I've recently filed two patents: 1)Walking by starting out with your right foot before noon EST on even numbered days. 2)Walking by starting out left foot from 1-3 on odd numbered days of the month EST. I'll be by later to collect on you all.
This is a distinctive pattern I've developed and you may not infringe upon it.
A patent on an ordered list? They'll give patents for anything now. Can't someone with half a clue get into power in the US and clean stuff up?
At my age, and married, I'm well past that, I'm not so young. I've been doing tech support for a lot of years in my spare time, just never as my main job. Besides I quite enjoy troubleshooting and cleaning up PCs and educating people about how to keep their PC clean.
oh I do tech support in my spare time while I goto college and take network engineering. I get paid pretty well for casual work, and I've seen some horror stories. Initial scans of ad-aware showing up like 1500+ hits and other ridiculous stuff. Mostly from people who stare at me blankly when I ask them if they understand the concept of a format, or how to install a program.
that reduce the amount of support a non-expert needs
I really don't consider safe-surfing to be an expert need. There seems to be some misconception that any idiot should be able to use a computer and people don't realize that there are basic skills you should pick up before using one in an uncontrolled environment, which includes home use, things like: 1)Copying, moving, deleting, renaming files 2)how to install/uninstall software 3)How to use basic security software like an anti-virus program or anti-spyware applications, including updating and scanning 4)How to retrieve basic information about your computer (i.e. how to browse the control panel, bring up the taskmanager, etc even if you don't know what to do with them once you got them open, at least someone helping you can skip that part) 5)Basic system maintenance like defragging 6)How to run windows update 7)How to avoid clicking on stupid crap 8)How to manage start-ups
A responsible parent would educate their children or not permit them access to the machine when its connected to the internet. Not exactly rocket science. I would much rather take the time to explain to them how to proplerly use stuff, and maybe get them using another browser like mozilla/firefox, then come up with some asinine solution like forcing them to run Vmware.
With that you're trusting them to limit themselves to vmware. What if they hose their install and you're not there? Suddenly they fire up the browser in the host OS and go to town. Education should be a higher priority.
Which is nothing but a band-aid solution to keep people stupid.
I run anti-spyware applications like once every 2-3 months and I never pick up a thing besides a few tracking cookies. Maybe people could expend a lot less effort with this kind of ridiculous setup if they learned how to surf the internet without clicking on every shiny thing that pops up in their face.
Which is fine in that type of situation, but this person is referring to a home use situation, which is entirely different. Setting up to run Vmware simply to surf because you're afraid of spyware is absolutely ridiculous.
Uninstalls? Yeah. I've taken it off my neighbors computer a couple times He has three girls and it finally got so bad that I rebuilt his laptop and installed vmware, then decreed that he was the only person in the house allowed to use the computer without starting vmware first and surfing from it. He backed it up and has been happy ever since.
Who sets up Vmware as a permanent use type of solution like this?
Why not just install anti-spyware tools, use mozilla, and even toss on the tea-timer from spybot.
I guess its been so long since I've been that naive I forget what its like..
Slashdot forges forward on April Fool's day with a slew of half-assed stories that seem completely implausible in an attempt to "fool" the masses. It seems apparent that they've misunderstood the point of the day, churning out endless crap rather that crafting a well thought out april fool's joke. The key to a solid April fools joke is creating something that people would actually swallow. Painting everything pink and going "ZOMG" doesn't quite fit in that. I'd challenge you next year to actually put some thought into it. This idea seems the result of a drunken kegger. You might craft various sources, maybe set up a few fake domains with stories on them to really build up the believability.
Yeah some of the scripted events can get a bit funny since they completely ignore whats going on. My worst AI experience thus far was when I was liberating kvatch. I fired a snowball spell, and at that exact moment a guard dispatched the monster he was fighting, tore directly across the room to the monster I was targetting and stepped in front of the snowball spell. I was labelled a murderer, and the other guard there called me a murderer, then proceeded to tell me I Was awesome and should lead the way.
