Europe has no software patents, and even if they get through, it's very unlikely that they would work retroactively. In other words, UNIX patents mean nothing in Europe.
To show a copyright infringement, SCO would have to: 1. Demonstrate that it is the copyright holder (that pretty much means defeating Novel/SuSe in another lawsuit) 2. Show precisely what pieces of code have been copied from Unix into Linux.
Strangely enough, SCO doesn't seem/want to do either.
One of KDE's goals is to provide an integrated framework. You can embed a KDE spreadsheet into a kword document with standard kparts, but you can't do it into abiword (well, you can convert it to a common format, import, etc, but that's not integration). What I'm trying to say is that KDE apps will (in most cases) work better with KDE apps than with Gnome apps.
As a KDE user, I will choose, when possible, a kde app over an equivalent gnome one; the letter k speeds up the process:)
IMHO, China has way too much to lose from such an action. I'd say that a lot of their foreign relations (and potentially trade) would be compromised. The relationship between China and Taiwan can hardly be "internal". IIRC the United States sold weapons to Taiwan a while ago.
I'd speculate China is very much interested in the lucrative semiconductor bussiness (Taiwan is clearly way ahead of China in this respect; technology exports to China are controlled), and certainly not in conquering Taiwan at any cost (read: very destructive war).
Bootlegging can't possibly produce high-quality material. If I were MPAA, I'd consider it "free advertising", pretty much like Napster was "free advertising" for RIAA... Sure, piracy is bad, and it certainly affects sales negatively. But a bootlegged copy is simply "low-quality spoiler" as far as I'm concerned.
And please stop talking about cellphones with cameras. Those usually have cheapass cmos image sensors and optics, they can barely catch a face right.
I would always use an opensource program instead of a proprietary one, if the two are functionally equivalent. Opensource is shitware proof (ad/spy-ware). The latest gaim works quite well under Windoze
It's good, at least, that gaim/trillian developers collaborate in cracking proprietary protocols.
Your comment is implying that mysql is actually faster than postgresql. That's simply wrong.
Yes, if you run simple queries in a single user scenario you do get better performance with mysql than with pg. With more complex queries and more users however, the simplistic query optimizer and concurrency manager that mysql has makes it perform worse than pg.
Some security-concious companies *will* fix their
security problems quickly. By releasing an exploit into the wild and not letting them know you're basically denying them the right to fix their software before script kitties can take action (in other words you kill the innocent as well)
So, I'd say the best way to do it would be to - 1. let them know, anonymously, of their security problem. 2. Wait 2-3 days. 3. Publish the exploit (underground channels/freenet/...).
Most people who worked with it will tell you the same thing: as far as programability is concerned, Symbian OS just sucks...
Symbian was designed for devices with small memory. This, unfortunately, comes at a price - even doing simple string operations can be quite a chore. Memory is really cheap these days, so its advantage is diminishing
I do own a Psion Revo, and its doing its job excellently. It never required a reboot, unlike my Zaurus PDA which did (although the current ROMs are quite stable). But...
With a linux programming background, developing for the Zaurus simply means that you have to get used to its resolution & a few other minor quirks (I never developed for WinCE, but I'm pretty sure a Windoze developer would say that it's pretty much the same thing). Developing for Symbian means learning a new philosophy.
Learning a new programming philosophy is worth it when the number of devices sold for that OS is high (e.g. Palm). But Symbian devices never sold that well (at least in the US).
This is probably one of the reasons Psion uses WinCE for its newest Netbook.
Oh wait, I guess they're French so it doesn't really matter...
Let's face it - climate IS changing. It doesn't take a PhD to realize that each and every person on this planet converts chemical energy into thermal energy (those who have a car to a much higher extent than the others). Even without the greenhouse effect, that would still be a lot of heat.
Does this mean that Xbox2 won't run Xbox 1 titles ?
Granted, they could do what PS2 does - have the old chip somewhere on the board doing "collateral" stuff when PS2 games are played, and use it for PS1 games as a full processor - but that's not very cost effective when somebody else is manufacturing your chips.
