Re:How much effort is needed by the developer now?
on
Unity 4 Adds Linux Support
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· Score: 4, Informative
Actually, Unity's surface shaders are more or less 3d-system-agnostic. Some features will of course degrade when the underlying system doesn't support them, and some, although supported, will be too intense for the hardware (e.g. fog on mobiles).
It is of course possible to create a platform-dependent game: in fact, it's as easy as File.ReadAllText("C:/Windows/blah"). However, the majority of real content that has been tried has run out of the box with no major issues.
Why is it that we have to wait for FF3 (or worse, run the unstable CVS copy) I think you just answered it right there. There are a lot of things involved in a release; they're not going to do a code freeze, strings freeze, etc., every time they fix a bug that annoys somebody. If you really want it now, you're perfectly able to get the fix from CVS and backport it to your copy.
A new method for removing particles from automobile exhaust is an algorithm in the broad sense. Assuming that this method meets other requirements for patentability, shouldn't it be patentable?
No. A device for removing particles from automobile exhaust should be legally patentable (under US patent law). A method for doing so should not.
You're exactly the person for whom the GPL, version 3 and all earlier versions, was written.
As far as a software user is concerned, GPL and public domain are basically equivalent, except that GPL software is guaranteed to stay public domain forever.
There are many, many apartment complexes that function as kind of subleasing ISPs for their residents. I'm fairly sure that, legally, they get protected common-carrier status. They would have to contract with a "real" ISP to install APs in sensible places, etc. As far as 3am maintenance, internet connectivity becomes another service they subcontract like water or electricity, and is handled as such.
For the neighbor option, obviously it would have to be more informal, and there's the potential for bandwidth issues, but a functioning, non-maximal-bandwidth connection is still preferable to a nonfunctioning, maximal-bandwidth connection.
The ability of users to create custom content (in addition to the three-platform releases) was a huge key to Neverwinter Nights's success.
While the official campaigns were great, all the longtime NWN players I know have spent countless hours playing on user-created and -hosted persistent worlds and user-created campaigns from places like The Vault. I can't think of many other games that are still being bought and played this long after their releases, and the ones that are probably fall into this category as well.
The arguments only make sense if one's development methodology is purely reactive. The guy makes it sound like his entire software team is scampering around frantically putting out fires, and doesn't have any time to spare on any bug that hasn't reached three-alarm status yet.
I'd rather squash my bugs when they're unknown or barely known than race to hack together a fix when the whole world is screaming. But apparently that's just me.
I didn't see the performance numbers in consumer reports, but my fiancee and I drive a Jetta TDI. The mileage is outstanding (we're moderately aggressive drivers), and performance is perfectly adequate (not once has acceleration been a problem), but it's a 5-speed manual.
The market may not be receptive to driving stick, but in that case it had better be receptive to higher price, reduced performance, and lower gas mileage, because that's the tradeoff for the go-kart convenience of not actually having to learn to drive.
My aunt doesn't have to know about overhead cams to drive to work...
Yet we all know of people who have no business driving and shouldn't be on the roads. Computers are tools, but they are complicated, sophisticated tools, and no amount of fisher-price theming can change that fact. People don't plop their kids down in the drivers' seats of cars without any prior training, but they'll expect to be able to effectively use a computer without a second thought.
Yes, it is the responsibility of software developers to create software that functions in the most correct, stable, and secure way possible, but when a majority of users are clamoring for EmailClient2112 to automagically open attachments without any intervention and for OperatingSystemRoomWithAView to stop making them enter passwords before modifying critical system settings, developers have a difficult choice to make: force users to be trained in the correct way to operate the software, or force the software to automatically do what some cross-section of the users wants without intervention.
Agreed, but it wasn't the school that investigated the student's private life. It was the police.
That's even worse! Has it really come to pass that being a video game enthusiast is justifiable cause for having one's residence searched?
He was not arrested nor charged with a crime, but he is being treated like a criminal. The other kids at his "alternative school" are there because they did things like assault other students. This kid's there because he's intelligent, creative, and motivated.
