I would agree that Linux isn't worse for gaming than any other platform except for the lack of software. I was mostly referring to the parent's listing of a few titles and implying that linux therefor is a gaming platform. The limited selection available just doesn't compete with a console or windows machine, and just because there are some titles doesn't mean its a viable solution for a gamer.
I'm not arguing the point that games will run fine under linux. I'm just pointing out that having a handfull of games that work doesn't mean that linux is a viable gamer solution. You pointed out several popular FPS's that run under Linux, but even that is just a small segment of the overall FPS market. And there are hardly any mainstream RPGs, MMORPGs, or RTSs available, unless you spend time tinkering with WINE. What you've shown is that linux works for you as a gaming platform, but it doesn't for most people, and I think that's what the original gp was alluding to.
Another small point, is that most people don't have the knowledge to get a linux machine running properly to play their games with modern hardware. Even using Debian based distros like Ubuntu, it can be a pain to install the binary drivers for your video card, or nforce chipset. And the built in drivers just don't cut it for high performance.
So basically, I'm not arguing that linux works for some people, and that it could be a decent gaming platform. I'm saying that just because it works for you, doesn't mean it will for everyone else.
The gp's point still stands. Gaming just isn't Linux's strength. It's got loads of other strengths, and no one denies that, but it's not really a gaming platform. A handful of games that do work doesn't change that.
I don't see how she's a prima donna. Too be honest, most people don't use laptops in class for the sole purpose of taking notes anyway. And I say this as one of those students who occasionally take my laptop to class. Especially when the room has wireless internet access, I find myself more often than not browsing the internet, playing with my computer settings, etc, rather than taking notes. And it's the same on all the other computers in the room; people are instant messaging, checking penny arcade, but rarely just taking notes. Paper and pencil have the advantage that they don't have a lot of alternative uses except for note taking, whereas a computer provides distractions aplenty for the user.
That generally only works for free software... I don't know of many places where you can easily download commercial software for Linux but not Windows. In addition, most people like to have physical copies of the software they pay for. And Commercial software is necessary; theres a lot of stuff out there that just isn't available any other way, and will stay that way for the forseable future.
I personally think it's not a bad way to introduce kids to programming, although not necessarily the best platform to teach programming.
When I first started programming, the school I was at started us off with VB6. It was just an introductary class to computers, and they taught us some basic programming stuff. I was really excited though, because it allowed me to easily make programs that looked like real programs. (at the time I had only ever really used GUI programs) The next level programming class, which I happily signed up for, moved on to C and taught us how to properly code, but VB was what really helped to grab my interest.
No wonder everybody loves the mac, what a beautifully designed machine. And what do we get from Microsoft to compare to this??
Umm, automatic data transfers? Try taking a look at Windows XP files and settings transfer wizard... it does basically the same thing, and has been in Windows XP from the beginning
It seems to me that the article is aimed more at K-12 than university level; most universities do pay decently for their IT department, and my university had several OSS labs, in addition to running a fair chunk of linux servers.
Most K-12 schools just can't afford that kind of staff though, and so you get things like my high school where a mish-mash of old Apple computers, PCs, and who knows what else lived together on a novell based system that was down more than it was up.
You really ought to consider looking up how much nuclear waste a reactor actually produces yearly, especially when fuel recycling is employed. And actually, the figures I quoted did include all the costs you mention. Those are the actual unsubsidized to customer prices of the electricity. Research a little bit on power production costs and you'll see that nuclear and coal have the lowest per kW/hr production costs, with oil and gas coming next, and with solar and wind lagging far behind.
I somehow doubt that. Nuclear energy costs on average for 2004 were 1.68 cents per kW/hr. For wind, 25 cents per kW/hr. For solar, 30 cents per kW/hr. That's quite a difference in price, and I really doubt that the UK has such a deviation in costs. The problem is that wind and solar power just plain cost more to use, and they don't usually produce as much power as a convential plant either. In fact, most wind/solar power stations are heavily government subsidized, or else they most likely wouldn't exist at all.
