Oh, and even worse than that; he wrote a text editor with an incredibly non-intuitive and sometimes even DANGEROUS command-set.
A developer friend of mine was editing some C source in emacs, when he somehow finger-flubbed a command that not only UPPERCASEd his ENTIRE source; but then SAVED WITHOUT PROMPTING.
To this day, he won't touch emacs. Can't say as I blame him.
Hell, even the OS X "Aqua-fied" emacs is nearly impossible to use. It doesn't matter HOW "powerful" something is (especially something like a TEXT EDITOR, for fuck's sake!), if you have to spend YEARS learning it.
but it is not a microkernel design in that things that are normally in the kernel in monolithic OSs, such as device drivers, are still built into the kernel.
Really? I can't remember the last time I had to RECOMPILE OS X when I installed a new device driver. Oh wait! Yes I can: NEVER!
So, how can "device drivers" be "built into" a kernel WITHOUT recompiling said Kernel?
I think that most OS X drivers are managed through IOKit, which is a Framework that provides an ABSTRACTION LAYER between the Kernel and the Driver. Other types of "Drivers" are known as KEXTs (Kernel EXTENSIONS), which are MODULES that essentially "plug-into" the Kernel. They are NOT "built in" in any way, shape, or form. They are dynamically linked, and certainly operate in Kernel-space; but they are NOT "built in".
It's a microkernel, check Wikipedia.
Basically you will get clearly slower performance, but possibly much more reliability/stability, security, and all the benefits that go with modularity.
The point is that
a) computers will get so fast that the performance hit doesn't matter in standard programs
b) people hope to find ways of improving performance somewhat more into the direction of monolithic designs (=all the major platforms in use)
c) some application areas simply put additional stability over performance, so if we had a working microkernel... (no, Minix isn't good enough)
For now, best take it as a research project.
So, why not just do "research" using Darwin and/or OS X?
It is microkernel (Mach, in fact)-based, too, and at least it will run on hardware that uses technologies from this century.
I bought an OSX laptop and successfully avoided Flash for a few months while I was using it to prepare the class I now teach. A good proportion of YouTube videos wouldn't play so I was glad at times to have another computer in the house to watch them, but mostly I didn't miss it at all.
Ultimately, though, it turned out that in order to hold online office hours at our university, I had to install Adobe Connect. That software is Flash from stem to stern. I installed Flash, and it took me a few days to get used to the surprise of animated (and noisy) ads again.
Conclusion: access to Flash is nice at times, but one generally does better without it.
Install the FREE ClickToFlash (now called "ClickToPlugin") on Safari. You can whitelist your university site, and still not have to put up with incessant (and dangerous) Flash. You can also tell YouTube that you prefer HTML 5, and it will play ALL (or almost all) videos that way.
Or you could install flash on your tablet... just saying...
That's the great part about Android, unlike the iOS devices that don't have flash, we can view the vast majority of the web on our devices.
Yeah, that's JUST what the average Android user needs: ANOTHER vector for exploits...
At the very most, I run into about one or two sites per month on my iPad that won't work due to lazy/cheap site developers. I can certainly live with that.
So, your "vast majority of the web" that "iOS devices cannot view" ACTUALLY turns out to be more like.005% (and falling every day) of sites that actually REQUIRE Flash.
Netflix uses Silverlight, something that sucks quite a bit. They do offer a dedicated app if you use Windows 8, but the app is surprisingly poorly designed, plus I don't really want Windows 8 on my desktop.
Question: What's the only thing worse than Flash?
Answer: Microsoft's attempt to copy it.
Seriously; even Microsoft has given up on Silverlight.
Yes, this is the case. It took me a while to realize that Apple no longer ships Flash with Macs, and so I was using YouTube sans Flash for about a month. It works on some videos, but not on others.
Yeah, in my experience, the ratio of "works" to "doesn't work" is about 10,000:1. I figure that Google probably doesn't constantly churn through their entire collection from A-Z, searching for, and converting, all of their old videos to HTML 5; but has some algorithm for deciding what priority to put on converting old videos (new ones are ALWAYS available in HTML 5), and so that accounts for the occasional "doesn't work". Nothing else explains inconsistency, considering that ALL they deliver are videos.
I have been using ClickToFlash on Safari for about 3 years now. Eliminating Flash from my browser's normal processing made Safari much more stable (it only crashes about four times a year, instead of four times per week), and sped up page-loads by an incredible amount.
