Re:way behind hubbard, toklein and asimov
on
New Heinlein Novel
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· Score: 1
Toklein published at least 15, including the Allakabeth, Simarillian, a book of poetry, and the 12 volume History of Middle Earth series.
The History of Middle-earth series was written by J. R. R.'s son, Christopher.
And for Pete's sake, at least spell correctly the names and works of the authors you're pretending to be an expert on. It's Tolkien, and it's The Silmarillion and Akallabeth. It's Middle-earth, not "Middle Earth," and it's Andromeda," not "Anromedea."
Point 2) Where did they get the gun? Notice how everyone is 100% ready to jump on the video game... my question... WHERE THE FUCK DID THEY GET THE GUN? I mean, of course the gun isn't dangerous. No way. Guns never kill people.
Blaming the gun is as bad as blaming the video game.
Lack or morals and/or intelligence is the real issue here.
Jeremy
Re:One of the things I find annoying...
on
Masters of Doom
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· Score: 4, Interesting
Doom and Wolfenstein 3D were vastly technologically different. Whereas Wolfenstein 3D was tile-based, had nothing but orthogonal angles and no height, Doom had varying angles, varying heights, stairs, elevators, and all sorts of other niceties that Wolfenstein 3D never had.
First Person shooters after Doom were called "Doom like" because "Wolfenstein 3D like" wouldn't have done them justice. It simply wasn't in the same technological arena.
That would explain the "register" variables. That keyword has been ignored by compilers for a long time, and so when you see it in code, it is almost always old code, copied from somewhere.
Or it means new code that has to run under old compilers; compilers that may not optimize access to such variables otherwise. Even the Python source code includes register variables, and continues to include register variables, simply because it runs on so many platforms.
What I find absolutely sickening is that in a world where people starve just blocks from executives and companies worth millions of dollars; where suicide bombers and terrorists and assassins run rampant; where an entire continent goes without AIDS drugs to satisfy the intellectual property "rights" of companies in the US, you're "sickened" by the guy who sends you email you don't want.
After reading this article, which I found quite interesting, I did come to a rather shocking conclusion. Although RMS is obviously a very talented and intelligent individual, he seems hellbent on enforcing his ethics and morals on others.
What has RMS done to "enforce" his ethics on morals on others? Preaching is not enforcing. Being opinionated is not enforcing. Until RMS knocks on your front door with a baseball bat in hand, he's not enforcing anything.
He refuses to have anything to do with anyone who even has the slightest relationship with a non-free program. In effect he and his cohorts are effective enforcing their beliefs on others or cutting them completely off from their organization.
People choose their friends as they see fit. It's not a basic human right to be friends with RMS or the FSF. It is, however, a basic human right to be able to choose your own associations, and RMS has chosen to base his decisions on adherence to his code of ethics. There's nothing "enforcing" about that.
How can you promote "free software" when you don't promote the "freedom to choose".
The "freedom to choose" doesn't include the freedom to oppress others. In RMS' viewpoint, Taking Free Software and turning it non-Free constitutes oppression of others. Again, he's perfectly free to hold his own opinion in that regard.
It's better to use some free software then no free software,
And the GPL allows that. What it doesn't allow is taking Free Software and turning it non-Free.
RMS is effectively limiting his friends and support by enforcing his views on them
Again, he's not enforcing his ideas on people. And who cares if he's limiting his friends and support? It's his choice.
Maybe he needs to learn to respect that some people might want to go down a middle ground,
The middle ground is almost never the moral high ground.
For example, OS X, a brilliant combination of free as well as proprietary software.
It still has bugs, bugs that can't be fixed by the users of the software. In RMS' view, that's a crime against those users.
Except if the GPL is invalid, then SCO had no right to distribute IBM's GPLed software in the Linux kernel, and is in violation of copyright law anyway.
How many backups do you keep? How many do you have on rotation? If you were compromised 5 months ago would you still have your backups since then? Or would you have overwritten them with more recent backups?
It's not that the FSF didn't have backups, it's that they've overwritten them with data that may itself have been compromised. I don't know many people who keep backups from 5 months ago.
The problem here, is that the bandwidth bottleneck will make your server either (a) run out of processes/threads, (b) run out of ports/sockets, or (c) run out of memory from spawning all of the processes/threads to handle all of the stalled connections.
Problems (a) and (c) are really problems with Apache's chosen server model (thread/process per connection) rather than with the slashdotting itself. Choosing a more appropriate server (such as thttpd, which also does throttling) pretty much solves those problems for you.
Making spammers pay for each spam they send? Sounds a lot like Daniel Bernstein's Internet Mail 2000 recommendation, except that this idea has far more potential for abuse. As much as I like Paul Graham's innovative ideas, this one is definitely both late on the scene and inferior to IM2000.
Give me a few months and I could make a damn good couterfeit $20 bill if I only had the paper and the press that makes them.
Which is exactly why both the company that produces the paper and the company that produces the printing press are under contractual obligation not to sell either to anyone but the US government.