Then you're not outside their response range. Everytime I try to tag a monster who's just inside my visual range and I miss him just a little, he never responds. They don't respond either when I hit one of a pair standing there. The one hit will come after me, the other stands there.
Oblivion has taken huge strides toward meeting fans of MMOs halfway by building A.I. that really lives alongside the player and ensuring that the actual missions are easily pursued."
I've played this a total of about 25 hours now, and I must say the answer is NO, it has not. The AI is horrible makes amateurish mistakes and isn't a stride towards anything good.
I've seen countless enemies stand there and do nothing while I spend 2 minutes shooting fireballs at them. I've seen them ignore comrades being attacked from range, and get caught on crazy terrain features like stairs.
read up on this and you can see how the xbox360 gimped the AI, and since this game is a port with no real improvements being made on the PC its quite telling about how the game was put together. The AI isn't even the worse part of the game. The level-scaling is attrocious and completely removes the feeling of immersion since every enemy you face is either leveled or replaced with a more powerful version. You only get ahead of meta-gaming and power-leveling.
Is the game enjoyable? Yes it is.
Is the game everything it was reported to be and should be? No, not by a long shot.
Thief had better AI awareness 8 or so years ago. Enemies reacted appropriately to things happening around them. They only react now if you're in range. You can stand there outside their response range, which is not outside your sight range and rain holy fire down around them. Unless you hit them, they don't care. You can do the same thing in a town.
"best known for" and "best" work aren't necessarily the same thing. Often in fact they're not. Many people do their best work when the public eye isn't on them and the public remembers them solely for what got their attention.
When its done at the speed she does it, you learn nothing. Our "textbook" which she never references yet insisted we have is Perl in 24 hours from SAMS by Clinton Pierce. I've learned infinitely more from that then the numerous times I've had to listen to her for 45 minutes. Infact I'm sure I could have learned everything I need to know from that in half the time and have written a challenge exam/program. Its made worse because when she gets wound up..she can't just stop to answer a question. She needs time to gear down, so everytime she goes on about something no one understands its a few minutes before someone can get the question out.
This reminds me of a situation I have this semester. We have an instructor who should not be in charge of a classroom. We've all been giving laptops as part of programs, and its common for us to use them in every class. She does not permit them, even though its a Perl class. If anyone raises the lid, she stops and stares at them until they close it. Saying nothing. She speaks extremely fast, and I do not exaggerate when I say that she does a 2 hour lecture in about 30-45 minutes and leaves no words out. She jumps around very erratically from topic to topic often forgetting to give us important information. Only to remember it 15 minutes later, blurt it out and expect us to insert it into the jumbled mess she's given us. The vast majority of our class often leaves with a bewildered look on our face. In 2 1/2 months I cannot say I've learned a single thing from listening to her. Complaints have been made by myself and several other students, but nothing can be done because she has good scores from some review or something. Yet I can't find 60 students that woudl give her an average score let alone an "above-average" score. She's often referred to as psycho insane. Even umprompted, like "Who's your Perl teacher?" Her lesson plan is the most ridiculous I have ever encountered when it comes to learning a programming lesson. 100% copying pre-existing codes, no trouble-shooting, no assignments that require creativity.
Attendance is mandatory, and I cannot take another course. There is no challenge exam. The academic coordinator has spoken with her, but she's union and has great reviews (which I can only surmise she had to coerce in some manner) so he can't force her to change or make any concessions, like allowing us to work quietly at the back during her lectures. Someone pulled their cellphone out of their pocket (I think they had it on vibrate because none of us noticed anyone with a cell, its not like they were talking on it, just had it in their hand) one day in class, she was the only one who noticed and yelled at them in the middle of class for it. All the rest of us saw was her snap at someone, and we still don't know whos' cell it was that went off.
Wasn't there an article that had the results of this new chip showing that it was like 40% faster than thew lead AMD chip? I thought it was on slashdot but this it the only mention I can find of it..anyone happen to have a link to it?
I have a very common first name with a last name that is a very common religious icon. A google search was 8 pages back before I found anything related to me, and it was from the xorg mailing list. I went a few more pages and found nothing else related to me.