I consider ClickToFlash to be the best of both worlds. Flash that doesn't get to execute is essentially "not there", and unless I don't understand all the attack-vectors (which is likely), I think that, for now, this strikes a good balance. Because, before I click that little "Flash Placeholder", it makes me stop and think about whether I really need to see what's "behind the curtain".
However, on my iPad, which is Flash-Free, I think I run into a Flash-only site only about once or twice a month. Even porn seems to be being delivered in HTML 5 from almost everywhere.
Bottom line: The only thing keeping Flash alive is lazy developers and/or cheapskate PHBs.
Your iPad 2 passes every test, except for half the tests.
And so, what about that C-64. It doesn't pass at least 1, and possibly 2 (mouse) of the tests, either.
Yet I dare you to post on here that IT isn't a PC...
Yes, I know about the 1351 Commodore mouse, and the various PS/2 and serial mouse kludges for the C-64; but if you're going to throw that up in my face, I submit that is no more kludgy than THIS Bluetooth mouse driver for the (jailbroken) iPad.
And I GUARANTEE more software will work with the iPad's mouse than was ever written AT ALL for the C-64, mouse or no mouse.
So, I guess we're down to one (arbitrary) "criteria". User-upgradeability. And the C-64 already fails that one; so...
Again, PLEASE argue that the C-64 IS a "PC", and the iPad (or Android/Windows) tablets/smartphones are NOT.
I'll be waiting for you to now move the goalpost...
Yay, Macs4All is back spewing lies in defense of his favorite brand. Let me see one comment made on slashdot that expresses that Android tablets are PCs and iPads are not. Go on, give me a comment number.
Trolls will be trolled Macs, I am bound and determined of that.
Please show me where I said anything about Android tablets and phones NOT being considered "Computers".
If you are going to build your own tablet or smart phone I suspect you are going to want a 3d printer to make the case, which adds a significant amount to the up front costs.
Personally, I suspect one could make ones own smart phone for under 3k, but I haven't had the time to try. Would be a cool project though.
But it would end up being the size of a Generation 1 "bag phone"
No, of course not. I draw the line at having an actual keyboard (which makes my daughter's HTC Desire Z phone more of a PC than a typical tablet is). TFA is just self-serving bullshit. And shame on TFS for publicizing the rubbish.
I can attach pretty much any Bluetooth keyboard (and maybe USB, too) to my iPad.
Lack of keyboard.
Lack of mouse.
Lack of peripheral support.
No user-upgradable components.
Traditional tablets are not PCs.
So, a Commodore 64 "isn't a PC" because it has "No user-upgradeable components", right?
My iPad 2 PASSES EVERY TEST (except the user-upgradeable one, and the "Mouse" (because it doesn't need one))...
So, by YOUR OWN TEST, the iPad most CERTAINLY is a "PC", if you are willing to concede the "No user-upgradeable parts" (which the C-64 also doesn't have), and the "Mouse" requirement, which you just threw in there to automatically exclude ANY tablet that uses a Touch interface (which is, er, ALL of them).
I'll just keep building my own computers out of parts, like I've been doing for the last 30 years or so, and I can build several computers for what Apple would have me pay for a single one of theirs.
In what universe does someone consider an iPad to be a personal computer?
Well, the Slashdot universe, for one. Well, at least they consider Android tablets and phones to be "Personal Computers"; so it should follow for (at least jailbroken) iPads/iPhones, too.
So we should include phones and game consoles as well. Got it.
Why not?
There's a longstanding geek tradition of trying to get Linux to run on everything from toaster-ovens to televisions. And with a (sort-of) Linux already running on a fairly-popular phone-platform (guess which one), and a (sort-of) Unix already running on another, why not?
Do tablets really count as a "PC"? If that's the case we might as well start considering smart phones PCs, since a modern tablet is basically just a scaled up smart phone.
Are you new here?
Slahdot-think considers ANYTHING with a microcontroller/microprocessor in it a "computer".
Now, let's sit back and watch as they try to argue the opposite in 3... 2... 1
Slashdot Mirror
However, on my iPad, which is Flash-Free, I think I run into a Flash-only site only about once or twice a month
Let me break that record: Albino Blacksheep, Newgrounds, and Kongregate. That makes three.
What, what and WHAT?