Then you can probably do quantum cryptography as well. Quantum cryptography has the nice property that an evesdropper cannot intercept the message without destroying it.
Anyway, RSA can be broken by factorization. Diffie-Hellman however requires the inversion of the discrete exponential function. While quantum computing can factorize in P-time, it cannot inverse an arbitrary function in a reasonable amount of time. It can do it more efficiently than a normal computer (2^(k/2) time as opposed to 2^k with Lov Grover's search algorithm, where k is the number of bits), but it's still exponential.
In any case, I wouldn't worry yet... Shor's algorithm, for 512 bits, requires in the order of tens of thousands qubits (with realistic quantum error correction). So far the highest number of qubits that were put together is around 10.
CNOT has been done before. IBM in fact has demonstrated Shor's algorithm on 15 (the smallest number that can be factorized with that algorithm). This required 7 qubits.
In a regular computer, data flows through "static" gates. In a quantum computer, the data (qubits) is stationary and the "gates" are in fact carefully crafted laser pulses (the article is not very specific about this particular CNOT gate though)
1-2 qubits is easy. More qubits are quite difficult to put together. That's why most of the current quantum computers barely do 10 qubits.
Errors are of analogical nature. Correcting them (with Q-ECC codes) is quite expensive - a more reliable qubit requires a couple normal qubits and gates (I say more reliable because the whole thing is probabilistic)
Quantum data is very "transient" - it cannot be copied. It can be teleported however (teleportation destroys the source). Storage is however difficult (keeping a superposition of qubits coherent for humanly-observable times is almost intractable)
A quantum computer can do an operation on 2^k superpositions at the same time (in other words, exponential work in constant time). Selecting the "right" answer from the superposition of 2^k results takes however 2^(k/2) (Lov Grover's algorithm) - so it's still exponential. This is one of the reasons quantum computers were not shown to be more powerful than regular ones (i.e QP != P) . Yes, Shor's factorization algorithm works in polynomial time on quantum computers, and is furthermore quite efficient, but factorization has been shown to be in P anyway (although the current "regular" algorithm is not efficient at all)
How about M$ buying its way out of the antitrust trial through the 2000 elections ? Isn't that a conflict of interests as well? It's certainly a more disgusting one.
I'm certainly not for State ownership, but it seems to me that in the US the companies are owning the state (and the only thing that changes when Democrats and Republicans replace each other is the dominant industry).
As a member who fortunately hasn't installed the 5 star yet, it seems to me that Mandrake simply wanted some betatesters before releasing the distribution to everybody (nice priviledge, I must say).
Bugs can happen, tons of updates in 2 weeks simply mean "beta".
The main difference is how the bus deals with transactions. SCSI is a split transaction bus, which means that you tell the drive - give me D, A, C, B (in a non-blocking way). The drive will give you back data in the order it finds more convenient (let's say A, B, C, D if it were at one end of the drive) - it effectively rearanges the requests/responses. The operating system already does that to some extent (elevator algorithm), but the OS can't do a better job than the disk controller itself. This is very crucial for servers, where multitasking happens a lot (clearly mutt won't see any difference)
The second - CPU utilization. A SCSI controller does a lot more work by itself than an IDE one - therefore it requires much less interaction with the CPU.
Then we have the bus bandwidth - this is probably no longer an issue, as ATA/66/100/133 can pipe enough bytes per second
Finally, the most important one - manufacturers simply don't make a 10k RPM hardrive IDE drive... And 10k - 7200 makes a hell of a difference.
Moore's law is about transistor counts (doubling every 18 month, and not speed, as it is widely believed). If you look at that, we're almost there - the latest Itanium has about 0.5 Billion transistors on-die. If the trend continues, we are going to see processors with a transistor count similar to the number of neurons of a human being rather soon.
Now, the real problem is what to do with them:). Itanium, as a server chip, allocates most them to caches- that's hardly useful for AI.
There are quite a few AI researchers who believe that what AI is not missing computing power but instead something fundamental (theoretical).
