Well that seems to make life a little more complicated for Linux. No mention of Apple in that article though, and I can't imagine Intel saying "no" to Apple if they decide they want in on EF too. Microsoft certainly aren't in a position to dictate an Apple exclusion deal with Intel either. Not in the post anti-trust world they now live in. Apples lawyers would be frothing at the mouth if MS tried a stunt like that.
I don't think MS will be able to engineer a position where they are the only technology route to this new type of content. Intel are part of the cadre of vendors working on this, and with Apple working so closely with Intel now, any hooks into this new technology will also be available to Apple (subject to the appropriate licensing deal). And you can bet that Jobs isn't going to sit back on his laurels and watch this unfold without getting in on the act. MS will have to share this market with Apple at least. Though where this leaves the Linux distros I don't know.
Intel also produced them for a while too, as part of the FAB-6 sale. At some point (I don't remember when) IBM got in on the act too. The new Alpha systems that are sold today (and they are still selling some) contain Alpha chips produced by IBM.
Huh? Compaq didn't have a FAB. The one that DEC had got sold off to Intel as part the DEC vs. Intel law suit way before Compaq took over the helm.
Compaq killed the Alpha because of two reasons:
1) bad, visionless (small) box-pushing mentality of its senior management. All the flim flam about cost was just an excuse. At the time Compaq announced the death of the Alpha chip and the move to Itanuim, the Alpha server line was enjoying its biggest growth numbers for many years, and it was making strong profits.
2) Compaq management, being so close to Intel and all, believed the Intel hype about IA64's mass market appeal, and the economies of scale that would bring. If nothing else, Intel managed to convince a competitor to commit an act of infanticide and in so doing, removed a serious threat to the adoption of IA64. Just imagine if Alpha had not died. What little market share IA64 has managed to grab would have been beaten to death by faster, stronger and cheaper Alpha chips.
Sure, Slashdot is a conversational forum, and people write "from the hip" without absolute consideration to their spelling. But come on.. you've seen the all too frequent misuse of the words their.vs. there, and your.vs. you're. And the list goes on.
How am I supposed to take anything someone says seriously, when their text is riddled with grammatical errors that my 14 year old nephew mastered years ago.
Native English speakers who can't express themselves without making childish mistakes like that, just appear thick! And it devalues anything of real importance they may have to say.
Have you also considered that if you practice spelling correctly all the time, then you're less likely to screw up when it really matters?
Thought I'd mention a bit of history (long since forgotten) that Marcus Ranum was also the author of the UberMUD and UnterMUD, mud engines. Two very nice mud cores, written in K&R C that ran on Ultrix. Both had their own strengths and weaknesses. UberMUD was my favourite, as it had its own scripting language called "U". UnterMUD didn't so it was harder to develop on, but its filestore backend was much smarter than Uber's. A union of the two would have been the perfect MUD engine IMO.
and will have no problem finding its way onto many casual users desktops.
You think so. Well consider this.. Apple at the moment has to write/maintain, what, a few hundred drivers for the limited variations in the hardware they provide. When OSXi comes out, the situation will stay pretty much the same. If Apple were to sell OSXi individually, then the number of drivers they would have to write/mange/support to cope with the variations in the "casual users desktops" would number in the thousands.
How many years has it taken for Linux distros to reach a point where they can install flawlessly on every desktop PC variation out there? Well, we're still waiting on that one. They are very good now, but still screw up on things as basic as sound card support.
If Apple really wanted to reach out more to the unwashed mases, then what would make more sense ( I think ) would be for Apple to license VMware. To engineer a version of OSXi that runs flawlessly inside a modified version of VMware. Then to package them together as one product, and sell that. Hey presto.. OSXi in an emulator, on virtually any PC with enough grunt to handle it.
But never the less with a condescending, superior than thou, up your own ass kind of attitude. And you're even worse in this reply. Take a look in the mirror, its not him who needs to grow up!
So are the DOJ offering to pay for all this? Storing that volume of data isn't free, in fact its bloody expensive. Why should the ISP's have to pay for this themselves, they won't get any benefit from it.
Its like a hidden tax.. call it an information tax for anyone who wants to get into the ISP business.
Once again? That's impossible with a first reply, you know. But hey, no matter. Although if you don't even bother to check who you're talking with...
Ah.. my bad. I assumed you were the same guy as this particular thread had taken on the tone of a 1-on-1 debate between jbolden and myself. I didn't expect someone else to jump in on such an old posting.
