If DirectX is so hard to program in, so clunky to use, and limits the game to being sold on only one OS, WHY do so many programmers use it?
Because DirectX is not so clunky to use anymore. Sure, it was a pain in the ass in its first few incarnations, and Direct3d was a joke in DirectX 2.0-5.0, but DirectX 8 is the ONLY API that will let programmers take full advantage of that GeForce 3 (or GeForce 1 or 2 for that matter) without any extensions needed. For OpenGL 1.2, if you wanted extra features beyond the spec, the driver writer has to implement it as an extension. This puts developers right back in 1993, having to write specific interfaces for each video/sound card.
OpenGL 1.3 closes the gap quite a bit, but DirectX 8 still has a higher featureset and will gain more features sooner than OpenGL will.
It seems logical (to me, at least) that programming as portably as possible, as simply as possible, and using standards where possible, leaves a lot more sales options open for the future... and DirectX seems to close all options *but one*.
Game programmers don't give a rat's ass about portability. All it has to do is run on their target platform at an acceptable speed.
When the linked site was slashdotted, it started generating that error. The error is from PHP, an open-source alternative to ASP (active server pages). Hence, the ironic humor.:)
Nathan
Re:Use Open Source to Fight Code Red
on
Code Red III
·
· Score: 1
The only problem is that the Code Red spawns 600 threads, and uses non-blocking sockets. That means that the only thing you've managed to do is slow down 1 of 600 threads; the other 599 are still going as fast as possible.
Wrong. There was an interview with the Final Fantasy producer in Next Generation a year or two ago that asked about why it was "Final" Fantasy. It was the last project Square green-lighted for production. If Final Fantasy had not succeeded, Square would not be the RPG powerhouse they are today and would probably have died with the NES.
Nathan
Use the following steps to really, really confuse a Windows user (it's particularly effective if they have a Linux dual-boot):
First, open MSDOS.SYS in notepad. Under [Options] add the line "Logo=0" (no quotes. and that's a zero, not a captial 'o'). Also change the BootGUI line to "BootGUI=0" and then save the file.
Next, create a text file called "greeting.txt" and make it look like the login banner for a Linux box. If you want to get really fancy, make several files that, when concatenated, closely resemble the Linux kernel boot process.
Now the fun begins.
Edit the autoexec.bat and REM out any existing lines. Then put the following at the top:
@ECHO OFF
CLS
TYPE C:\GREETING.TXT
PROMPT Login:
Note: put a space after the colon on the PROMPT line.
Save the file and wait for him to reboot. Or, if you want to go the full linux boot route, insert a "dir/s c:\windows\system >nul" between "type" commands. Not only will this put an adequate pause between files, but it will also generate a bit of disk activity to make the fake boot all the more convincing!
If you've ever used a Palm for anything more than solitaire, you've probably come into contact with Graffiti. Graffiti is basically a gesture-based means of inputting alphanumeric data. It's a very small step to make the graffiti gestures perform macros instead of representing a single letter.
Since Windows programs are controlled via messages, you can simply write a program that sends the same messages to the app that the user would generate if using the program manually. It's basically a glorified macro.
I haven't done any GUI work in X (I detest X more than I detest MS Windows), so I'm not familiar with how it handles GUI interaction.
Hmm, would a closed-circuit monitor of the computer area count as a "technology protection measure"? How about facing all the computer screens so they can be seen by passers-by?
Are you the project leader, or a lackey? If you're not the leader, then make the person who *is* the leader sit down and peruse peacefire.org.
If you *are* the leader, do a feasibility study of blocking software. Peacefire.org should be a good resource, but it won't hurt to do your own research--find examples of both legitimate topics being blocked, and of "obscene" material *not* being blocked. Tell them point blank, "this is a bad idea" and present your study to show *why* it is a bad idea.
If they press to continue the project, leave. The project is doomed to failure, so you probably won't want your name on it anyway. Suggest alternate solutions, such as close-captioned TV monitoring of the workstation screens, or using library card numbers as login/passwords so individual accounts can be suspended on a case-by-case basis.
