Likewise. It may take up more space, but it makes everything look neater and structured.
I just realised while thinking about this in that it's the same kind of thing I do when I take a photo - I like to have a clearly identifiable subject with some 'white space' to frame it, rather than an incoherent mass that has been clipped in a strange place. Even if framing in such a way isn't directly possible, I still try to make the cutoff as logical as possible, without any distractions.
If for example the conditions in an if statement are quite complicated, I will split them onto multiple lines and indent them a bit. If there was no line to separate the conditions from the subsequent execution statement, it would look pretty messy IMO:
The second example does 'flow', which is nice to look at, but the fact that it is awkward to tell where the condition stops and the subsequent execution statement starts, is not so nice.
It is still easier to double click an.exe in Windows than it is to install from the command line.
Maybe that's how you see it, but you then have to click 'I agree', 'next,next,next,...,finish'. I much prefer just typing 'apt-get whatever'. Of course I use Windows at work and Mac OS at home so I hardly ever get to use apt-get. I like the Mac OS installation method of simply copying an application to the applications folder to install it, it's pretty intuitive to be able to uninstall an app just by deleting it (which is something I did when I first started using Windows, since I was used to Macs and Amigas..).
I had started using it until I noticed Twitter doing so. I did it because of the reasons outlined by Brieeyebarr above.. I found it quite funny the first time I saw it.
That's entirely up to personal preference. I much prefer bluer 'cool' colour calibration and fairly high contrast in my monitors to 'warm' yellowy nonsense, and the same goes for things like lightbulbs. I don't mind yellowish sunlight, but that is because it brings warmth and often better visible definition than the pale light you get on dull cloudy days. You also get nice blue skies to balance out the yellow.
Since it's summer here at the moment (bright enough from around 4am-11pm) I don't often need to use artificial lights anyway:) When winter wraps round I'll probably still get by with the light from my TV most of the time as well;)
Do you often find yourself watching TV for 24 hours a day? Not disagreeing that it's not the best display life in the world, but it wouldn't be quite as dramatic as 6 months. And the type of person who is going to shell out $2500 for an 11" screen is probably going to get something better long before that one dies.
I think you are on the right track, but instead of having the desk horizontal, it would be better to be sloped so that you don't have to lean far forward and slouch to see your screen. Better at an angle like a draftsman would use. Could be curved back to horizontal to allow the elbows to rest on a solid surface..
I hadn't really thought about it before, but perhaps I wouldn't slouch my neck so much if I hadn't had to look down at a desk for all those years. Kids seem to slouch these days more than ever though, so slouching at a computer desk is possibly even worse than leaning over a writing desk?
This has just made me realise I need to raise up my monitor even higher than it is so that I don't slouch my eyes down to its level - time to find another sturdy box!
You know, this isn't just the internet, this is slashdot, where a lot of people can code or at least know some HTML - you could just use the anchor tag. I haven't used any autolinkify gubbimatrons, but I expect they'd take longer to click than it takes to type <a href=paste_url_here>link name here</a> anyway..
If you didn't apply the heatsink yourself, you don't know if it's been done correctly. On my first PC that I bought with my own money (well, half bought and my dad paid the rest), it kept locking up randomly, and after lots of IRQ and driver troubleshooting my dad removed the heatsink only to find that they hadn't applied it correctly. One reapplication of thermal paste and proper connection to the CPU later, and everything was fine (until that system got messed up in a lightning storm a few years later, but I still use the case when building my own machines)
The problem he was having with the machine was something to do with plugging into an external monitor, I can't remember the exact issue right now, but I tried installing new graphics drivers to no avail. I think I tried generic nVidia drivers and some from the Dell website. I remember at one point getting an error along the lines of "this installer needs 32 bit Vista", but that's the flipping OS that was running (yes, I checked under the My Computer equivalent's properties)!
He has a Latitude before that Dell sent out a replacement for because it had weird issues when being connected to a projector (and only a projector, it was fine for external monitors - I didn't realise laptops would actually recognise the difference, especially over a VGA cable rather than a DVI). The problem with one of them was that whenever the laptop was plugged into a projector, the machine would act as if a key was stuck, so that in Outlook the font view size would quickly ramp up to the max, and in Powerpoint the slides just flew by and stuck on the last page. I can't remember if both the latitudes did exactly the same thing, but that's the last 3 Dell laptops this guy has had have had issues with external displays or projectors (he's a sales guy so basically one of the only people in the company who does presentations from his own machine).