The people likely to be running the plant are also likely to be the ones who do have a reasonable education, or at least training for the job. I somehow doubt they're just going to hire some Homer Simpson wannabe off of the street to run the plant; they're going to bring in professionals to do the job. And I think you'll find that between the nuclear enginners, ex navy nuclear techs, etc., there will be plenty of qualified people for the jobs.
Besides, aren't pebble bed reactors supposed to be pretty resistant to going super-critical? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_reactors
Actually, Nuclear power neither consumes great deals of fuel, nor produces large amounts of pollution. Certainly not as much as the techniques they are supposed to replace. In fact, most nuclear waste in the U.S. (the hard stuff, like spent fuel) is recyclable (although the process is pretty nasty). I think you'll find that we won't hit those limitations that coal suffers from all that quickly.
Also, the other power sources you mention have a long way to go before they have a chance of being a viable replacement. Wind and solar power especially are extremely expensive and inefficient. In fact I seem to recall that solar power actually costs more to produce than the electricity is worth. Hydro power is an established enough technology, of course, but you kinda need a giant dam and a big river for it to work.
I'm not sure what exactly your point is... yes, DSL is over the same line as another service, but so is cable for that matter, isn't it? And it most definitely still qualifies as broadband; at least in my area, the average DSL plan is better than 70 times faster than standard dial-up. Which, oddly enough, is roughly equal in speed to the cable plans around here.
Unfortunately, not all employees come with a nice big sticker that say "I'm trustworthy" or "Don't touch me with a twenty foot pole" on them. But in general, I agree. At some point you have to acknowledge that no matter what you do, employees could steal information easily enough if they really wanted to, be it by memory, usb drive, or even "forgetting" to shred important documents. You just have to take precautions to discourage the bad ones, and trust the rest.
I've actually kinda had the opposite experiance. I've experienced plenty of annoying little bugs in Gnome, such as the network config utility not actually keeping my settings when I hit "ok", or Nautilus crashing at odd moments. And KDE seems, at least to me, to run a little faster. I think what it comes down to is which desktop's bugs annoy you less. I personally find that KDE does what I need with the least amount of annoyance. Others find Gnome, or IceWM, or one of the other myriad options work best.
Just so you know, the CTRL+ALT+DEL->change password isn't the default behavior of Windows XP. What he describes is how it works for most people, for whom pressing CTRL+ALT+DEL just brings up the task manager.
I guess I wasn't as clear as I could've been. I was agreeing with your first point, that most people don't have experience with other OS's. I'm not sure that they would switch even if they did know (at my shop the IT department is pretty happy with windows, and even though several of them are old unix boys feel no urge to try and rework everything). As to your second point... I'm still not sure I understand. You actually do say that windows is widely known to be unstable in your first post. Granted, people gripe about windows a lot, ala "ah, crap, -random program- just crashed. Stupid Windows..." But, that doesn't mean they're looking for an alternative. In fact, I'll bet that most of the problems of that type are not OS related, but software related. I haven't had Windows completely lock up on me in a very long time (certainly less often than I've had X crash on my linux machine).
the question i have is that ms FUD? or is that because users havent experienced anything better?
It's doubtful its FUD. Most people don't know what Linux or *BSD is, much less care. Also, I think you'll find that even if they do know about *nix, they still won't care too much. Something along the lines of "if it ain't broke..."
windows is widly known to be unstable and problematic so badly now...
Haven't used it too much lately, have you? XP actually managed to resolve most of the stability issues.
Slashdot Mirror
I would agree that Linux isn't worse for gaming than any other platform except for the lack of software. I was mostly referring to the parent's listing of a few titles and implying that linux therefor is a gaming platform. The limited selection available just doesn't compete with a console or windows machine, and just because there are some titles doesn't mean its a viable solution for a gamer.