I don't claim anything about comments, or any specific little detail
Then why are you wasting your time writing on this thread? The mandatory requirement (or lack of) comments as part of source code, within the GPL, is what jbolden and I were debating.
Well, try reading it third time, then. It's obvious for anything with more than one brain cell that if you have three different forms of same code, one being machine, second more or less human readable without comments, and the last human readable code with comments that the last one is the preferred form for _making modifications_ which is generally done _by humans_.
Once again you completely miss the point.
Sure, the latter form is the most useful, but does the GPL specifically require it? No.
Does it distinguish between source code with and without comments? No.
Does the presence or absence of comments affect the compilation or run time execution of a program, its function, essence or purpose? No, No, No, No, No.
You try and make a case that comments are an integral part of the source code by exaggerating the use of "preferred". When the very meaning of the word depicts an expression of choice.
No matter how much you want it to be true, your straw man argument falls over all by itself.
There is no requirement of "machine-readable" you seem to be fabricating that.
I suggest you re-read the post you replied to. The guy quotes from the GPL, where it explicitly states "machine-readable" in paragraph 3a. No fabrication on my part.
"The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable."
Well I read that twice, and I don't see the word "comments" anywhere in that definition. Would you like to try again ?
The GPL doesn't state that or ask for it. Its only requirement is for machine-readable source code. Comments make source code human readable. The machine doesn't understand them; the (insert-your-language-here) pre-processor just tosses them in the bit bucket at compile time.
According to your warped view, an Apple source tar ball with all the source comments stripped out would be less objectionable than with the source comments left in.
The power boost isn't sufficient to wipe out the speed losses from emulating the old architecture
How do you know that?
I don't know what the exact technology behind this "rosetta" thing is
Ah, you don't!
The fact is that Apple have been running Intel versions of OSX for 5 years now, so you can bet that they DO know and have already tested and measured the performance of PPC OSX apps under Rosetta emulation. If it truly sucked they wouldn't be making this move.
still sue the domain owner(s) for technically offering pointers to pointers
This is what I just don't get. If I put up a web site with a link pointing to something illegal on someone elses server, then how can I be sued for that?
If someone reads my web page, they pull the web page source from my computer to theirs to display it on their screen. At that point my involvement in the process is over. The link in the web page is merely a pointer as you said, a sign post if you will. If they click on the link, it then their system goes straight to the illegal content, not mine. And when the data transfers, it doesn't funnel through me.
So what basis does anyone have for suing me? For putting up a sign post that says... "illegal stuff over there". I don't think so.
Main Entry: obviate Function: transitive verb Inflected Form(s): -ated; -ating Etymology: Late Latin obviatus, past participle of obviare to meet, withstand, from Latin obviam : to anticipate and prevent (as a situation) or make unnecessary (as an action)
And how exactly does obviating make any sense in your sentence?
People are.... anticipating the fact that they have nothing useful to contribute... um, no that doesn't work.
People are.... preventing the fact that they have nothing useful to contribute... no, that doesn't work.
I wouldn't call trying to sound clever by using words you clearly don't understand a useful contribution either.
It may not be for you, as you obviously don't care about language. But for others it is. And someone has to speak out about correct spelling and use of diction in this forum every now and then. Personally I welcome it.
Who are you to tell him his view isn't important? At least he had something intelligent to say.
Wouldn't you want launchd to stop on an error, rather than continuing with undefined behavior?
And how do you think initd handles things in that situation? In my experience when initd executes a script or binary that barfs or exits prematurely, initd disappears up its own backside trying to re-run the offending item. Your system doesn't stop with some graceful error, oh no, initd goes CPU bound and the console is flooded with "init is respawning too rapidly" messages.
launchd is a decent attempt being some sanity to the proceedings.
As long as this is all done in a clean room environment, so we can minimize the risk of having superbug's crossing the sheep human barrier...
And THAT is what scares me the most. Never mind the ethics of the situation, blurring the boundaries between species is guaranteed to have unintended, accidental consequences with respect to new mutant diseases.
If it came down to a choice and it was my choice to make, I'd put a stop to it right now, its too dangerous. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, and I'd rather spare numerous thousands the suffering and loss a mutant superbug would bring, that risk all just to prolong the life of a handful of people.
I hope you learn before you die that quality, value and a full rich life is about what you do with each moment. Not how long that life span happens to be. If you need some inspiration on how to do this, then I recommend you read: Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom
ArsTechnia have done a stunning write up on changes in Tiger, and they report....
