A bug that ends up with a computer game character able to jump incredible distances instead of the 'normal' distance doesn't seem like much of a security hole to me. And no, I'm not just talking about Spiderman. A bug is simply anything that causes a program to produce an unintended result, which could be a security exploit, but could just be something perfectly safe, but unexpected (in a bad way, not in a wow-this-AI-is-smart way).
Sky make pretty good boxes. We had one years ago (probably around 10 years ago that we got it), and it was web enabled via dial up over the phone line. I recently used Sky+ at a relative's house and they are using basically the same system we had back then, but they can choose to record shows too. The only thing I don't like (and that I don't see why they haven't fixed by now) is that when you surf what's on other channels with the arrow keys, when you press 'information' it doesn't give you the information for the program being displayed in the little box of listings that you are browsing, it just gives you the information for the program you are currently watching. Other than that, the system is responsive and mostly intuitive - though it did take a couple of minutes to discover where the recorded content was being kept, as the original system wasn't designed with recording in mind and they have just tacked on the extra functionality..
The freeview tuner built into my HDTV has quite a slow interface by comparison to Sky, though the functionality is okay and I can deal with a very slight delay between pressing an arrow and the program guide reacting.
Actually, Apple have also gone through phases (some more than once) of pastel colours, black, see-through and brushed aluminium.. surely that counts as more than one trick.. or did you miss the iMac and coloured iPods because you were too busy being upset at Apple having success based on styling? Hint: even if the hardware looks good, if the innards and UI suck, it's not going to do that well. Wait, I'm most likely telling this to someone who lives in the US, where the Hummer H2 is regarded as a good car.. nevermind..
Taste, in preference terms, is entirely subjective. Taste, in flavouring terms, isn't, because two people should be able to say "this is a banana". Some people may also have better tastebuds than others for detecting traces of flavours in wine and crap like that.
While I like Apple products, and the UI is okay, I wouldn't say that the way things are done is always better than any other OS. I liked it better when you could access all your applications from the Apple menu by default for example. The default theme also doesn't look as good as some themes I've used on Linux. After a quick google, I see you can apparently get themes for OSX as well, but I've never been too fussed before (okay so I just assumed that Apple wouldn't be happy with people changing the look and thought I'd have to jump through hoops to change it). Linux and OSX are more stable than Windows, and OSX had a better interface than any Linux distro, because it is so controlled and all done by the same company. With Linux you can add lots of useful little gadgets and different menu bars and things, but it doesn't always feel like everything has been designed to work together, while with OSX, all apps are designed to the same standard and generally play nicely with the rest of the OS. So combining stability and a cohesive experience are the reason that I currently use an Apple rather than a generic PC running Ubuntu. I don't think it has so much to do with 'taste' as knowing that everything will 'just work' together and I won't have to faff around for hours trying to setup my applications and hardware to interface nicely with whatever API is currently being used as a sound or graphics subsystem in my distro, etc. Sometimes it's fun fiddling around with config files to get to know more about how your system works, but sometimes you just want to get on with other things.
If you can immediately distract Steve with shiny features, he will get bored of the gadget eventually and forget to examine the rest of it. If the mouse had a mini projector showing a slideshow of 'modern art' on the adjactent table surface, they may have gotten away with the button.
Actually, people that get caught get locked up. You probably have broken the law a few times yourself, whether it's speeding or recording songs of the radio and listening to them more than once, whatever. Going over the speed limit by 1mph makes very little difference out on a freeway, and you're saying that even if you do that by mistake, or because your car's speedo is slightly off, you're suddenly a 'criminal'? GP was simply trying to point out that not every person who has broken the law is a murderer or evil person, they could be someone who has otherwise been just like you or me, but were in a bad situation and made some stupid calls. They still should be held responsible for their actions, but it's not a great attitude to always think you're somehow "better" than someone who has never broken the law. Especially considering some of the crappier laws that are in existence. Are people who fight against things like prohibition deserving of prison?
I agree. Experience and proper technique can make up for differences in strength and agility, though if you keep your training up then you can maintain good strength and health for quite a while (not counting things like serious arthitis which would make most highly physical activity suck). There have been >70 year olds who run marathons!