I'm not arguing the point that games will run fine under linux. I'm just pointing out that having a handfull of games that work doesn't mean that linux is a viable gamer solution. You pointed out several popular FPS's that run under Linux, but even that is just a small segment of the overall FPS market. And there are hardly any mainstream RPGs, MMORPGs, or RTSs available, unless you spend time tinkering with WINE. What you've shown is that linux works for you as a gaming platform, but it doesn't for most people, and I think that's what the original gp was alluding to.
Another small point, is that most people don't have the knowledge to get a linux machine running properly to play their games with modern hardware. Even using Debian based distros like Ubuntu, it can be a pain to install the binary drivers for your video card, or nforce chipset. And the built in drivers just don't cut it for high performance. So basically, I'm not arguing that linux works for some people, and that it could be a decent gaming platform. I'm saying that just because it works for you, doesn't mean it will for everyone else.
The gp's point still stands. Gaming just isn't Linux's strength. It's got loads of other strengths, and no one denies that, but it's not really a gaming platform. A handful of games that do work doesn't change that.
I don't see how she's a prima donna. Too be honest, most people don't use laptops in class for the sole purpose of taking notes anyway. And I say this as one of those students who occasionally take my laptop to class. Especially when the room has wireless internet access, I find myself more often than not browsing the internet, playing with my computer settings, etc, rather than taking notes. And it's the same on all the other computers in the room; people are instant messaging, checking penny arcade, but rarely just taking notes. Paper and pencil have the advantage that they don't have a lot of alternative uses except for note taking, whereas a computer provides distractions aplenty for the user.
That generally only works for free software... I don't know of many places where you can easily download commercial software for Linux but not Windows. In addition, most people like to have physical copies of the software they pay for. And Commercial software is necessary; theres a lot of stuff out there that just isn't available any other way, and will stay that way for the forseable future.
Games on a mac mini?
That might be tough even with dual booting Windows... doesn't the mini only have an embedded Intel graphics solution?
I personally think it's not a bad way to introduce kids to programming, although not necessarily the best platform to teach programming.
When I first started programming, the school I was at started us off with VB6. It was just an introductary class to computers, and they taught us some basic programming stuff. I was really excited though, because it allowed me to easily make programs that looked like real programs. (at the time I had only ever really used GUI programs) The next level programming class, which I happily signed up for, moved on to C and taught us how to properly code, but VB was what really helped to grab my interest.
No wonder everybody loves the mac, what a beautifully designed machine. And what do we get from Microsoft to compare to this??
Umm, automatic data transfers? Try taking a look at Windows XP files and settings transfer wizard... it does basically the same thing, and has been in Windows XP from the beginning
It seems to me that the article is aimed more at K-12 than university level; most universities do pay decently for their IT department, and my university had several OSS labs, in addition to running a fair chunk of linux servers.
Most K-12 schools just can't afford that kind of staff though, and so you get things like my high school where a mish-mash of old Apple computers, PCs, and who knows what else lived together on a novell based system that was down more than it was up.
Uhh, you might want to RTFA. They are using a sempron.
You really ought to consider looking up how much nuclear waste a reactor actually produces yearly, especially when fuel recycling is employed. And actually, the figures I quoted did include all the costs you mention. Those are the actual unsubsidized to customer prices of the electricity. Research a little bit on power production costs and you'll see that nuclear and coal have the lowest per kW/hr production costs, with oil and gas coming next, and with solar and wind lagging far behind.
I somehow doubt that. Nuclear energy costs on average for 2004 were 1.68 cents per kW/hr. For wind, 25 cents per kW/hr. For solar, 30 cents per kW/hr. That's quite a difference in price, and I really doubt that the UK has such a deviation in costs. The problem is that wind and solar power just plain cost more to use, and they don't usually produce as much power as a convential plant either. In fact, most wind/solar power stations are heavily government subsidized, or else they most likely wouldn't exist at all.