"Thanks to the kernel hooks that make Spotlight so magically responsive, the Tiger Finder can no longer be surprised. It reflects file system changes instantly, regardless of their source."... and then they have a Quicktime demo showing a finder view, and a Terminal (shell) view of the same directory with files created in the shell appearing in the Finder window.
Slashdot Mirror
Well that seems to make life a little more complicated for Linux. No mention of Apple in that article though, and I can't imagine Intel saying "no" to Apple if they decide they want in on EF too. Microsoft certainly aren't in a position to dictate an Apple exclusion deal with Intel either. Not in the post anti-trust world they now live in. Apples lawyers would be frothing at the mouth if MS tried a stunt like that.
I don't think MS will be able to engineer a position where they are the only technology route to this new type of content. Intel are part of the cadre of vendors working on this, and with Apple working so closely with Intel now, any hooks into this new technology will also be available to Apple (subject to the appropriate licensing deal). And you can bet that Jobs isn't going to sit back on his laurels and watch this unfold without getting in on the act. MS will have to share this market with Apple at least. Though where this leaves the Linux distros I don't know.
Intel also produced them for a while too, as part of the FAB-6 sale. At some point (I don't remember when) IBM got in on the act too. The new Alpha systems that are sold today (and they are still selling some) contain Alpha chips produced by IBM.
Huh? Compaq didn't have a FAB. The one that DEC had got sold off to Intel as part the DEC vs. Intel law suit way before Compaq took over the helm.
Compaq killed the Alpha because of two reasons:
1) bad, visionless (small) box-pushing mentality of its senior management. All the flim flam about cost was just an excuse. At the time Compaq announced the death of the Alpha chip and the move to Itanuim, the Alpha server line was enjoying its biggest growth numbers for many years, and it was making strong profits.
2) Compaq management, being so close to Intel and all, believed the Intel hype about IA64's mass market appeal, and the economies of scale that would bring. If nothing else, Intel managed to convince a competitor to commit an act of infanticide and in so doing, removed a serious threat to the adoption of IA64. Just imagine if Alpha had not died. What little market share IA64 has managed to grab would have been beaten to death by faster, stronger and cheaper Alpha chips.
Spot on! I completely agree with you.
Sure, Slashdot is a conversational forum, and people write "from the hip" without absolute consideration to their spelling. But come on
How am I supposed to take anything someone says seriously, when their text is riddled with grammatical errors that my 14 year old nephew mastered years ago.
Native English speakers who can't express themselves without making childish mistakes like that, just appear thick! And it devalues anything of real importance they may have to say.
Have you also considered that if you practice spelling correctly all the time, then you're less likely to screw up when it really matters?
Thought I'd mention a bit of history (long since forgotten) that Marcus Ranum was also the author of the UberMUD and UnterMUD, mud engines. Two very nice mud cores, written in K&R C that ran on Ultrix. Both had their own strengths and weaknesses. UberMUD was my favourite, as it had its own scripting language called "U". UnterMUD didn't so it was harder to develop on, but its filestore backend was much smarter than Uber's. A union of the two would have been the perfect MUD engine IMO.
and will have no problem finding its way onto many casual users desktops.
You think so. Well consider this
How many years has it taken for Linux distros to reach a point where they can install flawlessly on every desktop PC variation out there? Well, we're still waiting on that one. They are very good now, but still screw up on things as basic as sound card support.
If Apple really wanted to reach out more to the unwashed mases, then what would make more sense ( I think ) would be for Apple to license VMware. To engineer a version of OSXi that runs flawlessly inside a modified version of VMware. Then to package them together as one product, and sell that. Hey presto
But never the less with a condescending, superior than thou, up your own ass kind of attitude. And you're even worse in this reply. Take a look in the mirror, its not him who needs to grow up!
I'm 40, pay my own bills, and to the best of my knowledge I don't have any cheetos-orange-fingered Everquest friends.
So are the DOJ offering to pay for all this? Storing that volume of data isn't free, in fact its bloody expensive. Why should the ISP's have to pay for this themselves, they won't get any benefit from it.
Its like a hidden tax
Once again? That's impossible with a first reply, you know. But hey, no matter. Although if you don't even bother to check who you're talking with...
Ah
I don't claim anything about comments, or any specific little detail
Then why are you wasting your time writing on this thread? The mandatory requirement (or lack of) comments as part of source code, within the GPL, is what jbolden and I were debating.