There are better solutions than blocking software.
It doesn't have to be a complicated game, although it should be something in the public domain (to avoid copyright hassles). Maybe offer the class a choice of which game to do.
For example, my HS project was a clone of the original NES Legend of Zelda game. I never finished it, but I got as far as a user-controllable character (with animation!), the basic tiling engine, and a scrollable map. I used mode x asm routines from Abrash's book, and ripped the keyboard handler out of the then-newly-released Wolfenstein 3d code.
A game covers just about every basic computing problem: file i/o, process synchronization, user i/o, and data processing. Now, Zelda was a little ambitious, but I think I got an impressive amount of it done considering it was me working alone for 8 months or so. If my entire class had been working on the project, we might have gotten the whole thing finished!
And, at the end of the course, your students have something they can have fun with, and take pride that they helped program it.
The trend has been for domains to be treated as trademarks. I.e. cocacola.com, if not owned by Coca-Cola, is a trademark violation.
However, traditional trademark law allows for multiple companies to have the same or similar names, with the stipulation that the two cannot exist in the same market. I couldn't market a Coca-cola soda, but I could market a Coca-cola ice cream if I felt like it.
The problem is that the DNS system currently does not allow for multiple sites from the same domain. In fact, it was never meant to.
Therefore, domains (in their current form) cannot be used effectively as trademarks in the traditional sense.
In order to accomodate trademarks, the DNS system would need to be overhauled so that the DNS entry is given based on classification of the server.
Take, for example, Amazon the book seller and Amazon the BDSM store. The first might be:
www.retailers.periodicals.amazon.com
The second might be:
www.retailers.adult.amazon.com
An alternate solution would be rather simple: for a given.com domain, the root page (i.e. http://www.amazon.com/) would be a mini-directory of all companies named amazon, which would exist as subdirectories from the root based on category. So our two examples above would be:
www.amazon.com/books
www.amazon.com/adult
As it stands right now, though, the DNS system is inherently incompatible with trademark law, and applying trademark law to it is futile at this point.
I've done both Linux and Windows development, and Linux wins by a mile.
1) Stability. If your program crashes in Linux, the worse thing you get is a coredump. In Windows, you're lucky if your system remains stable, and you may or may not get an error when the program crashes. This means you have to either:
a) run the binary to a "crash machine" or b) reboot after running the build
both of which waste equal amounts of time.
2) Debugging
Long Live the Core Dump. It's a million times more useful than "This program has performed an illegal operation..." (which you don't get half the time, especially if you're using DX, which has a nasty tendency to just dump you to the desktop). Is it any wonder PC games are so incredibly buggy when the OS doesn't provide any facilities for fixing the bugs?
Those are two main reasons that I abhor Windows development. The slickness of the IDE is not really an issue, in fact a MSDS-like IDE for linux would be tres cool.:)
A few months ago, Sid Meier released Antietam! as an EB-exclusive game. The game comes in a small DVD-sized container. I saw that, and thought, "if Sid Meier can squeeze one of his games into a box the size of a DVD, why can't everyone else?"
Every program should be able to fit in a box the size of a DVD case. The case can be made thicker (for multi-CD games, ie Baldur's gate) but all the packaging, documentation, etc must fit in the box. Exceptions can be made when necessary (i.e. flight sims).
If Playstation, Nintendo, and Sega developers can squeeze the documentation for their games into a jewel case, so can PC game developers.
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[pretty standard so far, right?]
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[in other words, you can't run two instances of the program at the same time, nor can you install it on two computers, even if only one of them would be in use at a time (i.e. home vs work).]