P.S. To all Matrix fans who will very likely flame me: the AI in the movie is only a metaphore.
... since it was precisely Carmack who said (2y ago I believe) that "All linux games combined didn't sell more copies than an average windows one" (very aprox. quote)
Neither of these 2 companies actually make money with Linux sales (I believe that they do cover porting costs, but nothing more than that)
Yes, LGP is great - my heart is with them. When a good game (that I also like) comes from them, my money will be with them, too...
Well, there are two companies that understood compatibility (Intel and MS), and look where they are now... Now how long did it take for 32 bit to truly replace 16 bit ? About a decade. If it takes Linux a decade to replace Windows (with compatibility tricks, if necessary) I'll personally be very happy about it.
PS2 runs PS1 games, but you also get so much more from a PS2 game.
Native drivers are obviously the right choice in the long term, but emulation is something that can break the vicious adoption cycle (hardware manufacturers aren't going to provide drivers until there is enough demand, while demand is small because of lack of drivers).
Take a look at the linux games area - Loki is dead, Transgaming is alive and well... Loki's approach was technically superior (very stable ports as opposed to games which play ok, but only ok), but the economics were not.
Emulation is good for creating a market; when the market is big enough, native ports and drivers will arrive as well.
Assuming you're using a real DB like PG (not mysql, I mean), with persistent connections you're gonna create a new connection for each user... that just sucks big time... For PG it implies spawning a new DB process.
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Europe has no software patents, and even if they get through, it's very unlikely that they would work retroactively. In other words, UNIX patents mean nothing in Europe.
To show a copyright infringement, SCO would have to: 1. Demonstrate that it is the copyright holder (that pretty much means defeating Novel/SuSe in another lawsuit) 2. Show precisely what pieces of code have been copied from Unix into Linux.
Strangely enough, SCO doesn't seem/want to do either.
One of KDE's goals is to provide an integrated framework. You can embed a KDE spreadsheet into a kword document with standard kparts, but you can't do it into abiword (well, you can convert it to a common format, import, etc, but that's not integration). What I'm trying to say is that KDE apps will (in most cases) work better with KDE apps than with Gnome apps.
As a KDE user, I will choose, when possible, a kde app over an equivalent gnome one; the letter k speeds up the process :)
I'd speculate China is very much interested in the lucrative semiconductor bussiness (Taiwan is clearly way ahead of China in this respect; technology exports to China are controlled), and certainly not in conquering Taiwan at any cost (read: very destructive war).
And please stop talking about cellphones with cameras. Those usually have cheapass cmos image sensors and optics, they can barely catch a face right.
IMHO, that's worst assumption one could ever make ...
It's good, at least, that gaim/trillian developers collaborate in cracking proprietary protocols.
Yes, if you run simple queries in a single user scenario you do get better performance with mysql than with pg. With more complex queries and more users however, the simplistic query optimizer and concurrency manager that mysql has makes it perform worse than pg.
Plural of schema is schemata
A virus is pretty much just genetic material (DNA). I'll be really impressed when they manage to create a cell (bacterium) from scratch.
So, I'd say the best way to do it would be to - 1. let them know, anonymously, of their security problem. 2. Wait 2-3 days. 3. Publish the exploit (underground channels/freenet/...).
Shouldn't we be looking for ways to cool down the planet at the same time ?
Symbian was designed for devices with small memory. This, unfortunately, comes at a price - even doing simple string operations can be quite a chore. Memory is really cheap these days, so its advantage is diminishing
I do own a Psion Revo, and its doing its job excellently. It never required a reboot, unlike my Zaurus PDA which did (although the current ROMs are quite stable). But ...
With a linux programming background, developing for the Zaurus simply means that you have to get used to its resolution & a few other minor quirks (I never developed for WinCE, but I'm pretty sure a Windoze developer would say that it's pretty much the same thing). Developing for Symbian means learning a new philosophy. Learning a new programming philosophy is worth it when the number of devices sold for that OS is high (e.g. Palm). But Symbian devices never sold that well (at least in the US).