Once again you completely miss the point.
Sure, the latter form is the most useful, but does the GPL specifically require it? No.
Does it distinguish between source code with and without comments? No.
Does the presence or absence of comments affect the compilation or run time execution of a program, its function, essence or purpose? No, No, No, No, No.
You try and make a case that comments are an integral part of the source code by exaggerating the use of "preferred". When the very meaning of the word depicts an expression of choice.
No matter how much you want it to be true, your straw man argument falls over all by itself.
My view may be "warped" but it is accurate
No its not.
There is no requirement of "machine-readable" you seem to be fabricating that.
I suggest you re-read the post you replied to. The guy quotes from the GPL, where it explicitly states "machine-readable" in paragraph 3a. No fabrication on my part.
"The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable."
Well I read that twice, and I don't see the word "comments" anywhere in that definition. Would you like to try again ?
Comments are part of source code
The GPL doesn't state that or ask for it. Its only requirement is for machine-readable source code. Comments make source code human readable. The machine doesn't understand them; the (insert-your-language-here) pre-processor just tosses them in the bit bucket at compile time.
According to your warped view, an Apple source tar ball with all the source comments stripped out would be less objectionable than with the source comments left in.
Yeah, right
The power boost isn't sufficient to wipe out the speed losses from emulating the old architecture
How do you know that?
I don't know what the exact technology behind this "rosetta" thing is
Ah, you don't!
The fact is that Apple have been running Intel versions of OSX for 5 years now, so you can bet that they DO know and have already tested and measured the performance of PPC OSX apps under Rosetta emulation. If it truly sucked they wouldn't be making this move.
On my 15" PowerBook I have F1-F12 keys and the Optical Eject key is where F13 would be if it existed.
I read it as him saying that they only allow the app to write to its own directory, or subdirectory in Program Files, not the whole thing.
You forgot one
3) As a source of revenue for the state. Prisons are big business and a convenient source of cheap labour.
still sue the domain owner(s) for technically offering pointers to pointers
This is what I just don't get. If I put up a web site with a link pointing to something illegal on someone elses server, then how can I be sued for that?
If someone reads my web page, they pull the web page source from my computer to theirs to display it on their screen. At that point my involvement in the process is over. The link in the web page is merely a pointer as you said, a sign post if you will. If they click on the link, it then their system goes straight to the illegal content, not mine. And when the data transfers, it doesn't funnel through me.
So what basis does anyone have for suing me? For putting up a sign post that says
Main Entry: obviate
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): -ated; -ating
Etymology: Late Latin obviatus, past participle of obviare to meet, withstand, from Latin obviam
: to anticipate and prevent (as a situation) or make unnecessary (as an action)
And how exactly does obviating make any sense in your sentence?
People are
People are
I wouldn't call trying to sound clever by using words you clearly don't understand a useful contribution either.
FYI it's not a big deal
It may not be for you, as you obviously don't care about language. But for others it is. And someone has to speak out about correct spelling and use of diction in this forum every now and then. Personally I welcome it.
Who are you to tell him his view isn't important? At least he had something intelligent to say.
Wouldn't you want launchd to stop on an error, rather than continuing with undefined behavior?
And how do you think initd handles things in that situation? In my experience when initd executes a script or binary that barfs or exits prematurely, initd disappears up its own backside trying to re-run the offending item. Your system doesn't stop with some graceful error, oh no, initd goes CPU bound and the console is flooded with "init is respawning too rapidly" messages.
launchd is a decent attempt being some sanity to the proceedings.
As long as this is all done in a clean room environment, so we can minimize the risk of having superbug's crossing the sheep human barrier...
And THAT is what scares me the most. Never mind the ethics of the situation, blurring the boundaries between species is guaranteed to have unintended, accidental consequences with respect to new mutant diseases.
If it came down to a choice and it was my choice to make, I'd put a stop to it right now, its too dangerous. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, and I'd rather spare numerous thousands the suffering and loss a mutant superbug would bring, that risk all just to prolong the life of a handful of people.
I hope you learn before you die that quality, value and a full rich life is about what you do with each moment. Not how long that life span happens to be. If you need some inspiration on how to do this, then I recommend you read: Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom
ArsTechnia have done a stunning write up on changes in Tiger, and they report
"Thanks to the kernel hooks that make Spotlight so magically responsive, the Tiger Finder can no longer be surprised. It reflects file system changes instantly, regardless of their source."