Gah. I hope it isn't one of those models that we have. I guess I should have pointed out that it is indeed an XPS laptop, forgot there are XPS desktops..
For one thing, if you were using a time critical application, you'd probably have special real-time hardware and kernel modifications, since the standard Linux kernel doesn't do guaranteed real time operation.
Even if the hypothetical system was running a time critical application with specialised hardware, the point was is that in this case the bug would result in a stable time during runtime, but the system time would always be exactly 1 second out from the hardware clock. If all the time-synced systems were running the same OS then the bug would be 'innocent'. You wouldn't ever notice the bug unless you booted into the BIOS or another OS and checked against a watch synced exactly to the buggy OS.
Basically this would require 2 bugs to work so it is admittedly very contrived. And it could become an issue in a time critical system if different parts of the system were using different versions of software (which seems like a bad idea anyway). Causing deaths isn't exactly the same as a 'security risk' either, that's a health and safety risk! I just wanted to point out that not all bugs have to be a security problem.
I tried my best - I was actually expecting some smartarse to come up with a way of claiming that a broken toilet was a security risk, perhaps if it meant you had to leave the house to use another toilet, or had to order in some new parts which could be tainted by a man in the middle attack;)
Unfortunately it'll only pay off if other people aren't idiots and follow suit. That's why we still have companies like McDonalds (I do actually like eating at some other fast food places, but McDonalds don't seem to put any effort in at all) and Microsoft.
I've got at least one person using OpenOffice though, he asked me last year about which version of Office to get (or maybe he just wanted a crack, I can't remember) then I pointed him to OOo and he's been happy with that ever since. For doing simple stuff like student essays then the slight formatting issues between Office and OOo don't really matter.
Only someone at our company ordered an XPS that has no equivalent XP drivers. I really didn't want to let them get Vista, but they were wanting something flashy to show off at presentations -.- They now want to install XP on the laptop but tough shit, I warned them in the first place, and if there are no drivers available, then the system may be pretty unusable in XP. There perhaps are hacked XP drivers or even actual XP drivers available now though.. is that a ray of light at the end of the tunnel?
I'm not you, and I, in fact, only use Windows at work. In my job role I basically get to tell people what they are and are not allowed to purchase in terms of computer hardware, so the OP's post is quite relevant to me.
I have seen at least one other slashdotter claim that they only use Windows because they have to for work as well. I've not seen many claim that they are 'normal home users'. I expect people in that category spend far more time watching YouTube or playing 'The Sims' than they ever do on slashdot. What level of interest does your average computer user actually have in how their computer works? Consider how many drivers are interested in how the alternator in their car works, or even know that their car has an alternator.
Please refrain from using 'we' when referring to yourself - unless you are perhaps royalty or an editor, then it is of course your perogative.
I'm pretty sure that shouldn't have needed explaining...
I wasn't really thinking in a kernel context, was just trying to think of an innocent bug. I'm not familiar with the kernel's code so I'm not sure where the kernel ends and other things begin, but if for example there was a bug that meant that the system time consistently read the time of the clock on the mobo as the actual clock time + 1 second, and wrote to the clock as the system time -1 second, then IMO that wouldn't pose a security risk, but I would still consider it a bug of sorts.
'Denial of service' (ie something is broken) isn't a security issue unless it is actively caused by an attacker. You don't call the police when your toilet is broken, you call a plumber. If something however is working but can be disabled by a malicious attacker via a bug in the kernel, yes that's a security issue.
SCO rhymes with 'no'. And the fact that it's Bill Gates as Darth Vader and not actually Darth Vader should give you an idea that this might not be a direct quote. Unless perhaps in your own language, SCO is pronounced 'Luke!'
Slashdot Mirror
I also much prefer aligning the {}'s vertically.
Likewise. It may take up more space, but it makes everything look neater and structured.
I just realised while thinking about this in that it's the same kind of thing I do when I take a photo - I like to have a clearly identifiable subject with some 'white space' to frame it, rather than an incoherent mass that has been clipped in a strange place. Even if framing in such a way isn't directly possible, I still try to make the cutoff as logical as possible, without any distractions.