I can count on one hand the amount of CDs I've bought since I first came across napster in like 1999.
However, discounting that get xx CDs for a penny from Columbia house, I can also count on one hand the amount I bought pre-napster. Infact, since I was young and flaked on the columbia house thing, I don't think I actually bought any CDs pre napster.
I like music, but I don't listen to it religiously so it doesn't make sense for me to go out and pay $40-$50 for the type of CD I might like. I'm sure a lot of other people feel the same way.
what is this ranks crap? Levels are broken up by ranks? Did they think people just wouldn't stand for constantly increasing their virtual pen fifteen at a frantic pace it just wouldn't interest them?
We have enough of those games. How about a developer step up and create something thats actually worth getting into. A persistent and huge world so that the players can truly shape and play in it. Its not a roleplaying game if the roleplaying does nothing to further the game. D&D is the poster child for what people think of when they think of roleplaying games. Its the ambassador to the masses and they just urinated all over it.
Is that an appropriate response though?
It seems like the "standard-society-accepted" response, but is that really the answer to the problem? When creating a response to a problem such as this you need to balance everything, including the time factor. How long would it take you to form a viable alternative party? Whats going to happen in that time frame? Could the US become a dictatorship run with an iron-fist before you arrive there? The noblest answer in the world won't help you if it takes x time to bring to fruition and you only have x-10.
We don't know how long we have until things goto hell in a hand-basket, but if they continue to escalate as they are, we probably don't have enough time for some enterprising individual to start a viable alternative and actually come to power. Beyond being appealing, you'd need to sway traditional voters. Those who would vote democrat or republican even if the anti-christ was running the platform. That would be an extremely time consuming proposition. Things are going to come to a head, and we need a solution before that happens.
I think most people can acknowledge that the US is about half-way down a very slippery slope. When you see news stories like this with increasing frequency, you have to ask yourself a question.
What are you going to do about it?
Do you grumble? Do you post about it in some meaningless forum? Create a blog and vent constantly? Goto a party, drink a little too much and carry on about "Bush"?
What's the appropriate response, and how do you go about making sure its heard?
Does that response change as the days and weeks pass? The point is simple:
This type of thing is pretty unacceptable, and what is anyone really doing about it?
We can harp on this stuff all day long, but until someone, or more likely a large group of someones, is willing to stand up and actually make a difference, its not going to change or stop.
Slashdot Mirror
I've recently filed two patents:
1)Walking by starting out with your right foot before noon EST on even numbered days.
2)Walking by starting out left foot from 1-3 on odd numbered days of the month EST.
I'll be by later to collect on you all.
This is a distinctive pattern I've developed and you may not infringe upon it.
A patent on an ordered list? They'll give patents for anything now. Can't someone with half a clue get into power in the US and clean stuff up?
At my age, and married, I'm well past that, I'm not so young. I've been doing tech support for a lot of years in my spare time, just never as my main job. Besides I quite enjoy troubleshooting and cleaning up PCs and educating people about how to keep their PC clean.
we can all hope for something better can't we? ;)
oh I do tech support in my spare time while I goto college and take network engineering. I get paid pretty well for casual work, and I've seen some horror stories.
Initial scans of ad-aware showing up like 1500+ hits and other ridiculous stuff. Mostly from people who stare at me blankly when I ask them if they understand the concept of a format, or how to install a program.
that reduce the amount of support a non-expert needs
I really don't consider safe-surfing to be an expert need. There seems to be some misconception that any idiot should be able to use a computer and people don't realize that there are basic skills you should pick up before using one in an uncontrolled environment, which includes home use, things like:
1)Copying, moving, deleting, renaming files
2)how to install/uninstall software
3)How to use basic security software like an anti-virus program or anti-spyware applications, including updating and scanning
4)How to retrieve basic information about your computer (i.e. how to browse the control panel, bring up the taskmanager, etc even if you don't know what to do with them once you got them open, at least someone helping you can skip that part)
5)Basic system maintenance like defragging
6)How to run windows update
7)How to avoid clicking on stupid crap
8)How to manage start-ups
A responsible parent would educate their children or not permit them access to the machine when its connected to the internet. Not exactly rocket science.