Only when its cold. Some guy said I was a 'white ninja' for doing occasional martial arts, then mentioning how I did "a lot of martial arts" last year, and how my 2 classes a week were nothing in comparison to his mighty number of hours a week that he did martial arts, and the times when he went away on long weekends with wu-shu masters to learn the secrets of long weekend martial art training. I'm not sure he was white, but I'm not sure who is more of a "white ninja".. the one who was training twice a week for a fun method of exercise, or the one who is taking it seriously enough to go on weekend retreats (but still reckons he'll have to stop by the time he's 36 because he won't be in the absolute peak physical condition required for balance and poise in the arts he's studying.. pfft..). Aside from the racist undertones, I just found the whole thing pretty offensive. Doing any activity in a club twice a week, and then home practice in between, is 'a lot' to me, but obviously not to self-proclaimed hardcore martial artists who get offended when someone says they did 'martial arts' instead of 'exercise'. *sigh* That guy really pissed me off
Because companies like Microsoft are still held back by monopolies commissions and that kind of thing. Sure there's still plenty of corruption, but at least there is an attempt at some measure of control. There is also stuff like mandatory minimum wages, minimum holiday time per year, minimum break time for number of hours worked, etc. Plenty of law is beneficial to the common man. Some laws are beneficial to big business too, and generally even where the law isn't the way they want it, they try to get round the problem with money/brute force. It works sometimes, and other times it doesn't.
I thought he was more pointing out that by getting rid of certain laws, you'd be letting those with money do whatever the hell they wanted, which would result in the unwashed masses being treated kind of like slaves. I don't think he meant actual slaves, more like extremely cheap labour. I'm not going to say whether I think that would happen or not because I haven't looked into libertarianism, I'm just trying to point out what you seem to have overlooked.
Disclaimer: I currently have a Macbook Pro, and have owned several Macs throughout my life, as well as IBM compatible PCs (which I suppose technically Macs are these days anyway) running everything from Windows 3.11 to XP as well a few different Linux distros, several Amigas, a Commodore 100, and other little handheld computer devices.
Couldn't you come up with something a bit better than 'no right click' and 'relevant apps'? Relevant is highly relative. You can tell from the same root for the word. A lot of people (including me) find that OSX is all they need for a home PC. Some lucky people also find that it's all they need for work too. I actually find the right click method on my Macbook more convenient than having a separate button, and just find it a PITA using other laptops now, because you need to move your whole hand to get your thumb over the second button, rather than just dropping a second finger onto the trackpad and doing a normal click.
Personally, my only problems with the Macbook Pro are: Overheats if you put the graphics card back to the clock speeds that ATI actually designed it for and play a 3D game for more than an hour; no docking port.
To me it sounds like you've never actually used a Mac for any length of time and are just sticking with the standard moronic Mac complaints. Just in case you're wondering, things like the iPod, iTunes and the iPhone don't interest me, but I'm happy they are successes as that means more cash for Apple to continue developing their computers and OS.
I bought Farcry just because people were making such a big deal about the graphics and I wanted to see if my system could handle it. Not gonna be doing that again.. well, not until I forget the valuable lesson at least! I also bought a game called Devastation way back when which had nice graphics and okay physics, but still pretty boring. Since then I've not bought much for the PC apart from Half-Life 2 and a few racing games. One of my friends is getting all excited about Diablo III and wants me to try out Diablo II with him online, but I cba with PC games any more, I like sitting in front of my HDTV (which will take PC input, but why bother if I need to buy a GeForce 8/9 to drive it adequately) with my PS3, which I expect will be able to play Diablo III quite acceptably (whereas this friend who has a PS3 as well is now thinking about buying a new PC just for playing Diablo III:/ )
I don't think the poster was complaining about that exactly, it is a pretty natural progression. He was complaining about last gen always being lambasted so much, when in fact it's still passable.
I agree with him - I buy some of my movies as blu-ray and some as DVD, depending on whether they're just a drama, comedy, action movie, documentary, etc. Eventually I'll be buying everything in HD as the prices come down, but at the moment I consider DVD very adequate for most movies. Especially compared to the Standard Definition stuff that I get on my freeview box, it looks awful on a full HDTV.
Actually, in the past I've noticed that once a film gets started I don't even tend to notice the medium it's using anymore. For example I've re-watched some old Disney or Star Wars videotapes and eventually just got wrapped up in the story and hardly even noticed the crappy hissy sound quality (which I take much more umbrage at than low-res graphics).
Disney are still only getting around to releasing movies on DVD so that they can milk as much money as possible out of people buying all the different versions, it's pathetic. I was going to criticize the Star Wars movies of the same, but I've just noticed that it is due out 'soon', but it remains to be seen just how long that will actually take.