A teenager in possession of swords is not a problem for anybody but his parents until he actually commits a crime with them. Were they sharpened? It doesn't matter; there's nothing wrong with having sharpened swords, even for a teenager. Were they hidden? It doesn't matter; there's nothing wrong with hiding one's things, particularly if you suspect that some asshat is going to overreact if he learns about them. Did his parents know about them? That's the parents' job to determine, not the school's nor the police's.
I do feel that, at most, the school should have contacted the parents. If the regulations require a different course of action, they are wrong and require modification. Yes, I realize that, in contemporary America, getting them effectively modified in any reasonable time frame is a pipe dream. I'm sure the current hyperreactionary atmosphere, catalyzed by the VTech shootings, was a major contributor to events, and that is no excuse.
We do disagree about the swords. My opinion is that there's no reason he shouldn't have them, regardless of the state of the edges. I agree, in a general sense, that it's not ok for him to have them without his parents' knowledge; however, I do not agree that it is the school's, the police's, or anyone else's prerogative to enforce parental inquisition.
The question is this: How did the school officials find out that he was playing a first-person shooter with self-made maps of the school? Somebody must have complained -- teacher, student or parent. They are required to investigate and possibly take action.
No. It is not the school's duty to investigate students' private lives. At most, they should have called the student's parents. "Hello, Ms. Parent? Hi, I'm Bass Ackwards, the principal at your son's school. No, your son is all right. I just wanted to chat with you for a second because it came to our attention that your son has created a reproduction of our school for a violent computer game called Counterstrike..."
Your own list of five points greatly mischaracterizes the situation by leaving off key pieces of information.
It is not illegal to create custom maps of one's school.
It is not the school's nor the police's duty to enforce "normality."
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Actually, Unity's surface shaders are more or less 3d-system-agnostic. Some features will of course degrade when the underlying system doesn't support them, and some, although supported, will be too intense for the hardware (e.g. fog on mobiles).
It is of course possible to create a platform-dependent game: in fact, it's as easy as File.ReadAllText("C:/Windows/blah").
However, the majority of real content that has been tried has run out of the box with no major issues.
There are a lot of things involved in a release; they're not going to do a code freeze, strings freeze, etc., every time they fix a bug that annoys somebody. If you really want it now, you're perfectly able to get the fix from CVS and backport it to your copy.
No. A device for removing particles from automobile exhaust should be legally patentable (under US patent law). A method for doing so should not.
Those aren't encoded tracks on the CD. They're konqueror offering to automatically rip and encode the tracks for you.
So what you're saying is that RHEL is Common Criteria certified, so the OS is more secure, and SOMEONE doesn't have to worry about going to prison.
You're exactly the person for whom the GPL, version 3 and all earlier versions, was written.
As far as a software user is concerned, GPL and public domain are basically equivalent, except that GPL software is guaranteed to stay public domain forever.
There are many, many apartment complexes that function as kind of subleasing ISPs for their residents. I'm fairly sure that, legally, they get protected common-carrier status. They would have to contract with a "real" ISP to install APs in sensible places, etc. As far as 3am maintenance, internet connectivity becomes another service they subcontract like water or electricity, and is handled as such.
For the neighbor option, obviously it would have to be more informal, and there's the potential for bandwidth issues, but a functioning, non-maximal-bandwidth connection is still preferable to a nonfunctioning, maximal-bandwidth connection.
Talk to the apartment complex and/or your neighbors about setting up a single, shared wireless network to avoid the problem?
I know, what kind of a moron would use a word like Grecian?!
I must have some nonstandard use case, because I've lost data with both ReiserFS (multiple times, as I optimistically tried newer versions) and XFS.
Ext3, on the other hand, has been rock solid for me.
Apparently you've never used ReiserFS.
So why not GPLv2 then?
Oh, man, I'm in trouble - ALL my boxes are running irc!
Please post your full name, so that we all know with whom to avoid entering a relationship.
