I'm really starting to hate facebook. Friends have posted photos I want to see, other friends have commented on those photos and I want to read them. But I don't see any notifications on my main news feed about any of this. But I get tons of crap about vampires and I seem to get notified about people I don't know becoming friends with people I hardly know.
Can someone suggest a cleaner, more useful alternative to facebook that I can try and talk all my friends into joining?
I used to play D&D (and AD&D) a lot when I was in junior high (I'm a crusty old 38 years now). I had a lot of fun. Occasionally I browse through the computer games at the box store and see things that look D&D-ish. But, I think I really would like to have something that feels like the old "pen-and-graph-paper" game rather than the most awesome 3d graphics.
Is there a computer game out there that can give me that nostalgic experience? Or will I have to buy the books and get a group of like-minded geeks together for old times sake?
>> was probably about a 333 GHz Pentium 2
> That's some impressive overclocking there.
Ha -- good one! 333 MEGA-Hz.:)
> Seriously, 2-3 crashes a day? That would be intolerable for me.
In retrospect, yeah it does sound intolerable. Somehow I just got used to it. To this day I hit ctrl-s, ctrl-s, ctrl-s frequently when I pause for thought.:)
Wow 1998 -- was that 10 years ago already? I remember having very fond memories on Windows 98, actually. I used to do Delphi development all day, and Win 98 used to crash on me at least 2 or 3 times a day, but it was really nice and fast on my computer (which was probably about a 333 GHz Pentium 2).
Pretty nice product, Windows 98. Other developers were either using Windows NT (which was slow and a nightmare to configure and keep running), or relatively early Linuxes (which was stable, but (IMO) mind bogglingly difficult to use -- I spent an entire afternoon once trying to get a Caldera installation to change screen resolution or mount a CD).
Windows 98 was actually pretty ok. It's all I used until Windows 2000 came along.
I'd like to move my iMac around the house. I don't have a wireless router but there's about 6 wireless access points I can see in my neighbourhood alone. There's all password protected though -- probably with WEP.
Can anyone point me to a simple tutorial on cracking a WEP password? I really just want to check my email, I wouldn't abuse my neighbour's internet access with anything malicious.
I got a Blu-ray player free with my TV at Christmas so I'm glad to hear the format appears to be winning. But it seems to me we should be getting our movies over the internet and distributing these little plastic discs is kind of silly.
A year or so ago I started a myspace page just out of curiosity. I shut it down a couple months later because it really didn't do anything for me.
A couple months back I got a facebook account, and while it's more functional that the myspace page, the vast majority of the content I see there is silliness and spam. I find the applications and installation stuff a annoyance. It's also not very customizable appearance wise. Other than an occasional vacation photo from a friend I rarely see, there's not much there that helps me. I'm considering canceling that too.
What I'd really like is something like facebook that's pure communication function, and less gibberish and marketing. Actually, something like a web-based AOL could work -- email, chat rooms, IM, all built into one facebook-like web site. More elegant looking and customizable.
Cape Breton is one of the foggiest places in Canada (my dear old Newfoundland wins first place on that list).
Don't let the coastline fool you, this ain't Florida. The northern atlantic is a cold, icy, foggy place most of the year (remember Titanic). I certainly hope you don't need good weather to launch rockets.
Vista SP1 will be one step closer to a Windows that's as good as Mac OS X.
Just like Windows eventually caught up to Mac with Windows95 and then exceeded it with Windows 2000, Microsoft will once again catch up to Mac OS X with an eventual improved version of Vista that looks and feels as good.
When that time comes Apple faithful will rant "Mac's had that for 5 years!" and it won't matter anymore. Apple had better get innovating the next major killer features fast, because Microsoft is always improving.
I'm so glad I bought a Mac so I don't have to be bothered with the constant update and restart warnings; and no more clumsy virus scans and adware.
I've never actually used Vista, but whenever I have to use Windows XP at work it always feels so antiquated compared to Mac OS X. Everything on Mac is so much cleaner, nicer and more sophisticated.
I spent 10 years as a Windows user, and often watched UNIX savvy coworkers dance magically around terminal windows and vi. While I always thought the character driven interfaces were decidedly 1980, I also always felt it would make me a better rounded tech guy if I learned more about that world.
When I bought a Mac (because I wanted something better than Windows), I thought a nice side effect was I would have to learn more about UNIX. I bought a copy of "Learning UNIX for Mac OS X Tiger" and read through most of it. And I'm now very comfortable using the command line for simple things like FTPing, changing file permissions, and modifying simple text files (although I always use PICO because VI just seems like black magic to me).
But you know what? I really don't ever need to "know" that Mac OS X is UNIX. More so than any LINUX or Solaris box I've ever used, the UNIXness of Mac OS X is very nicely hidden -- actually, not "hidden", it's just that since Mac OS X has such a nice UI, and such great apps, I never really need to care about the UNIX underpinnings.
It's quite nice to be able to have your nice UNIX cake, and be able to eat your nice GUI cake too.
I've spent most of the last 10 years building desktop and web applications with Java: AWT, Swing, JSP, Struts, J2EE, EJBs, and on and on.