4. The Product may not be rented, leased, or in any other manner commercially exploited without prior written permission of Xing. However, you may transfer this license to use the Product to another party (the "Transferee") on a permanent basis by transferring all parts of the Product to the Transferee. Such transfer of possession terminates your license from Xing. The Transferee will be licensed under the terms of this Agreement upon the Transferee's acceptance of this Agreement by its initial use of the Product. Upon notification to Xing of the transfer, the Transferee will receive customer support on the same terms you did at the time of the transfer, and the Transferee will receive no support if for any reason you were ineligible for support. If you transfer the Product, you must remove all parts of it, along with any installation devices, from your computer, and you may not retain any parts or copies for your own use.
[so much for right of first sale..]
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[license ends with more standard legal stuff, including the obligatory all-caps "we aren't responsible, damnit!" section.]
Nathan Strong change "geeblooz" to "gblues" and remove ".has.crappy.service" to e-mail me.
... but this is really good customer service on Intel's part. Will it cost them? You bet.
Intel's engineers are humans too, they make mistakes. But, when the mistakes happen, Intel takes care of its customers. Just like they replaced all those Pentiums with the FDIV bug.
Oh, and for all you RDRAM hatemongers: The problem has nothing to do with RDRAM; the memory controller used in specific motherboards was not shielded properly, causing intermittent lockups.
So please, guys, cut Intel some slack here. It's not like AMD is bulletproof, either (Athlon/GeForce, anyone?).
No, rules are not required for interaction. However, if you want that interaction to be productive (i.e. have something meaningful occur), you are going to need to define some rules.
For example, web site navigation. Web page designers can count on the fact that any graphical browser is going to change the mouse cursor to a hand when pointed at a link. Without that, many sites would be un-navigable because they are image/javascript laden and the user doesn't know where to go (this is bad design to begin with, but that's not the point).
Also, consider games. Games without rules are simply not fun. Even fairly unrestrictive games such as pen-and-paper RPGs have a set of rules that must be followed. Would solitaire be the #1 game if players could choose any card from any pile? Would Quake be as fun if individual players could turn off things like lava or blast radius damage, or even collision detection?
If we define "interaction" to mean general human interaction, the need for rules becomes even clearer. Without rules for grammar, word meanings, pronounciation, etc, people would not be able to communicate. Even if every person spoke a unique language, the act of learning another person's language is learning the rules needed to communicate! In fact, by reading this post, you are following rules needed to recognize characters in the alphabet, group them into words, and determine the meaning of those words.
To borrow from a Tic-Tac commercial: Can you interact without rules? Certainly, but I wouldn't reccomend it.
Oh GREAT. Just what we need--so much for the whole "you can't 'accidentally' find porn on the Internet" argument. This just throws that out the window, because all a porn site needs to do is hijack the right search keywords and wait for cnn.com to have a broken link.. *poof* millions of users get sent to porn.
Not only that, but it makes site debugging a pain in the ass.
Moderators: If this appears twice, moderate one of them down to 0. Slashdot 500'd on my first attempt and I'm not sure it went through
For the 'average' user, trying to install Windows 98 from scratch is _just as hard_ as trying to install Linux from scratch. Installing an OS from scratch is _not_ something that today's "average" user is an any way capable of doing on their own.
Assuming the 'average' user knows how to insert a floppy into their computer and can press the 'reset' button, Windows 98 can be installed pretty much unattended. The only real challenge is making sure the CD-ROM drive is accessible from a boot floppy. Once the setup program is running, there is literally nothing to installing 98. It even reboots by itself:)
The Linux install procedure is truly something that needs a lot of work. What I'd like to see:
A windows-based installer that will, bare minimum, automatically generate any needed boot floppies. A complete Linux installer that does everything (partitioning, ext2 formatting, LILO installing, etc) from inside Windows would be cool too.
An autodetect program that can detect video, audio, network, scsi, ide, etc. devices and automatically configure the system to load the drivers on boot.
Some way to keep the boot messages from being displayed on the screen unless it's an error or kernel panic.
Given that the NY Judge's ruling repeatedly mentions the lack of evidence presented at the trial, the EFF needs all the dough it can get to hire good lawyers who *gasp* do their homework. Jon has a chance, but not if his lawyers putz around with baseless/unproven (as in having no supporting evidence provided) arguments.
