion to heart and implement it. But seeing as you've invested nothing, if they choose not to impliment it then you have little reason to complain.
You seem to be of the opinion that OSS owes you something. You are mistaken; they owe you nothing. If you should happen to find OSS offerings useful, then good. If you don't, then tough luck.
Reverse engineering is not that simple. Completely reverse engineering large projects is not viable in most situations.
Many projects are so complex that they are very difficult to expand and modify, even with the source code and documentation available.
Take something like AutoCAD, which is the result of years and years of piling on addons and extensions. Something like that is simply too complex to completely reverse engineer.
s/then/than/
Just a small correction - buffer overflows usually don't overwrite any code. Typically they overwrite the return address stored on the stack from the last CALL, so when the current function RETurns it jumps into the buffer itself, which is then executed. This is typically possible because the stack on x86 machines grows downwards - higher memory addresses (in relation to the stack pointer) point to data pushed previously on to the stack, and when a buffer is overflowed it leaks into higher memory locations then the buffer it was destined for.
Please.
'True love' is not magic; like every other state of mind it is nothing more than the result of electrochemical reactions in your brain. It is not insusceptible to external influence.
You are mistaken. Everything you have listed can be learned by:
A) Reading
and
B) Working on personal/OSS projects.
All the knowledge is out there for free.
Some of the worst programmers I have seen have come out of College, and some of the best taught themselves. This is not the norm, of course, but an intelligent person simply does not need to be taught.
No, it isn't. Happiness is not some ultimate goal; it is nothing more than a biological system evolved to encourage people to do things beneficial to the race.
Any dedicated programmer will spend a great deal of his free time studying CS. Not just specific programming languages and algorithm implementations, but CS theory as well. You do not require a degree for this - just a willingness to sacrifice a fair bit of your social life for something far more enjoyable and rewarding.
When it comes to CS, College offers nothing that cannot be learned by a dedicated individual on his own time.
So install Slackware and a lightweight WM. There is no need for Gnome or KDE.
Enlightenment, Blackbox, WindowMaker, Ratpoison, etc all work fine.
You do not have your machine as 'stripped down as possible'.
At LANs it is far easier to ensure all players are using the same setup with no third party programs or illegal cvars giving them an advantage.
There is also almost no latency on a LAN.
Morality is nothing more than instinctual response to stimuli.
Hurting others feels wrong; it is instinctual. The same for theft or any other number of things generally considered to be wrong.
Morality is nothing more than animalistic instinct.
Wow, nice.
You managed to write a *blatantly* sarcastic post and still hook two idiots into responding seriously.
Enough bad press and the vast majority of society will consider an individual a terrible person. For the average Joe, this is not something that can be overcome.
Provide logic and reasoning.
What grants those rights? There is nothing in the physical universe that we understand that in any way indicates that there is such thing as a natural right.
The concept of 'rights' is merely something we have created for the good of society. They don't really exist.
No you would not be able to counter it, nor would any average family be able to counter a determined business or wealthy individual.
Please.
If I disliked somebody enough then I would gladly ruin their reputation for a mere $1500 a month.
That you think nobody would do that is naive.
No, one cannot. Freedom of speech is simply not an issue in this incident. The student still has full rights to say (post) what he pleases.
The school should not have its right to select students as it sees fit infringed on.
The school in question is a private institution; there is absolutely no reason (legal or otherwise) that the faculty should be forced to retain a student they do not want there.
Erk, the first sentence is true, and the second wasn't intended to be quoted =(
True, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand.
The students still retain their rights to free speech - the private school is merely making use of its right to select its student as it sees fit.
It is no different than, say, a messageboard administrator banning a user for saying something that administrator disagrees with. The server is the property of the administrator, and he is allowed to control who may interface with it and in what manner.
The students still have full freedom of speech; it is merely that private institutions have the freedom to choose their students as they see fit.