This is probably one of the reasons Psion uses WinCE for its newest Netbook.
Let's face it - climate IS changing. It doesn't take a PhD to realize that each and every person on this planet converts chemical energy into thermal energy (those who have a car to a much higher extent than the others). Even without the greenhouse effect, that would still be a lot of heat.
Granted, they could do what PS2 does - have the old chip somewhere on the board doing "collateral" stuff when PS2 games are played, and use it for PS1 games as a full processor - but that's not very cost effective when somebody else is manufacturing your chips.
Anyway, RSA can be broken by factorization. Diffie-Hellman however requires the inversion of the discrete exponential function. While quantum computing can factorize in P-time, it cannot inverse an arbitrary function in a reasonable amount of time. It can do it more efficiently than a normal computer (2^(k/2) time as opposed to 2^k with Lov Grover's search algorithm, where k is the number of bits), but it's still exponential.
In any case, I wouldn't worry yet ... Shor's algorithm, for 512 bits, requires in the order of tens of thousands qubits (with realistic quantum error correction). So far the highest number of qubits that were put together is around 10.
In a regular computer, data flows through "static" gates. In a quantum computer, the data (qubits) is stationary and the "gates" are in fact carefully crafted laser pulses (the article is not very specific about this particular CNOT gate though)
1-2 qubits is easy. More qubits are quite difficult to put together. That's why most of the current quantum computers barely do 10 qubits.
Errors are of analogical nature. Correcting them (with Q-ECC codes) is quite expensive - a more reliable qubit requires a couple normal qubits and gates (I say more reliable because the whole thing is probabilistic)
Quantum data is very "transient" - it cannot be copied. It can be teleported however (teleportation destroys the source). Storage is however difficult (keeping a superposition of qubits coherent for humanly-observable times is almost intractable)
A quantum computer can do an operation on 2^k superpositions at the same time (in other words, exponential work in constant time). Selecting the "right" answer from the superposition of 2^k results takes however 2^(k/2) (Lov Grover's algorithm) - so it's still exponential. This is one of the reasons quantum computers were not shown to be more powerful than regular ones (i.e QP != P) . Yes, Shor's factorization algorithm works in polynomial time on quantum computers, and is furthermore quite efficient, but factorization has been shown to be in P anyway (although the current "regular" algorithm is not efficient at all)
I'm certainly not for State ownership, but it seems to me that in the US the companies are owning the state (and the only thing that changes when Democrats and Republicans replace each other is the dominant industry).
Bugs can happen, tons of updates in 2 weeks simply mean "beta".
The second - CPU utilization. A SCSI controller does a lot more work by itself than an IDE one - therefore it requires much less interaction with the CPU.
Then we have the bus bandwidth - this is probably no longer an issue, as ATA/66/100/133 can pipe enough bytes per second
Finally, the most important one - manufacturers simply don't make a 10k RPM hardrive IDE drive ... And 10k - 7200 makes a hell of a difference.
Now, the real problem is what to do with them :). Itanium, as a server chip, allocates most them to caches- that's hardly useful for AI.
There are quite a few AI researchers who believe that what AI is not missing computing power but instead something fundamental (theoretical).
P.S. To all Matrix fans who will very likely flame me: the AI in the movie is only a metaphore.
Neither of these 2 companies actually make money with Linux sales (I believe that they do cover porting costs, but nothing more than that)
Yes, LGP is great - my heart is with them. When a good game (that I also like) comes from them, my money will be with them, too ...
PS2 runs PS1 games, but you also get so much more from a PS2 game.
Take a look at the linux games area - Loki is dead, Transgaming is alive and well ... Loki's approach was technically superior (very stable ports as opposed to games which play ok, but only ok), but the economics were not.
Emulation is good for creating a market; when the market is big enough, native ports and drivers will arrive as well.
Assuming you're using a real DB like PG (not mysql, I mean), with persistent connections you're gonna create a new connection for each user ... that just sucks big time ... For PG it implies spawning a new DB process.
But connection pooling scales much, much better than persistent connections ... Especially when each user makes only a couple of requests.