If for example the conditions in an if statement are quite complicated, I will split them onto multiple lines and indent them a bit. If there was no line to separate the conditions from the subsequent execution statement, it would look pretty messy IMO:
if ( (blah && (blah < abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz)) ||
(blah && blah) ||
blah )
{
blah = blahblahblah;
blah++;
}
if ( (blah && (blah < abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz)) ||
(blah && blah) ||
blah) {
blah = blahblahblah;
blah++;
}
The second example does 'flow', which is nice to look at, but the fact that it is awkward to tell where the condition stops and the subsequent execution statement starts, is not so nice.
It is still easier to double click an .exe in Windows than it is to install from the command line.
Maybe that's how you see it, but you then have to click 'I agree', 'next,next,next,...,finish'. I much prefer just typing 'apt-get whatever'. Of course I use Windows at work and Mac OS at home so I hardly ever get to use apt-get. I like the Mac OS installation method of simply copying an application to the applications folder to install it, it's pretty intuitive to be able to uninstall an app just by deleting it (which is something I did when I first started using Windows, since I was used to Macs and Amigas..).
I had started using it until I noticed Twitter doing so. I did it because of the reasons outlined by Brieeyebarr above.. I found it quite funny the first time I saw it.
That's entirely up to personal preference. I much prefer bluer 'cool' colour calibration and fairly high contrast in my monitors to 'warm' yellowy nonsense, and the same goes for things like lightbulbs. I don't mind yellowish sunlight, but that is because it brings warmth and often better visible definition than the pale light you get on dull cloudy days. You also get nice blue skies to balance out the yellow.
Since it's summer here at the moment (bright enough from around 4am-11pm) I don't often need to use artificial lights anyway :) When winter wraps round I'll probably still get by with the light from my TV most of the time as well ;)
Either that, or they will switch to a different product..
Do you often find yourself watching TV for 24 hours a day? Not disagreeing that it's not the best display life in the world, but it wouldn't be quite as dramatic as 6 months. And the type of person who is going to shell out $2500 for an 11" screen is probably going to get something better long before that one dies.
Depending on how small the OLED's can be made
You do realise that you get OLED TVs and displays? A dimly lit pixel sized OLED will look pretty small when on your ceiling.
He could, if it weren't for the vicious homocidal storms and drunk drivers circling his town
I think you are on the right track, but instead of having the desk horizontal, it would be better to be sloped so that you don't have to lean far forward and slouch to see your screen. Better at an angle like a draftsman would use. Could be curved back to horizontal to allow the elbows to rest on a solid surface..
I hadn't really thought about it before, but perhaps I wouldn't slouch my neck so much if I hadn't had to look down at a desk for all those years. Kids seem to slouch these days more than ever though, so slouching at a computer desk is possibly even worse than leaning over a writing desk?
This has just made me realise I need to raise up my monitor even higher than it is so that I don't slouch my eyes down to its level - time to find another sturdy box!
Here here!
"Hear, hear!"
Which makes more sense from a "you guys should listen to that!" perspective?
You know, this isn't just the internet, this is slashdot, where a lot of people can code or at least know some HTML - you could just use the anchor tag. I haven't used any autolinkify gubbimatrons, but I expect they'd take longer to click than it takes to type <a href=paste_url_here>link name here</a> anyway..
No system, no possibility of system failure.
That was my point.
Sometimes, pure intuition can be more handy than maths.
If you didn't apply the heatsink yourself, you don't know if it's been done correctly. On my first PC that I bought with my own money (well, half bought and my dad paid the rest), it kept locking up randomly, and after lots of IRQ and driver troubleshooting my dad removed the heatsink only to find that they hadn't applied it correctly. One reapplication of thermal paste and proper connection to the CPU later, and everything was fine (until that system got messed up in a lightning storm a few years later, but I still use the case when building my own machines)
The problem he was having with the machine was something to do with plugging into an external monitor, I can't remember the exact issue right now, but I tried installing new graphics drivers to no avail. I think I tried generic nVidia drivers and some from the Dell website. I remember at one point getting an error along the lines of "this installer needs 32 bit Vista", but that's the flipping OS that was running (yes, I checked under the My Computer equivalent's properties)!