I would much rather take the time to explain to them how to proplerly use stuff, and maybe get them using another browser like mozilla/firefox, then come up with some asinine solution like forcing them to run Vmware.
With that you're trusting them to limit themselves to vmware. What if they hose their install and you're not there? Suddenly they fire up the browser in the host OS and go to town. Education should be a higher priority.
Which is nothing but a band-aid solution to keep people stupid. I run anti-spyware applications like once every 2-3 months and I never pick up a thing besides a few tracking cookies. Maybe people could expend a lot less effort with this kind of ridiculous setup if they learned how to surf the internet without clicking on every shiny thing that pops up in their face.
Which is fine in that type of situation, but this person is referring to a home use situation, which is entirely different. Setting up to run Vmware simply to surf because you're afraid of spyware is absolutely ridiculous.
Who sets up Vmware as a permanent use type of solution like this? Why not just install anti-spyware tools, use mozilla, and even toss on the tea-timer from spybot.
I guess its been so long since I've been that naive I forget what its like..
Slashdot forges forward on April Fool's day with a slew of half-assed stories that seem completely implausible in an attempt to "fool" the masses. It seems apparent that they've misunderstood the point of the day, churning out endless crap rather that crafting a well thought out april fool's joke. The key to a solid April fools joke is creating something that people would actually swallow. Painting everything pink and going "ZOMG" doesn't quite fit in that. I'd challenge you next year to actually put some thought into it. This idea seems the result of a drunken kegger. You might craft various sources, maybe set up a few fake domains with stories on them to really build up the believability.
Yeah some of the scripted events can get a bit funny since they completely ignore whats going on. My worst AI experience thus far was when I was liberating kvatch. I fired a snowball spell, and at that exact moment a guard dispatched the monster he was fighting, tore directly across the room to the monster I was targetting and stepped in front of the snowball spell. I was labelled a murderer, and the other guard there called me a murderer, then proceeded to tell me I Was awesome and should lead the way.
Then you're not outside their response range. Everytime I try to tag a monster who's just inside my visual range and I miss him just a little, he never responds.
They don't respond either when I hit one of a pair standing there. The one hit will come after me, the other stands there.
I've played this a total of about 25 hours now, and I must say the answer is NO, it has not. The AI is horrible makes amateurish mistakes and isn't a stride towards anything good. I've seen countless enemies stand there and do nothing while I spend 2 minutes shooting fireballs at them. I've seen them ignore comrades being attacked from range, and get caught on crazy terrain features like stairs.
Xbox360 AI developer comments
read up on this and you can see how the xbox360 gimped the AI, and since this game is a port with no real improvements being made on the PC its quite telling about how the game was put together. The AI isn't even the worse part of the game. The level-scaling is attrocious and completely removes the feeling of immersion since every enemy you face is either leveled or replaced with a more powerful version. You only get ahead of meta-gaming and power-leveling.
Is the game enjoyable? Yes it is.
Is the game everything it was reported to be and should be? No, not by a long shot.
Thief had better AI awareness 8 or so years ago. Enemies reacted appropriately to things happening around them. They only react now if you're in range. You can stand there outside their response range, which is not outside your sight range and rain holy fire down around them. Unless you hit them, they don't care. You can do the same thing in a town.
"best known for" and "best" work aren't necessarily the same thing. Often in fact they're not. Many people do their best work when the public eye isn't on them and the public remembers them solely for what got their attention.
When its done at the speed she does it, you learn nothing. Our "textbook" which she never references yet insisted we have is Perl in 24 hours from SAMS by Clinton Pierce.
I've learned infinitely more from that then the numerous times I've had to listen to her for 45 minutes.
Infact I'm sure I could have learned everything I need to know from that in half the time and have written a challenge exam/program. Its made worse because when she gets wound up..she can't just stop to answer a question. She needs time to gear down, so everytime she goes on about something no one understands its a few minutes before someone can get the question out.