Okay, while I don't believe in the Christian god, I haven't seen any 3 year olds who are skilled masons recently. Have you even seen the original 10 commandments? It's not just like 'thou shalt not kill', each command is quite verbose.
Plus, I was joking and meant command as in assembler commands.. I don't see why this needs to get into a debate about any possible gods out there, or why you think that if a god does exist, it has to be the one from the bible.
In Microsoft's case the cycle is repeating infinitely, since they are far past their 'third system'. The sad thing is that they have hardly added any bells and whistles, apart from the aero interface. Stuff like the DRM is more like adding dog-doo on a stick.
Couple of things. You forgot Mac OS. That's a pretty good choice for the masses and the technically minded alike. Secondly, you're being dumb. So what if it isn't designed for home use? Cars can be modified. You could modify your wife's accord with monster truck suspension and tyres, bigger engine, whatever, to suit specific tasks. Who cares if it wasn't designed for that if, in the end, it works. If there is no way of getting DirectX working properly on this then it isn't suited for use by the masses, but otherwise I can see it being a perfectly usable workstation OS. I've used Windows NT Server, Windows 2000 and 2003 Server, and they do have some useful features.
'Server' just means it has more features built in for administrative tasks and doing stuff like DNS/DHCP/web hosting. Look at something like Ubuntu. The only difference between 'home' type and 'server' type installs is some extra server-y packages, and perhaps a lack of X for some server installs. That doesn't mean that X and games can't be installed on the server, or that apache can't be installed on your home machine.
If you don't like this idea, just forget about it, and stop trying to tell people what they can't do, just because they aren't "meant" to. Maybe try watching a bit of amateur rally driving too. Lo, I see front wheel drive family cars driving down dirt tracks that they weren't ever "meant" to drive on!
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A bug that ends up with a computer game character able to jump incredible distances instead of the 'normal' distance doesn't seem like much of a security hole to me. And no, I'm not just talking about Spiderman. A bug is simply anything that causes a program to produce an unintended result, which could be a security exploit, but could just be something perfectly safe, but unexpected (in a bad way, not in a wow-this-AI-is-smart way).
Sky make pretty good boxes. We had one years ago (probably around 10 years ago that we got it), and it was web enabled via dial up over the phone line. I recently used Sky+ at a relative's house and they are using basically the same system we had back then, but they can choose to record shows too. The only thing I don't like (and that I don't see why they haven't fixed by now) is that when you surf what's on other channels with the arrow keys, when you press 'information' it doesn't give you the information for the program being displayed in the little box of listings that you are browsing, it just gives you the information for the program you are currently watching. Other than that, the system is responsive and mostly intuitive - though it did take a couple of minutes to discover where the recorded content was being kept, as the original system wasn't designed with recording in mind and they have just tacked on the extra functionality..
The freeview tuner built into my HDTV has quite a slow interface by comparison to Sky, though the functionality is okay and I can deal with a very slight delay between pressing an arrow and the program guide reacting.
"Ass-hole" is also commonly accepted in traditional vulgar parlance.
Actually, Apple have also gone through phases (some more than once) of pastel colours, black, see-through and brushed aluminium.. surely that counts as more than one trick.. or did you miss the iMac and coloured iPods because you were too busy being upset at Apple having success based on styling? Hint: even if the hardware looks good, if the innards and UI suck, it's not going to do that well. Wait, I'm most likely telling this to someone who lives in the US, where the Hummer H2 is regarded as a good car.. nevermind..
Taste, in preference terms, is entirely subjective. Taste, in flavouring terms, isn't, because two people should be able to say "this is a banana". Some people may also have better tastebuds than others for detecting traces of flavours in wine and crap like that.
While I like Apple products, and the UI is okay, I wouldn't say that the way things are done is always better than any other OS. I liked it better when you could access all your applications from the Apple menu by default for example. The default theme also doesn't look as good as some themes I've used on Linux. After a quick google, I see you can apparently get themes for OSX as well, but I've never been too fussed before (okay so I just assumed that Apple wouldn't be happy with people changing the look and thought I'd have to jump through hoops to change it). Linux and OSX are more stable than Windows, and OSX had a better interface than any Linux distro, because it is so controlled and all done by the same company. With Linux you can add lots of useful little gadgets and different menu bars and things, but it doesn't always feel like everything has been designed to work together, while with OSX, all apps are designed to the same standard and generally play nicely with the rest of the OS. So combining stability and a cohesive experience are the reason that I currently use an Apple rather than a generic PC running Ubuntu. I don't think it has so much to do with 'taste' as knowing that everything will 'just work' together and I won't have to faff around for hours trying to setup my applications and hardware to interface nicely with whatever API is currently being used as a sound or graphics subsystem in my distro, etc. Sometimes it's fun fiddling around with config files to get to know more about how your system works, but sometimes you just want to get on with other things.