Imagine someone was getting sued for promising that the sun will rise tomorrow. Which defense are you more likely to believe:
a.)
The sun rose yesterday, the day before, and the day before, etcetera, so OF COURSE the sun will rise tomorrow!
b.)
As you can see from these satellite pictures [Exhibit A], the Earth is indeed rotating on its axis at a more or less constant rate of speed. While the defense admits that the rate is declining, the decline is not so great that movement would stop within the next 24 hours, much less the next year. Indeed, according to the data presented here [Exhibit B], the sun will run out of hydrogen and go supernova before the Earth's rotational speed ceases.
The judge doesn't want to hear opinion, he wants evidence and proof to support the opinion. It is this proof, not the opinions expressed in speech, that will make the difference.
Make sure all your communications--be they verbal, print, or electronic--use proper English. This especially includes recruitment letters.
I spent a few months in California, and after I was terminated from the job I put my resume and availability up on dice.com. I got quite a few e-mails from recruiters, and one directly from a startup.
This particular person not only misspelled (and I mean grossly misspelled, not a typo) several words, but did not have correct grammar. Also, the tone of his mail was rather desperate. This left me with a bad first impression, and was one of the first dice.com replies that hit the round file.
Say what you want about the suits, but professionalism matters when it comes to communications with the public--that goes double for communications with other companies, and triple for potential employees. It doesn't mean you have to wear a suit, just use proper grammar/spelling/punctuation and don't use slang in company literature.
While I'm on the subject of California and dice.com, am I the only one who gets turned off by spam from recruiters that use "startup!" as if it was some magic mantra to attract employees?
Slashdot Mirror
OpenGL 1.3 closes the gap quite a bit, but DirectX 8 still has a higher featureset and will gain more features sooner than OpenGL will.
Game programmers don't give a rat's ass about portability. All it has to do is run on their target platform at an acceptable speed.When the linked site was slashdotted, it started generating that error. The error is from PHP, an open-source alternative to ASP (active server pages). Hence, the ironic humor. :)
Nathan
The only problem is that the Code Red spawns 600 threads, and uses non-blocking sockets. That means that the only thing you've managed to do is slow down 1 of 600 threads; the other 599 are still going as fast as possible.
Nathan
Wrong. There was an interview with the Final Fantasy producer in Next Generation a year or two ago that asked about why it was "Final" Fantasy. It was the last project Square green-lighted for production. If Final Fantasy had not succeeded, Square would not be the RPG powerhouse they are today and would probably have died with the NES. Nathan
Use the following steps to really, really confuse a Windows user (it's particularly effective if they have a Linux dual-boot):
First, open MSDOS.SYS in notepad. Under [Options] add the line "Logo=0" (no quotes. and that's a zero, not a captial 'o'). Also change the BootGUI line to "BootGUI=0" and then save the file.
Next, create a text file called "greeting.txt" and make it look like the login banner for a Linux box. If you want to get really fancy, make several files that, when concatenated, closely resemble the Linux kernel boot process.
Now the fun begins.
Edit the autoexec.bat and REM out any existing lines. Then put the following at the top:
Note: put a space after the colon on the PROMPT line.
Save the file and wait for him to reboot. Or, if you want to go the full linux boot route, insert a "dir /s c:\windows\system >nul" between "type" commands. Not only will this put an adequate pause between files, but it will also generate a bit of disk activity to make the fake boot all the more convincing!
Nathan
If you've ever used a Palm for anything more than solitaire, you've probably come into contact with Graffiti. Graffiti is basically a gesture-based means of inputting alphanumeric data. It's a very small step to make the graffiti gestures perform macros instead of representing a single letter.
For once, Windows actually makes things easier ;)
Since Windows programs are controlled via messages, you can simply write a program that sends the same messages to the app that the user would generate if using the program manually. It's basically a glorified macro.
I haven't done any GUI work in X (I detest X more than I detest MS Windows), so I'm not familiar with how it handles GUI interaction.