Some of us here are over 18, ya know, and don't spend 24/7 in our Mom's basement, pleying STUPID Flash games...
He already did that. It's called emacs.
Oooo!
So a GENERATION ago, he wrote a TEXT EDITOR.
Wow.
Oh, and even worse than that; he wrote a text editor with an incredibly non-intuitive and sometimes even DANGEROUS command-set.
A developer friend of mine was editing some C source in emacs, when he somehow finger-flubbed a command that not only UPPERCASEd his ENTIRE source; but then SAVED WITHOUT PROMPTING.
To this day, he won't touch emacs. Can't say as I blame him.
Hell, even the OS X "Aqua-fied" emacs is nearly impossible to use. It doesn't matter HOW "powerful" something is (especially something like a TEXT EDITOR, for fuck's sake!), if you have to spend YEARS learning it.
but it is not a microkernel design in that things that are normally in the kernel in monolithic OSs, such as device drivers, are still built into the kernel.
Really? I can't remember the last time I had to RECOMPILE OS X when I installed a new device driver. Oh wait! Yes I can: NEVER!
So, how can "device drivers" be "built into" a kernel WITHOUT recompiling said Kernel?
I think that most OS X drivers are managed through IOKit, which is a Framework that provides an ABSTRACTION LAYER between the Kernel and the Driver. Other types of "Drivers" are known as KEXTs (Kernel EXTENSIONS), which are MODULES that essentially "plug-into" the Kernel. They are NOT "built in" in any way, shape, or form. They are dynamically linked, and certainly operate in Kernel-space; but they are NOT "built in".
It's a microkernel, check Wikipedia. Basically you will get clearly slower performance, but possibly much more reliability/stability, security, and all the benefits that go with modularity. The point is that a) computers will get so fast that the performance hit doesn't matter in standard programs b) people hope to find ways of improving performance somewhat more into the direction of monolithic designs (=all the major platforms in use) c) some application areas simply put additional stability over performance, so if we had a working microkernel... (no, Minix isn't good enough)
For now, best take it as a research project.
So, why not just do "research" using Darwin and/or OS X?
It is microkernel (Mach, in fact)-based, too, and at least it will run on hardware that uses technologies from this century.
But I guess that even Darwin isn't "free" enough.
Ya know, life's WAAAAY too short...
Any user oriented system in development (as HURD clearly is) has to add support for USB, sound cards and SATA at some point.
Yes, and that "point" came about a decade ago.
That is no reason for ridicule.
Sure it is. If ANY other OS was just now adding support for those things, they would be laughed right off of Slashdot.
Luckily, those are easy to circumvent if you just use a suitable browser.
Careful: Your ignorance is showing...
On Safari, you can install "ClickToPlugin" f/k/a "ClickToFlash" and achieve the same result as with FlashBlock on FF.
So, it seems that FireFox is no more "suitable" without a Flash-Blocker plugin that Safari, eh?
I bought an OSX laptop and successfully avoided Flash for a few months while I was using it to prepare the class I now teach. A good proportion of YouTube videos wouldn't play so I was glad at times to have another computer in the house to watch them, but mostly I didn't miss it at all.
Ultimately, though, it turned out that in order to hold online office hours at our university, I had to install Adobe Connect. That software is Flash from stem to stern. I installed Flash, and it took me a few days to get used to the surprise of animated (and noisy) ads again.
Conclusion: access to Flash is nice at times, but one generally does better without it.
Install the FREE ClickToFlash (now called "ClickToPlugin") on Safari. You can whitelist your university site, and still not have to put up with incessant (and dangerous) Flash. You can also tell YouTube that you prefer HTML 5, and it will play ALL (or almost all) videos that way.
Or you could install flash on your tablet... just saying...
That's the great part about Android, unlike the iOS devices that don't have flash, we can view the vast majority of the web on our devices.
Yeah, that's JUST what the average Android user needs: ANOTHER vector for exploits...
.005% (and falling every day) of sites that actually REQUIRE Flash.
At the very most, I run into about one or two sites per month on my iPad that won't work due to lazy/cheap site developers. I can certainly live with that.
So, your "vast majority of the web" that "iOS devices cannot view" ACTUALLY turns out to be more like
Xxx stuff
I don't think I've seen ANY porn site that REQUIRES Flash for quite some time.
Netflix uses Silverlight, something that sucks quite a bit. They do offer a dedicated app if you use Windows 8, but the app is surprisingly poorly designed, plus I don't really want Windows 8 on my desktop.