The people likely to be running the plant are also likely to be the ones who do have a reasonable education, or at least training for the job. I somehow doubt they're just going to hire some Homer Simpson wannabe off of the street to run the plant; they're going to bring in professionals to do the job. And I think you'll find that between the nuclear enginners, ex navy nuclear techs, etc., there will be plenty of qualified people for the jobs.
Besides, aren't pebble bed reactors supposed to be pretty resistant to going super-critical?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_reactors
Actually, Nuclear power neither consumes great deals of fuel, nor produces large amounts of pollution. Certainly not as much as the techniques they are supposed to replace. In fact, most nuclear waste in the U.S. (the hard stuff, like spent fuel) is recyclable (although the process is pretty nasty). I think you'll find that we won't hit those limitations that coal suffers from all that quickly.
Also, the other power sources you mention have a long way to go before they have a chance of being a viable replacement. Wind and solar power especially are extremely expensive and inefficient. In fact I seem to recall that solar power actually costs more to produce than the electricity is worth. Hydro power is an established enough technology, of course, but you kinda need a giant dam and a big river for it to work.
I'm not sure what exactly your point is... yes, DSL is over the same line as another service, but so is cable for that matter, isn't it? And it most definitely still qualifies as broadband; at least in my area, the average DSL plan is better than 70 times faster than standard dial-up. Which, oddly enough, is roughly equal in speed to the cable plans around here.
How do they convince people to fund something like this? It's just going to be money down the drain, and any 14 year old could tell you that.
If ever there was an overused joke on slashdot...
Unfortunately, not all employees come with a nice big sticker that say "I'm trustworthy" or "Don't touch me with a twenty foot pole" on them. But in general, I agree. At some point you have to acknowledge that no matter what you do, employees could steal information easily enough if they really wanted to, be it by memory, usb drive, or even "forgetting" to shred important documents. You just have to take precautions to discourage the bad ones, and trust the rest.
Be reasonable. You're posting on slashdot.
I've actually kinda had the opposite experiance. I've experienced plenty of annoying little bugs in Gnome, such as the network config utility not actually keeping my settings when I hit "ok", or Nautilus crashing at odd moments. And KDE seems, at least to me, to run a little faster. I think what it comes down to is which desktop's bugs annoy you less. I personally find that KDE does what I need with the least amount of annoyance. Others find Gnome, or IceWM, or one of the other myriad options work best.
Just so you know, the CTRL+ALT+DEL->change password isn't the default behavior of Windows XP. What he describes is how it works for most people, for whom pressing CTRL+ALT+DEL just brings up the task manager.
Actually it looks like they do... I think they're referring to the "Click this link if you wish to be removed from the mailing list" links.
I guess I wasn't as clear as I could've been. I was agreeing with your first point, that most people don't have experience with other OS's. I'm not sure that they would switch even if they did know (at my shop the IT department is pretty happy with windows, and even though several of them are old unix boys feel no urge to try and rework everything). As to your second point... I'm still not sure I understand. You actually do say that windows is widely known to be unstable in your first post. Granted, people gripe about windows a lot, ala "ah, crap, -random program- just crashed. Stupid Windows..." But, that doesn't mean they're looking for an alternative. In fact, I'll bet that most of the problems of that type are not OS related, but software related. I haven't had Windows completely lock up on me in a very long time (certainly less often than I've had X crash on my linux machine).
the question i have is that ms FUD? or is that because users havent experienced anything better?
It's doubtful its FUD. Most people don't know what Linux or *BSD is, much less care. Also, I think you'll find that even if they do know about *nix, they still won't care too much. Something along the lines of "if it ain't broke..."
windows is widly known to be unstable and problematic so badly now...
Haven't used it too much lately, have you? XP actually managed to resolve most of the stability issues.
No, its not. Why should a newcomer care if the OS runs on a wristwatch? They want something to work well on their Desktop.