Through all those years I've had to fight perceptions of Java being hard to distribute, slow, difficult, insecure, and over-engineered. I've done pretty well in the battle, and produced some pretty nice products.
Maybe I'm having a bit of a mid-life crisis, and I'm wondering where to go from here. I'm looking at alternatives for development: AJAX, Ruby, PHP, and Adobe AIR. But nothing out there (outside of the Microsoft world) does everything that Java does as well -- but Java just doesn't do GUI too well. Although GWT is pretty cool. And I've always thought Applets were underrated and under-utilized.
The point of this rant? Java 7 doesn't excite me in the least. Me and everyone I know are firmly planted in Java 5 (or is it 1.5? I always forget) and we don't appear to be moving to Java 6 (1.6?) -- so why should we care about Java 7 (1.7?).
Anyway, that's my rant. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!
Microsoft makes even more money if Apple puts Vista on every computer. It's an untapped market. Seems like it would be good for Microsoft.
In the short term sounds good for Microsoft. But in the long term, no.
Here's the scenario that Microsoft is afraid of: Computer user buys a Mac with Mac OS X and Windows. Yes, Microsoft got paid for the copy of Windows. But the user is now living in a Mac OS X world, logging into Mac OS X, using Mac's browser, Mac's Mail.app, iLife and so on. Windows has been delegated to the status of virtual machine, there only to support the running of Microsoft Project and the few other Windows only apps.
Over time, the user is focused more on the OS X software updates, the new OS X features, and the new OS X applications. Windows has become less important -- almost irrelevant, certainly out-of-mind for him.
Five years later, time to buy a new computer. He gets a new Mac. Doesn't even think about getting Windows this time -- or just decides to continue to use the old five year old copy of Windows from his previous Mac. Windows, for him, has become a legacy product.
Bill Gates has *always* said that Windows can be obsolete in five years.
Microsoft has a long history of announcing new technologies long before they really exist in order to prevent a competitor from gaining marketing hype and momentum. This strategy goes right back to the earliest Windows versions -- you can read lots about this from an MS programmer's perspective in Barbarians.
Since Apple is about to announce their "top secret" features in Leopard, it seems obvious it will be this sort of touch screen technology and that Microsoft is trying to steal Apple's thunder by announcing this vaperware.
Eastern Canada is currently experiencing its thickest strongest ice in 30 years. Coast Guard officials I've spoken with say the ice severity follows a 30 year cycle and current conditions are the same as in the 1970s.
I'm conservative and I'll probably vote for McCain and/or Giuliani, but I have to say there's a lot to like about this Obama fellow. He seems rather "tuned in".
Slashdot Mirror
I'm really starting to hate facebook. Friends have posted photos I want to see, other friends have commented on those photos and I want to read them. But I don't see any notifications on my main news feed about any of this. But I get tons of crap about vampires and I seem to get notified about people I don't know becoming friends with people I hardly know.
Can someone suggest a cleaner, more useful alternative to facebook that I can try and talk all my friends into joining?
I used to play D&D (and AD&D) a lot when I was in junior high (I'm a crusty old 38 years now). I had a lot of fun. Occasionally I browse through the computer games at the box store and see things that look D&D-ish. But, I think I really would like to have something that feels like the old "pen-and-graph-paper" game rather than the most awesome 3d graphics.
Is there a computer game out there that can give me that nostalgic experience? Or will I have to buy the books and get a group of like-minded geeks together for old times sake?
Is there anything especially interesting in the batch?
Insiders say, it's gonna suck!
>> was probably about a 333 GHz Pentium 2 :)
:)
> That's some impressive overclocking there.
Ha -- good one! 333 MEGA-Hz.
> Seriously, 2-3 crashes a day? That would be intolerable for me.
In retrospect, yeah it does sound intolerable. Somehow I just got used to it. To this day I hit ctrl-s, ctrl-s, ctrl-s frequently when I pause for thought.
Pretty nice product, Windows 98. Other developers were either using Windows NT (which was slow and a nightmare to configure and keep running), or relatively early Linuxes (which was stable, but (IMO) mind bogglingly difficult to use -- I spent an entire afternoon once trying to get a Caldera installation to change screen resolution or mount a CD).
Windows 98 was actually pretty ok. It's all I used until Windows 2000 came along.
Just FYI, I'm now all Mac OS X and loving it. ;)
Thanks!
I'd like to move my iMac around the house. I don't have a wireless router but there's about 6 wireless access points I can see in my neighbourhood alone. There's all password protected though -- probably with WEP.
Can anyone point me to a simple tutorial on cracking a WEP password? I really just want to check my email, I wouldn't abuse my neighbour's internet access with anything malicious.
Thanks!
I got a Blu-ray player free with my TV at Christmas so I'm glad to hear the format appears to be winning. But it seems to me we should be getting our movies over the internet and distributing these little plastic discs is kind of silly.