Nathan
Hmm, would a closed-circuit monitor of the computer area count as a "technology protection measure"? How about facing all the computer screens so they can be seen by passers-by?
KDE team, read my lips:
Pleasink to be stoppink gettink ideas from UserFriendly
Are you the project leader, or a lackey? If you're not the leader, then make the person who *is* the leader sit down and peruse peacefire.org.
If you *are* the leader, do a feasibility study of blocking software. Peacefire.org should be a good resource, but it won't hurt to do your own research--find examples of both legitimate topics being blocked, and of "obscene" material *not* being blocked. Tell them point blank, "this is a bad idea" and present your study to show *why* it is a bad idea.
If they press to continue the project, leave. The project is doomed to failure, so you probably won't want your name on it anyway. Suggest alternate solutions, such as close-captioned TV monitoring of the workstation screens, or using library card numbers as login/passwords so individual accounts can be suspended on a case-by-case basis.
There are better solutions than blocking software.
Nathan
It doesn't have to be a complicated game, although it should be something in the public domain (to avoid copyright hassles). Maybe offer the class a choice of which game to do.
For example, my HS project was a clone of the original NES Legend of Zelda game. I never finished it, but I got as far as a user-controllable character (with animation!), the basic tiling engine, and a scrollable map. I used mode x asm routines from Abrash's book, and ripped the keyboard handler out of the then-newly-released Wolfenstein 3d code.
A game covers just about every basic computing problem: file i/o, process synchronization, user i/o, and data processing. Now, Zelda was a little ambitious, but I think I got an impressive amount of it done considering it was me working alone for 8 months or so. If my entire class had been working on the project, we might have gotten the whole thing finished!
And, at the end of the course, your students have something they can have fun with, and take pride that they helped program it.
Nathan
The trend has been for domains to be treated as trademarks. I.e. cocacola.com, if not owned by Coca-Cola, is a trademark violation.
However, traditional trademark law allows for multiple companies to have the same or similar names, with the stipulation that the two cannot exist in the same market. I couldn't market a Coca-cola soda, but I could market a Coca-cola ice cream if I felt like it.
The problem is that the DNS system currently does not allow for multiple sites from the same domain. In fact, it was never meant to.
Therefore, domains (in their current form) cannot be used effectively as trademarks in the traditional sense.
In order to accomodate trademarks, the DNS system would need to be overhauled so that the DNS entry is given based on classification of the server.
Take, for example, Amazon the book seller and Amazon the BDSM store. The first might be:
www.retailers.periodicals.amazon.com
The second might be:
www.retailers.adult.amazon.com
An alternate solution would be rather simple: for a given .com domain, the root page (i.e. http://www.amazon.com/) would be a mini-directory of all companies named amazon, which would exist as subdirectories from the root based on category. So our two examples above would be:
www.amazon.com/books
www.amazon.com/adult
As it stands right now, though, the DNS system is inherently incompatible with trademark law, and applying trademark law to it is futile at this point.
Nathan
No,
Marriage is Love
Marriage is an Institution
Love is Blind
Therefore Marriage is Blind
Therefore Blind is an Institution
Sorry, thanks for playing.
I've done both Linux and Windows development, and Linux wins by a mile.
:)
1) Stability. If your program crashes in Linux, the worse thing you get is a coredump. In Windows, you're lucky if your system remains stable, and you may or may not get an error when the program crashes. This means you have to either:
a) run the binary to a "crash machine" or
b) reboot after running the build
both of which waste equal amounts of time.
2) Debugging
Long Live the Core Dump. It's a million times more useful than "This program has performed an illegal operation..." (which you don't get half the time, especially if you're using DX, which has a nasty tendency to just dump you to the desktop). Is it any wonder PC games are so incredibly buggy when the OS doesn't provide any facilities for fixing the bugs?
Those are two main reasons that I abhor Windows development. The slickness of the IDE is not really an issue, in fact a MSDS-like IDE for linux would be tres cool.