He has a Latitude before that Dell sent out a replacement for because it had weird issues when being connected to a projector (and only a projector, it was fine for external monitors - I didn't realise laptops would actually recognise the difference, especially over a VGA cable rather than a DVI). The problem with one of them was that whenever the laptop was plugged into a projector, the machine would act as if a key was stuck, so that in Outlook the font view size would quickly ramp up to the max, and in Powerpoint the slides just flew by and stuck on the last page. I can't remember if both the latitudes did exactly the same thing, but that's the last 3 Dell laptops this guy has had have had issues with external displays or projectors (he's a sales guy so basically one of the only people in the company who does presentations from his own machine).
Gah. I hope it isn't one of those models that we have. I guess I should have pointed out that it is indeed an XPS laptop, forgot there are XPS desktops..
Are you perchance a fellow subscriber to A Word A Day? Either that, or you're just very good with your Twain references!
For one thing, if you were using a time critical application, you'd probably have special real-time hardware and kernel modifications, since the standard Linux kernel doesn't do guaranteed real time operation.
Even if the hypothetical system was running a time critical application with specialised hardware, the point was is that in this case the bug would result in a stable time during runtime, but the system time would always be exactly 1 second out from the hardware clock. If all the time-synced systems were running the same OS then the bug would be 'innocent'. You wouldn't ever notice the bug unless you booted into the BIOS or another OS and checked against a watch synced exactly to the buggy OS.
Basically this would require 2 bugs to work so it is admittedly very contrived. And it could become an issue in a time critical system if different parts of the system were using different versions of software (which seems like a bad idea anyway). Causing deaths isn't exactly the same as a 'security risk' either, that's a health and safety risk! I just wanted to point out that not all bugs have to be a security problem.
I tried my best - I was actually expecting some smartarse to come up with a way of claiming that a broken toilet was a security risk, perhaps if it meant you had to leave the house to use another toilet, or had to order in some new parts which could be tainted by a man in the middle attack ;)
Unfortunately it'll only pay off if other people aren't idiots and follow suit. That's why we still have companies like McDonalds (I do actually like eating at some other fast food places, but McDonalds don't seem to put any effort in at all) and Microsoft.
I've got at least one person using OpenOffice though, he asked me last year about which version of Office to get (or maybe he just wanted a crack, I can't remember) then I pointed him to OOo and he's been happy with that ever since. For doing simple stuff like student essays then the slight formatting issues between Office and OOo don't really matter.
If you find someone who has an old XP machine [...] use the activation code on the machine
He didn't make any mention of Vista (and in fact neither do TFS and TFT)
Only someone at our company ordered an XPS that has no equivalent XP drivers. I really didn't want to let them get Vista, but they were wanting something flashy to show off at presentations -.- They now want to install XP on the laptop but tough shit, I warned them in the first place, and if there are no drivers available, then the system may be pretty unusable in XP. There perhaps are hacked XP drivers or even actual XP drivers available now though.. is that a ray of light at the end of the tunnel?
we're not you and are, in fact, normal home users
I'm not you, and I, in fact, only use Windows at work. In my job role I basically get to tell people what they are and are not allowed to purchase in terms of computer hardware, so the OP's post is quite relevant to me.
I have seen at least one other slashdotter claim that they only use Windows because they have to for work as well. I've not seen many claim that they are 'normal home users'. I expect people in that category spend far more time watching YouTube or playing 'The Sims' than they ever do on slashdot. What level of interest does your average computer user actually have in how their computer works? Consider how many drivers are interested in how the alternator in their car works, or even know that their car has an alternator.
Please refrain from using 'we' when referring to yourself - unless you are perhaps royalty or an editor, then it is of course your perogative.
I'm pretty sure that shouldn't have needed explaining...
I wasn't really thinking in a kernel context, was just trying to think of an innocent bug. I'm not familiar with the kernel's code so I'm not sure where the kernel ends and other things begin, but if for example there was a bug that meant that the system time consistently read the time of the clock on the mobo as the actual clock time + 1 second, and wrote to the clock as the system time -1 second, then IMO that wouldn't pose a security risk, but I would still consider it a bug of sorts.
'Denial of service' (ie something is broken) isn't a security issue unless it is actively caused by an attacker. You don't call the police when your toilet is broken, you call a plumber. If something however is working but can be disabled by a malicious attacker via a bug in the kernel, yes that's a security issue.
SCO rhymes with 'no'. And the fact that it's Bill Gates as Darth Vader and not actually Darth Vader should give you an idea that this might not be a direct quote. Unless perhaps in your own language, SCO is pronounced 'Luke!'