I certainly hope so! I'm not about to try skating at any temperature above 0C.
The ability of users to create custom content (in addition to the three-platform releases) was a huge key to Neverwinter Nights's success.
While the official campaigns were great, all the longtime NWN players I know have spent countless hours playing on user-created and -hosted persistent worlds and user-created campaigns from places like The Vault. I can't think of many other games that are still being bought and played this long after their releases, and the ones that are probably fall into this category as well.
The arguments only make sense if one's development methodology is purely reactive. The guy makes it sound like his entire software team is scampering around frantically putting out fires, and doesn't have any time to spare on any bug that hasn't reached three-alarm status yet.
I'd rather squash my bugs when they're unknown or barely known than race to hack together a fix when the whole world is screaming. But apparently that's just me.
I didn't see the performance numbers in consumer reports, but my fiancee and I drive a Jetta TDI. The mileage is outstanding (we're moderately aggressive drivers), and performance is perfectly adequate (not once has acceleration been a problem), but it's a 5-speed manual.
The market may not be receptive to driving stick, but in that case it had better be receptive to higher price, reduced performance, and lower gas mileage, because that's the tradeoff for the go-kart convenience of not actually having to learn to drive.
I'm sure there are plenty of women in the US who would support a similar thing if commuter trains were the norm.
Surely you mean since Sun started pushing Java as the key platform for exactly that kind of desktop/online integration?
Yet we all know of people who have no business driving and shouldn't be on the roads. Computers are tools, but they are complicated, sophisticated tools, and no amount of fisher-price theming can change that fact. People don't plop their kids down in the drivers' seats of cars without any prior training, but they'll expect to be able to effectively use a computer without a second thought.
Yes, it is the responsibility of software developers to create software that functions in the most correct, stable, and secure way possible, but when a majority of users are clamoring for EmailClient2112 to automagically open attachments without any intervention and for OperatingSystemRoomWithAView to stop making them enter passwords before modifying critical system settings, developers have a difficult choice to make: force users to be trained in the correct way to operate the software, or force the software to automatically do what some cross-section of the users wants without intervention.
That's even worse! Has it really come to pass that being a video game enthusiast is justifiable cause for having one's residence searched?
He was not arrested nor charged with a crime, but he is being treated like a criminal. The other kids at his "alternative school" are there because they did things like assault other students. This kid's there because he's intelligent, creative, and motivated.
A teenager in possession of swords is not a problem for anybody but his parents until he actually commits a crime with them. Were they sharpened? It doesn't matter; there's nothing wrong with having sharpened swords, even for a teenager. Were they hidden? It doesn't matter; there's nothing wrong with hiding one's things, particularly if you suspect that some asshat is going to overreact if he learns about them. Did his parents know about them? That's the parents' job to determine, not the school's nor the police's.
I do feel that, at most, the school should have contacted the parents. If the regulations require a different course of action, they are wrong and require modification. Yes, I realize that, in contemporary America, getting them effectively modified in any reasonable time frame is a pipe dream. I'm sure the current hyperreactionary atmosphere, catalyzed by the VTech shootings, was a major contributor to events, and that is no excuse.
We do disagree about the swords. My opinion is that there's no reason he shouldn't have them, regardless of the state of the edges. I agree, in a general sense, that it's not ok for him to have them without his parents' knowledge; however, I do not agree that it is the school's, the police's, or anyone else's prerogative to enforce parental inquisition.
I hereby move to amend Godwin's Law to include child pornography.
No. It is not the school's duty to investigate students' private lives. At most, they should have called the student's parents. "Hello, Ms. Parent? Hi, I'm Bass Ackwards, the principal at your son's school. No, your son is all right. I just wanted to chat with you for a second because it came to our attention that your son has created a reproduction of our school for a violent computer game called Counterstrike..."
Your own list of five points greatly mischaracterizes the situation by leaving off key pieces of information.So what you're saying is, to make C# perform like C++, code it like FORTRAN.