Nathan
A few months ago, Sid Meier released Antietam! as an EB-exclusive game. The game comes in a small DVD-sized container. I saw that, and thought, "if Sid Meier can squeeze one of his games into a box the size of a DVD, why can't everyone else?"
Every program should be able to fit in a box the size of a DVD case. The case can be made thicker (for multi-CD games, ie Baldur's gate) but all the packaging, documentation, etc must fit in the box. Exceptions can be made when necessary (i.e. flight sims).
If Playstation, Nintendo, and Sega developers can squeeze the documentation for their games into a jewel case, so can PC game developers.
Nathan
Thanks for the information, although in this case there wasn't a retailer involved--I purchased it directly from Xing.
Nathan
Actually, no. I purchased it online, which means I would have to throw away my modem and my hard disk. ;)
Nathan
Xing Technology Corporation
End-User License Agreement
This License Agreement (this "Agreement") is a legal agreement between you and Xing Technology Corporation, a California corporation ("Xing") for the accompanying software, associated media, printed materials, audiovisual content, and "online" or electronic documentation (collectively, the "Product"). By installing or using the Product, you agree to be bound by the terms of this Agreement. If you do not agree to all of the terms of this agreement, de-install all copies of the Product from your computer and return all Product materials to your distributor or Xing for a refund of any license fees paid.
LICENSE:
1. The Product is licensed, not sold. The Product is protected by copyright law and international copyright treaty provisions, as well as other intellectual property laws and treaties. You must not allow copies of the Product or any part of it to be made or distributed to anyone else. You may make backup copies of the software for archival purposes only.
2. Xing grants to you a non-exclusive, non-sublicensable license to use the Product for your own use only.
[pretty standard so far, right?]
3. The Product is licensed for use on a single session of a single computer. If your computer is capable of running more than one simultaneous session, you may not use the Product on more than one session at a time. You may delete the Product from one computer and reinstall it on another, but you may not install the Product on more than one computer at any given time. If you wish to install the Product on more than one computer or use the Product for more than one session on a particular computer, you must purchase separate copies of the Product for each such computer or session.
[in other words, you can't run two instances of the program at the same time, nor can you install it on two computers, even if only one of them would be in use at a time (i.e. home vs work).]
4. The Product may not be rented, leased, or in any other manner commercially exploited without prior written permission of Xing. However, you may transfer this license to use the Product to another party (the "Transferee") on a permanent basis by transferring all parts of the Product to the Transferee. Such transfer of possession terminates your license from Xing. The Transferee will be licensed under the terms of this Agreement upon the Transferee's acceptance of this Agreement by its initial use of the Product. Upon notification to Xing of the transfer, the Transferee will receive customer support on the same terms you did at the time of the transfer, and the Transferee will receive no support if for any reason you were ineligible for support. If you transfer the Product, you must remove all parts of it, along with any installation devices, from your computer, and you may not retain any parts or copies for your own use.
[so much for right of first sale..]
5. The Product in source code form is confidential and Xing's protected trade secret, and you may not attempt to reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble or otherwise decipher any portion of the Product. Reproduction and/or redistribution of any portion of the Product is specifically prohibited in the absence of a separate written agreement with Xing.
[Hooray for DMCA! You can't reverse engineer or otherwise use xing's software for anything other than what the UI lets you do.]
6. If audiovisual content contained in or bundled with the Product (the "Content") contains its own license agreement, that agreement controls use of the Content. Otherwise, use of the Content is controlled by this Agreement. You may not modify, copy, or distribute the Content except to the extent this Agreement allows modification, copying, or distribution of the Product. You may not use the Content except in conjunction with personal testing or demonstration of the Product. The Content must at all times remain with the Product in its original form.
7. All video, audio, and other content accessed through the Product is the property of the applicable content owner and may be protected by applicable copyright law. This Agreement gives you no rights to such content.
8. If you use the Product to create or distribute audio, video, or other content, Xing is not responsible for such content, and you are solely responsible, for the property rights, legality, and regulation of all such content, including but not limited to issues of copyright ownership and obscenity regulation worldwide.