"Contractual obligation," you say? I pity the poor fool who tries to go behind the federal government's back when it comes to the money it prints. And you thought IRS audits were bad...
I believe that using a statistical approach like this is a step in the right direction.
A step in the right direction for translation, perhaps, but not for understanding.
For me the holy grail is when I can converse with a computer meaningfully. I believe a similar approach will be required for the computer to "understand" language, and to be able to formulate a coherent and appropriate response.
Do you really want you computer using a statistical approach to trying to understand what you're telling it to rm?
microsoft is finally supporting a community effort to port their technology to the open source community; if only by not suing, though most likely unwillingly.
Or maybe they're waiting until a large number of people have implemented their systems on Mono before they sue, forcing all those people to switch platforms to Windows if they don't want to throw away their investment.
but why would you not throw everything you have behind mono?
Because it would make me dependent on the good nature of a company that's been shown to be anything but good natured.
What, pray tell, makes listening to music while cycling any more dangerous than listening to music while driving? Cyclists have as much a right to use their roads in exactly the same manner as you gas guzzlers.
If you hit a cyclist, listening to music or not, it's your fault, your negligence.
Electronic actually came from Greek, electron, electros, which means "amber" (you know, the amber you rub that builds up static electricity? That's the one).
Now, you want to use this in your BSD license UberChat application. You can't just use Translator, because then your app would need to be LGPL as well.
This is where you're wrong. You can always link (2-clause) BSD licensed code with code of any other license, including the (L)GPL, without relicensing the BSD code. It's not like you link with the (L)GPL and suddenly your code is required to be less free -- your code can be released under whatever freer than the (L)GPL license you prefer, and linking with some form of the GPL won't change that.
The (L)GPL may suddenly say that your code must be licensed under the same license, but all that means is that there's now an implicit double license in place. With your code, people can now choose between your freer BSD license, or the (possibly viral) (L)GPL license. I don't think the common choice is hard to predict...
Absolutely it should be open for use by all. GPL software is absolutely "open for use" by one and all. The GPL even states it has to be.
Yes, the GPL states that...and much more. The GPL also states that publically released code depending on GPLed code also has to be GPLed. Thus GPLed code is only "open for use" by all who are willing to license their own code (i.e., the code developed with their own non-tax money) under the GPL.
If the government releases source code under the BSD license, that source code is truly "open for all to use." If the government releases source code under the GPL, it's effectively dictating the license other people must develop their own code under. And that's not right.
They're actually slightly faster than their bounded cousins; their bounded cousins have to check the bound on every iteration through the loop (all these functions are fundamentally just loops), whereas the unsafe versions can simply not do that check.
I've also used Python for this, but I feel that Python's asyncore is still too buggy for prime time, and also the asynchore library is slightly more complex to utilize.
I can agree that it's probably somewhat more complex to use, but "too buggy for prime time"? It's been used in numerous projects, not the least of which is Zope. It's been used in production "prime time" situations for several years now with no major difficulties. At the very least, it's 847 lines of code. That's about 30 minutes of reading.
P.S. Proverbs havent been around for 'thousands of years', more like 16 to 17 hundred.
Well, considering the New Testament quotes Proverbs, it must've been around for at least 2,000 or so years. It's also one of the oldest Jewish books, and I believe is considered to have been authored more than 3,000 years ago.
Slashdot Mirror
The History of Middle-earth series was written by J. R. R.'s son, Christopher.
And for Pete's sake, at least spell correctly the names and works of the authors you're pretending to be an expert on. It's Tolkien, and it's The Silmarillion and Akallabeth. It's Middle-earth, not "Middle Earth," and it's Andromeda," not "Anromedea."
Jeremy
Maybe I'm just being an anal-retentive grammar Nazi, but I simply can't respect an author who uses the non-word "virii" in his works.
Sorry. It's simply not a word. He might as well be writing in l33tspeak.
Jeremy
Too bad there are 10,000 square centimeters in a square meter.
The metric system only helps if people know how to use it
Jeremy
IPV6 :)
It works in Konqueror, of course.
Blaming the gun is as bad as blaming the video game.
Lack or morals and/or intelligence is the real issue here.
Jeremy
Doom and Wolfenstein 3D were vastly technologically different. Whereas Wolfenstein 3D was tile-based, had nothing but orthogonal angles and no height, Doom had varying angles, varying heights, stairs, elevators, and all sorts of other niceties that Wolfenstein 3D never had.
First Person shooters after Doom were called "Doom like" because "Wolfenstein 3D like" wouldn't have done them justice. It simply wasn't in the same technological arena.
Jeremy
Or it means new code that has to run under old compilers; compilers that may not optimize access to such variables otherwise. Even the Python source code includes register variables, and continues to include register variables, simply because it runs on so many platforms.
Jeremy
What I find absolutely sickening is that in a world where people starve just blocks from executives and companies worth millions of dollars; where suicide bombers and terrorists and assassins run rampant; where an entire continent goes without AIDS drugs to satisfy the intellectual property "rights" of companies in the US, you're "sickened" by the guy who sends you email you don't want.