If you can immediately distract Steve with shiny features, he will get bored of the gadget eventually and forget to examine the rest of it. If the mouse had a mini projector showing a slideshow of 'modern art' on the adjactent table surface, they may have gotten away with the button.
Aren't 100% of nouns handl'd that way? And IMO it would be his' or him's really, hi's makes no sense.
Proper apostrophe usage was probably invented by grammar nazis just so they could criticise others' punctuation anyway.
aym in yoor boot, analyzin yoor spayr tyr
Actually, people that get caught get locked up. You probably have broken the law a few times yourself, whether it's speeding or recording songs of the radio and listening to them more than once, whatever. Going over the speed limit by 1mph makes very little difference out on a freeway, and you're saying that even if you do that by mistake, or because your car's speedo is slightly off, you're suddenly a 'criminal'? GP was simply trying to point out that not every person who has broken the law is a murderer or evil person, they could be someone who has otherwise been just like you or me, but were in a bad situation and made some stupid calls. They still should be held responsible for their actions, but it's not a great attitude to always think you're somehow "better" than someone who has never broken the law. Especially considering some of the crappier laws that are in existence. Are people who fight against things like prohibition deserving of prison?
I agree. Experience and proper technique can make up for differences in strength and agility, though if you keep your training up then you can maintain good strength and health for quite a while (not counting things like serious arthitis which would make most highly physical activity suck). There have been >70 year olds who run marathons!
Yes. My head can be defined as pointy, if pointy means 'oval'.
Only when its cold. Some guy said I was a 'white ninja' for doing occasional martial arts, then mentioning how I did "a lot of martial arts" last year, and how my 2 classes a week were nothing in comparison to his mighty number of hours a week that he did martial arts, and the times when he went away on long weekends with wu-shu masters to learn the secrets of long weekend martial art training. I'm not sure he was white, but I'm not sure who is more of a "white ninja".. the one who was training twice a week for a fun method of exercise, or the one who is taking it seriously enough to go on weekend retreats (but still reckons he'll have to stop by the time he's 36 because he won't be in the absolute peak physical condition required for balance and poise in the arts he's studying.. pfft..). Aside from the racist undertones, I just found the whole thing pretty offensive. Doing any activity in a club twice a week, and then home practice in between, is 'a lot' to me, but obviously not to self-proclaimed hardcore martial artists who get offended when someone says they did 'martial arts' instead of 'exercise'. *sigh* That guy really pissed me off
Because companies like Microsoft are still held back by monopolies commissions and that kind of thing. Sure there's still plenty of corruption, but at least there is an attempt at some measure of control. There is also stuff like mandatory minimum wages, minimum holiday time per year, minimum break time for number of hours worked, etc. Plenty of law is beneficial to the common man. Some laws are beneficial to big business too, and generally even where the law isn't the way they want it, they try to get round the problem with money/brute force. It works sometimes, and other times it doesn't.
I thought he was more pointing out that by getting rid of certain laws, you'd be letting those with money do whatever the hell they wanted, which would result in the unwashed masses being treated kind of like slaves. I don't think he meant actual slaves, more like extremely cheap labour. I'm not going to say whether I think that would happen or not because I haven't looked into libertarianism, I'm just trying to point out what you seem to have overlooked.
I see. Let me provide some conditions then:
Unfortunately, even God can only fit an average of 5 commands onto a stone tablet, depending on compression techniques and the data to be recorded.
Just because one exists doesn't mean that more can't exist too ;)
Disclaimer: I currently have a Macbook Pro, and have owned several Macs throughout my life, as well as IBM compatible PCs (which I suppose technically Macs are these days anyway) running everything from Windows 3.11 to XP as well a few different Linux distros, several Amigas, a Commodore 100, and other little handheld computer devices.
Couldn't you come up with something a bit better than 'no right click' and 'relevant apps'? Relevant is highly relative. You can tell from the same root for the word. A lot of people (including me) find that OSX is all they need for a home PC. Some lucky people also find that it's all they need for work too. I actually find the right click method on my Macbook more convenient than having a separate button, and just find it a PITA using other laptops now, because you need to move your whole hand to get your thumb over the second button, rather than just dropping a second finger onto the trackpad and doing a normal click.