9. Xing retains all ownership and intellectual property rights in and to the Product. You agree to abide by the copyright law and all other applicable laws of the United States, including those relating to United States export controls. You agree not to ship or re-export any portion of the Product to any destination to which it could not lawfully have been exported originally under those export controls.
10. Xing may terminate this Agreement at any time by delivering notice to you, and you may terminate this Agreement at any time by removing all copies of the Product from your computer and destroying all Product materials. However, Sections 4 through 12 of this Agreement shall indefinitely survive its termination. This Agreement is personal to you and you agree not to assign your rights under it. This Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of California and by U.S. federal law relating to intellectual property in general, and to copyrights, patents, and trademarks in particular. You agree to submit all disputes to the exclusive jurisdiction of courts or tribunals located within the territorial boundaries of the U.S.
11. The Product is covered solely by the accompanying Xing Limited Warranty. THE PRODUCT IS PROVIDED WITHOUT ANY OTHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
12. XING SHALL NOT BE LIABLE: (A) FOR INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, OR INDIRECT DAMAGES OF ANY SORT WHATSOEVER, WHETHER ARISING IN TORT, CONTRACT, OR OTHERWISE (INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS, REVENUES, OR INFORMATION, OR FOR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) RESULTING FROM YOUR USE OF THE PRODUCT OR YOUR INABILITY TO USE THE PRODUCT, EVEN IF XING HAS BEEN INFORMED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES; OR (B) FOR ANY CLAIM BY ANY PARTY OTHER THAN YOU. IN NO EVENT SHALL XING'S LIABILITY TO YOU EXCEED THE AMOUNT YOU ORIGINALLY PAID FOR THE PRODUCT. THIS LIMITATION OF LIABILITY SHALL NOT APPLY TO LIABILITY FOR DEATH OR PERSONAL INJURY TO THE EXTENT APPLICABLE LAW PROHIBITS SUCH LIMITATION. SOME STATES AND JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, SO THE ABOVE LIMITATION AND EXCLUSION MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.
13. The Product is provided with Restricted Rights. Use, duplication, or disclosure by the U.S. Government or any of its agencies or instrumentalities is subject to the restrictions set forth in subdivision (c)(1)(ii) of the Rights in Technical Data and Computer Software clause at DFARS 252.227-7013, or in subdivision (c)(1) and (c)(2) of the Commercial Computer Software -- Restricted Rights clause at 48 CFR 52.227-19, as applicable. Manufacturer/contractor is Xing Technology Corporation, 2925 McMillan, San Luis Obispo, CA 93401.
"Xing" and "StreamWorks" are registered trademarks, "SmartFAQ" is a service mark, and "XingMPEG", "MPEGLive!", "MPEG2Live!", "MP3Live!", "XingMP3", "StreamWorks MP3 Server", "XingDVD", "AudioCatalyst", "XingMP3 Player" and all logo and graphic designs are trademarks of Xing Technology Corporation.
Other product and company names appearing in Xing Technology Corporation products and materials are used for identification purposes only and may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. Registered and unregistered trademarks used in any Xing Technology Corporation products and materials are the exclusive property of their respective owners.
Copyright (c) 1994-99 Xing Technology Corporation. All rights reserved.
[license ends with more standard legal stuff, including the obligatory all-caps "we aren't responsible, damnit!" section.]
Nathan Strong
change "geeblooz" to "gblues" and remove ".has.crappy.service" to e-mail me.
Intel's engineers are humans too, they make mistakes. But, when the mistakes happen, Intel takes care of its customers. Just like they replaced all those Pentiums with the FDIV bug.
Oh, and for all you RDRAM hatemongers: The problem has nothing to do with RDRAM; the memory controller used in specific motherboards was not shielded properly, causing intermittent lockups.
So please, guys, cut Intel some slack here. It's not like AMD is bulletproof, either (Athlon/GeForce, anyone?).