Amazing.
Jeremy
What has RMS done to "enforce" his ethics on morals on others? Preaching is not enforcing. Being opinionated is not enforcing. Until RMS knocks on your front door with a baseball bat in hand, he's not enforcing anything.
People choose their friends as they see fit. It's not a basic human right to be friends with RMS or the FSF. It is, however, a basic human right to be able to choose your own associations, and RMS has chosen to base his decisions on adherence to his code of ethics. There's nothing "enforcing" about that.
The "freedom to choose" doesn't include the freedom to oppress others. In RMS' viewpoint, Taking Free Software and turning it non-Free constitutes oppression of others. Again, he's perfectly free to hold his own opinion in that regard.
It's better to use some free software then no free software,
And the GPL allows that. What it doesn't allow is taking Free Software and turning it non-Free.
Again, he's not enforcing his ideas on people. And who cares if he's limiting his friends and support? It's his choice.
The middle ground is almost never the moral high ground.
It still has bugs, bugs that can't be fixed by the users of the software. In RMS' view, that's a crime against those users.
Jeremy
Except if the GPL is invalid, then SCO had no right to distribute IBM's GPLed software in the Linux kernel, and is in violation of copyright law anyway.
They're screwed.
Jeremy
How many backups do you keep? How many do you have on rotation? If you were compromised 5 months ago would you still have your backups since then? Or would you have overwritten them with more recent backups?
It's not that the FSF didn't have backups, it's that they've overwritten them with data that may itself have been compromised. I don't know many people who keep backups from 5 months ago.
Jeremy
Problems (a) and (c) are really problems with Apache's chosen server model (thread/process per connection) rather than with the slashdotting itself. Choosing a more appropriate server (such as thttpd, which also does throttling) pretty much solves those problems for you.
Jeremy
Making spammers pay for each spam they send? Sounds a lot like Daniel Bernstein's Internet Mail 2000 recommendation, except that this idea has far more potential for abuse. As much as I like Paul Graham's innovative ideas, this one is definitely both late on the scene and inferior to IM2000.
Jeremy
Which is exactly why both the company that produces the paper and the company that produces the printing press are under contractual obligation not to sell either to anyone but the US government.
"Contractual obligation," you say? I pity the poor fool who tries to go behind the federal government's back when it comes to the money it prints. And you thought IRS audits were bad...
Jeremy
A step in the right direction for translation, perhaps, but not for understanding.
Do you really want you computer using a statistical approach to trying to understand what you're telling it to rm?
Jeremy
Or maybe they're waiting until a large number of people have implemented their systems on Mono before they sue, forcing all those people to switch platforms to Windows if they don't want to throw away their investment.
Because it would make me dependent on the good nature of a company that's been shown to be anything but good natured.
Jeremy
What, pray tell, makes listening to music while cycling any more dangerous than listening to music while driving? Cyclists have as much a right to use their roads in exactly the same manner as you gas guzzlers.
If you hit a cyclist, listening to music or not, it's your fault, your negligence.
Jeremy
Electronic actually came from Greek, electron, electros, which means "amber" (you know, the amber you rub that builds up static electricity? That's the one).
Jeremy
This is where you're wrong. You can always link (2-clause) BSD licensed code with code of any other license, including the (L)GPL, without relicensing the BSD code. It's not like you link with the (L)GPL and suddenly your code is required to be less free -- your code can be released under whatever freer than the (L)GPL license you prefer, and linking with some form of the GPL won't change that.
The (L)GPL may suddenly say that your code must be licensed under the same license, but all that means is that there's now an implicit double license in place. With your code, people can now choose between your freer BSD license, or the (possibly viral) (L)GPL license. I don't think the common choice is hard to predict...
Jeremy
Yes, the GPL states that...and much more. The GPL also states that publically released code depending on GPLed code also has to be GPLed. Thus GPLed code is only "open for use" by all who are willing to license their own code (i.e., the code developed with their own non-tax money) under the GPL.
If the government releases source code under the BSD license, that source code is truly "open for all to use." If the government releases source code under the GPL, it's effectively dictating the license other people must develop their own code under. And that's not right.
Jeremy
You're not describing a simulation, you're describing complexity, the science of emergent property of complex (but on the surface simple) systems.
Jeremy
They're actually slightly faster than their bounded cousins; their bounded cousins have to check the bound on every iteration through the loop (all these functions are fundamentally just loops), whereas the unsafe versions can simply not do that check.
Jeremy
I can agree that it's probably somewhat more complex to use, but "too buggy for prime time"? It's been used in numerous projects, not the least of which is Zope. It's been used in production "prime time" situations for several years now with no major difficulties. At the very least, it's 847 lines of code. That's about 30 minutes of reading.
Jeremy
Well, considering the New Testament quotes Proverbs, it must've been around for at least 2,000 or so years. It's also one of the oldest Jewish books, and I believe is considered to have been authored more than 3,000 years ago.
Jeremy