A couple months back I got a facebook account, and while it's more functional that the myspace page, the vast majority of the content I see there is silliness and spam. I find the applications and installation stuff a annoyance. It's also not very customizable appearance wise. Other than an occasional vacation photo from a friend I rarely see, there's not much there that helps me. I'm considering canceling that too.
What I'd really like is something like facebook that's pure communication function, and less gibberish and marketing. Actually, something like a web-based AOL could work -- email, chat rooms, IM, all built into one facebook-like web site. More elegant looking and customizable.
Is that what OpenSocial is? I have not tried it.
Apple's QuickView and Preview app does a much nicer job of viewing PDFs. Adobe should totally get Apple to build their PDF viewer.
I'll do you one better. Star Wars jumped the shark when Boba Fett fell into the Sarlacc Pit.
Don't let the coastline fool you, this ain't Florida. The northern atlantic is a cold, icy, foggy place most of the year (remember Titanic). I certainly hope you don't need good weather to launch rockets.
boxlight
looks like Mistersoftie is up to their old hype the vaporware tricks to dissuade buyers from going with attractive alternatives.
He may have seen a leviathan" or a behemoth.
"Run Doctor Grant, run for your life!" QUAAAACK!
Eclipse has been available for Mac OS X for years. What's the news here?
Just like Windows eventually caught up to Mac with Windows95 and then exceeded it with Windows 2000, Microsoft will once again catch up to Mac OS X with an eventual improved version of Vista that looks and feels as good.
When that time comes Apple faithful will rant "Mac's had that for 5 years!" and it won't matter anymore. Apple had better get innovating the next major killer features fast, because Microsoft is always improving.
I've never actually used Vista, but whenever I have to use Windows XP at work it always feels so antiquated compared to Mac OS X. Everything on Mac is so much cleaner, nicer and more sophisticated.
When I bought a Mac (because I wanted something better than Windows), I thought a nice side effect was I would have to learn more about UNIX. I bought a copy of "Learning UNIX for Mac OS X Tiger" and read through most of it. And I'm now very comfortable using the command line for simple things like FTPing, changing file permissions, and modifying simple text files (although I always use PICO because VI just seems like black magic to me).
But you know what? I really don't ever need to "know" that Mac OS X is UNIX. More so than any LINUX or Solaris box I've ever used, the UNIXness of Mac OS X is very nicely hidden -- actually, not "hidden", it's just that since Mac OS X has such a nice UI, and such great apps, I never really need to care about the UNIX underpinnings.
It's quite nice to be able to have your nice UNIX cake, and be able to eat your nice GUI cake too.
I've spent most of the last 10 years building desktop and web applications with Java: AWT, Swing, JSP, Struts, J2EE, EJBs, and on and on.
Through all those years I've had to fight perceptions of Java being hard to distribute, slow, difficult, insecure, and over-engineered. I've done pretty well in the battle, and produced some pretty nice products.
Maybe I'm having a bit of a mid-life crisis, and I'm wondering where to go from here. I'm looking at alternatives for development: AJAX, Ruby, PHP, and Adobe AIR. But nothing out there (outside of the Microsoft world) does everything that Java does as well -- but Java just doesn't do GUI too well. Although GWT is pretty cool. And I've always thought Applets were underrated and under-utilized.
The point of this rant? Java 7 doesn't excite me in the least. Me and everyone I know are firmly planted in Java 5 (or is it 1.5? I always forget) and we don't appear to be moving to Java 6 (1.6?) -- so why should we care about Java 7 (1.7?).
Anyway, that's my rant. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!
Microsoft makes even more money if Apple puts Vista on every computer. It's an untapped market. Seems like it would be good for Microsoft.
In the short term sounds good for Microsoft. But in the long term, no.
Here's the scenario that Microsoft is afraid of: Computer user buys a Mac with Mac OS X and Windows. Yes, Microsoft got paid for the copy of Windows. But the user is now living in a Mac OS X world, logging into Mac OS X, using Mac's browser, Mac's Mail.app, iLife and so on. Windows has been delegated to the status of virtual machine, there only to support the running of Microsoft Project and the few other Windows only apps.
Over time, the user is focused more on the OS X software updates, the new OS X features, and the new OS X applications. Windows has become less important -- almost irrelevant, certainly out-of-mind for him.
Five years later, time to buy a new computer. He gets a new Mac. Doesn't even think about getting Windows this time -- or just decides to continue to use the old five year old copy of Windows from his previous Mac. Windows, for him, has become a legacy product.
Bill Gates has *always* said that Windows can be obsolete in five years.
boxlight
Microsoft has a long history of announcing new technologies long before they really exist in order to prevent a competitor from gaining marketing hype and momentum. This strategy goes right back to the earliest Windows versions -- you can read lots about this from an MS programmer's perspective in Barbarians.
Since Apple is about to announce their "top secret" features in Leopard, it seems obvious it will be this sort of touch screen technology and that Microsoft is trying to steal Apple's thunder by announcing this vaperware.
boxlight
Eastern Canada is currently experiencing its thickest strongest ice in 30 years. Coast Guard officials I've spoken with say the ice severity follows a 30 year cycle and current conditions are the same as in the 1970s.
boxlight