Personally, my only problems with the Macbook Pro are: Overheats if you put the graphics card back to the clock speeds that ATI actually designed it for and play a 3D game for more than an hour; no docking port.
To me it sounds like you've never actually used a Mac for any length of time and are just sticking with the standard moronic Mac complaints. Just in case you're wondering, things like the iPod, iTunes and the iPhone don't interest me, but I'm happy they are successes as that means more cash for Apple to continue developing their computers and OS.
I bought Farcry just because people were making such a big deal about the graphics and I wanted to see if my system could handle it. Not gonna be doing that again.. well, not until I forget the valuable lesson at least! I also bought a game called Devastation way back when which had nice graphics and okay physics, but still pretty boring. Since then I've not bought much for the PC apart from Half-Life 2 and a few racing games. One of my friends is getting all excited about Diablo III and wants me to try out Diablo II with him online, but I cba with PC games any more, I like sitting in front of my HDTV (which will take PC input, but why bother if I need to buy a GeForce 8/9 to drive it adequately) with my PS3, which I expect will be able to play Diablo III quite acceptably (whereas this friend who has a PS3 as well is now thinking about buying a new PC just for playing Diablo III :/ )
Meow! Better watch where you poke your overinflated ego, you might end up hitting something pointy.
primitive or simplistic are not the same as 'bad'.. I love the graphics on old 2D point and click adventure games :)
I don't think the poster was complaining about that exactly, it is a pretty natural progression. He was complaining about last gen always being lambasted so much, when in fact it's still passable.
I agree with him - I buy some of my movies as blu-ray and some as DVD, depending on whether they're just a drama, comedy, action movie, documentary, etc. Eventually I'll be buying everything in HD as the prices come down, but at the moment I consider DVD very adequate for most movies. Especially compared to the Standard Definition stuff that I get on my freeview box, it looks awful on a full HDTV.
Actually, in the past I've noticed that once a film gets started I don't even tend to notice the medium it's using anymore. For example I've re-watched some old Disney or Star Wars videotapes and eventually just got wrapped up in the story and hardly even noticed the crappy hissy sound quality (which I take much more umbrage at than low-res graphics).
Disney are still only getting around to releasing movies on DVD so that they can milk as much money as possible out of people buying all the different versions, it's pathetic. I was going to criticize the Star Wars movies of the same, but I've just noticed that it is due out 'soon', but it remains to be seen just how long that will actually take.
Okay, while I don't believe in the Christian god, I haven't seen any 3 year olds who are skilled masons recently. Have you even seen the original 10 commandments? It's not just like 'thou shalt not kill', each command is quite verbose.
Plus, I was joking and meant command as in assembler commands.. I don't see why this needs to get into a debate about any possible gods out there, or why you think that if a god does exist, it has to be the one from the bible.
In Microsoft's case the cycle is repeating infinitely, since they are far past their 'third system'. The sad thing is that they have hardly added any bells and whistles, apart from the aero interface. Stuff like the DRM is more like adding dog-doo on a stick.
Couple of things. You forgot Mac OS. That's a pretty good choice for the masses and the technically minded alike. Secondly, you're being dumb. So what if it isn't designed for home use? Cars can be modified. You could modify your wife's accord with monster truck suspension and tyres, bigger engine, whatever, to suit specific tasks. Who cares if it wasn't designed for that if, in the end, it works. If there is no way of getting DirectX working properly on this then it isn't suited for use by the masses, but otherwise I can see it being a perfectly usable workstation OS. I've used Windows NT Server, Windows 2000 and 2003 Server, and they do have some useful features.
'Server' just means it has more features built in for administrative tasks and doing stuff like DNS/DHCP/web hosting. Look at something like Ubuntu. The only difference between 'home' type and 'server' type installs is some extra server-y packages, and perhaps a lack of X for some server installs. That doesn't mean that X and games can't be installed on the server, or that apache can't be installed on your home machine.
If you don't like this idea, just forget about it, and stop trying to tell people what they can't do, just because they aren't "meant" to. Maybe try watching a bit of amateur rally driving too. Lo, I see front wheel drive family cars driving down dirt tracks that they weren't ever "meant" to drive on!
Unfortunately, even God can only fit 5 commands on a single stone tablet.