NathanQuestion: does interaction require rules?
Answer:
No, rules are not required for interaction. However, if you want that interaction to be productive (i.e. have something meaningful occur), you are going to need to define some rules.
For example, web site navigation. Web page designers can count on the fact that any graphical browser is going to change the mouse cursor to a hand when pointed at a link. Without that, many sites would be un-navigable because they are image/javascript laden and the user doesn't know where to go (this is bad design to begin with, but that's not the point).
Also, consider games. Games without rules are simply not fun. Even fairly unrestrictive games such as pen-and-paper RPGs have a set of rules that must be followed. Would solitaire be the #1 game if players could choose any card from any pile? Would Quake be as fun if individual players could turn off things like lava or blast radius damage, or even collision detection?
If we define "interaction" to mean general human interaction, the need for rules becomes even clearer. Without rules for grammar, word meanings, pronounciation, etc, people would not be able to communicate. Even if every person spoke a unique language, the act of learning another person's language is learning the rules needed to communicate! In fact, by reading this post, you are following rules needed to recognize characters in the alphabet, group them into words, and determine the meaning of those words.
To borrow from a Tic-Tac commercial: Can you interact without rules? Certainly, but I wouldn't reccomend it.
the correct quote is:
Oh GREAT. Just what we need--so much for the whole "you can't 'accidentally' find porn on the Internet" argument. This just throws that out the window, because all a porn site needs to do is hijack the right search keywords and wait for cnn.com to have a broken link.. *poof* millions of users get sent to porn.
Not only that, but it makes site debugging a pain in the ass.
Thanks Berkeley!
Moderators: If this appears twice, moderate one of them down to 0. Slashdot 500'd on my first attempt and I'm not sure it went through
Assuming the 'average' user knows how to insert a floppy into their computer and can press the 'reset' button, Windows 98 can be installed pretty much unattended. The only real challenge is making sure the CD-ROM drive is accessible from a boot floppy. Once the setup program is running, there is literally nothing to installing 98. It even reboots by itself :)
The Linux install procedure is truly something that needs a lot of work. What I'd like to see:
- A windows-based installer that will, bare minimum, automatically generate any needed boot floppies. A complete Linux installer that does everything (partitioning, ext2 formatting, LILO installing, etc) from inside Windows would be cool too.
- An autodetect program that can detect video, audio, network, scsi, ide, etc. devices and automatically configure the system to load the drivers on boot.
- Some way to keep the boot messages from being displayed on the screen unless it's an error or kernel panic.
NathanGiven that the NY Judge's ruling repeatedly mentions the lack of evidence presented at the trial, the EFF needs all the dough it can get to hire good lawyers who *gasp* do their homework. Jon has a chance, but not if his lawyers putz around with baseless/unproven (as in having no supporting evidence provided) arguments.
Imagine someone was getting sued for promising that the sun will rise tomorrow. Which defense are you more likely to believe:
The judge doesn't want to hear opinion, he wants evidence and proof to support the opinion. It is this proof, not the opinions expressed in speech, that will make the difference.
Bah, enough ranting :P
NathanMake sure all your communications--be they verbal, print, or electronic--use proper English. This especially includes recruitment letters.
I spent a few months in California, and after I was terminated from the job I put my resume and availability up on dice.com. I got quite a few e-mails from recruiters, and one directly from a startup.
This particular person not only misspelled (and I mean grossly misspelled, not a typo) several words, but did not have correct grammar. Also, the tone of his mail was rather desperate. This left me with a bad first impression, and was one of the first dice.com replies that hit the round file.
Say what you want about the suits, but professionalism matters when it comes to communications with the public--that goes double for communications with other companies, and triple for potential employees. It doesn't mean you have to wear a suit, just use proper grammar/spelling/punctuation and don't use slang in company literature.
While I'm on the subject of California and dice.com, am I the only one who gets turned off by spam from recruiters that use "startup!" as if it was some magic mantra to attract employees?
Nathan