This reminds me of a situation I have this semester.
We have an instructor who should not be in charge of a classroom.
We've all been giving laptops as part of programs, and its common for us to use them in every class.
She does not permit them, even though its a Perl class.
If anyone raises the lid, she stops and stares at them until they close it. Saying nothing.
She speaks extremely fast, and I do not exaggerate when I say that she does a 2 hour lecture in about 30-45 minutes and leaves no words out. She jumps around very erratically from topic to topic often forgetting to give us important information. Only to remember it 15 minutes later, blurt it out and expect us to insert it into the jumbled mess she's given us. The vast majority of our class often leaves with a bewildered look on our face. In 2 1/2 months I cannot say I've learned a single thing from listening to her.
Complaints have been made by myself and several other students, but nothing can be done because she has good scores from some review or something. Yet I can't find 60 students that woudl give her an average score let alone an "above-average" score. She's often referred to as psycho insane. Even umprompted, like "Who's your Perl teacher?"
Her lesson plan is the most ridiculous I have ever encountered when it comes to learning a programming lesson. 100% copying pre-existing codes, no trouble-shooting, no assignments that require creativity.
Attendance is mandatory, and I cannot take another course. There is no challenge exam. The academic coordinator has spoken with her, but she's union and has great reviews (which I can only surmise she had to coerce in some manner) so he can't force her to change or make any concessions, like allowing us to work quietly at the back during her lectures. Someone pulled their cellphone out of their pocket (I think they had it on vibrate because none of us noticed anyone with a cell, its not like they were talking on it, just had it in their hand) one day in class, she was the only one who noticed and yelled at them in the middle of class for it. All the rest of us saw was her snap at someone, and we still don't know whos' cell it was that went off.
Wasn't there an article that had the results of this new chip showing that it was like 40% faster than thew lead AMD chip? I thought it was on slashdot but this it the only mention I can find of it..anyone happen to have a link to it?
I have a very common first name with a last name that is a very common religious icon. A google search was 8 pages back before I found anything related to me, and it was from the xorg mailing list. I went a few more pages and found nothing else related to me.
I can count on one hand the amount of CDs I've bought since I first came across napster in like 1999. However, discounting that get xx CDs for a penny from Columbia house, I can also count on one hand the amount I bought pre-napster. Infact, since I was young and flaked on the columbia house thing, I don't think I actually bought any CDs pre napster. I like music, but I don't listen to it religiously so it doesn't make sense for me to go out and pay $40-$50 for the type of CD I might like. I'm sure a lot of other people feel the same way.
We have enough of those games. How about a developer step up and create something thats actually worth getting into. A persistent and huge world so that the players can truly shape and play in it. Its not a roleplaying game if the roleplaying does nothing to further the game. D&D is the poster child for what people think of when they think of roleplaying games. Its the ambassador to the masses and they just urinated all over it.
It seems like the "standard-society-accepted" response, but is that really the answer to the problem? When creating a response to a problem such as this you need to balance everything, including the time factor. How long would it take you to form a viable alternative party? Whats going to happen in that time frame? Could the US become a dictatorship run with an iron-fist before you arrive there? The noblest answer in the world won't help you if it takes x time to bring to fruition and you only have x-10.
We don't know how long we have until things goto hell in a hand-basket, but if they continue to escalate as they are, we probably don't have enough time for some enterprising individual to start a viable alternative and actually come to power. Beyond being appealing, you'd need to sway traditional voters. Those who would vote democrat or republican even if the anti-christ was running the platform. That would be an extremely time consuming proposition. Things are going to come to a head, and we need a solution before that happens.
What's the appropriate response, and how do you go about making sure its heard? Does that response change as the days and weeks pass? The point is simple: This type of thing is pretty unacceptable, and what is anyone really doing about it?
We can harp on this stuff all day long, but until someone, or more likely a large group of someones, is willing to stand up and actually make a difference, its not going to change or stop.