Question: What's the only thing worse than Flash?
Answer: Microsoft's attempt to copy it.
Seriously; even Microsoft has given up on Silverlight.
An Amazon Instant Video...flash only currently.
Inexcusable.
Yes, this is the case. It took me a while to realize that Apple no longer ships Flash with Macs, and so I was using YouTube sans Flash for about a month. It works on some videos, but not on others.
Yeah, in my experience, the ratio of "works" to "doesn't work" is about 10,000:1. I figure that Google probably doesn't constantly churn through their entire collection from A-Z, searching for, and converting, all of their old videos to HTML 5; but has some algorithm for deciding what priority to put on converting old videos (new ones are ALWAYS available in HTML 5), and so that accounts for the occasional "doesn't work". Nothing else explains inconsistency, considering that ALL they deliver are videos.
I have been using ClickToFlash on Safari for about 3 years now. Eliminating Flash from my browser's normal processing made Safari much more stable (it only crashes about four times a year, instead of four times per week), and sped up page-loads by an incredible amount.
I consider ClickToFlash to be the best of both worlds. Flash that doesn't get to execute is essentially "not there", and unless I don't understand all the attack-vectors (which is likely), I think that, for now, this strikes a good balance. Because, before I click that little "Flash Placeholder", it makes me stop and think about whether I really need to see what's "behind the curtain".
However, on my iPad, which is Flash-Free, I think I run into a Flash-only site only about once or twice a month. Even porn seems to be being delivered in HTML 5 from almost everywhere.
Bottom line: The only thing keeping Flash alive is lazy developers and/or cheapskate PHBs.
Your iPad 2 passes every test, except for half the tests.
And so, what about that C-64. It doesn't pass at least 1, and possibly 2 (mouse) of the tests, either.
Yet I dare you to post on here that IT isn't a PC...
Yes, I know about the 1351 Commodore mouse, and the various PS/2 and serial mouse kludges for the C-64; but if you're going to throw that up in my face, I submit that is no more kludgy than THIS Bluetooth mouse driver for the (jailbroken) iPad.
And I GUARANTEE more software will work with the iPad's mouse than was ever written AT ALL for the C-64, mouse or no mouse.
So, I guess we're down to one (arbitrary) "criteria". User-upgradeability. And the C-64 already fails that one; so...
Again, PLEASE argue that the C-64 IS a "PC", and the iPad (or Android/Windows) tablets/smartphones are NOT.
I'll be waiting for you to now move the goalpost...
Yay, Macs4All is back spewing lies in defense of his favorite brand. Let me see one comment made on slashdot that expresses that Android tablets are PCs and iPads are not. Go on, give me a comment number. Trolls will be trolled Macs, I am bound and determined of that.
Please show me where I said anything about Android tablets and phones NOT being considered "Computers".
Learn to read, hater.
...and some might (reasonably) argue, "common sense".
If you are going to build your own tablet or smart phone I suspect you are going to want a 3d printer to make the case, which adds a significant amount to the up front costs.
Personally, I suspect one could make ones own smart phone for under 3k, but I haven't had the time to try. Would be a cool project though.
But it would end up being the size of a Generation 1 "bag phone"
Do tablets really count as a "PC"?
No, of course not. I draw the line at having an actual keyboard (which makes my daughter's HTC Desire Z phone more of a PC than a typical tablet is). TFA is just self-serving bullshit. And shame on TFS for publicizing the rubbish.
I can attach pretty much any Bluetooth keyboard (and maybe USB, too) to my iPad.
Now who's publishing "bullshit"?
Lack of keyboard.
Lack of mouse.
Lack of peripheral support.
No user-upgradable components.
Traditional tablets are not PCs.
So, a Commodore 64 "isn't a PC" because it has "No user-upgradeable components", right?
My iPad 2 PASSES EVERY TEST (except the user-upgradeable one, and the "Mouse" (because it doesn't need one))...
So, by YOUR OWN TEST, the iPad most CERTAINLY is a "PC", if you are willing to concede the "No user-upgradeable parts" (which the C-64 also doesn't have), and the "Mouse" requirement, which you just threw in there to automatically exclude ANY tablet that uses a Touch interface (which is, er, ALL of them).
An open architecture has always been the defining characteristic of "personal computers", so that is not an irrelevant distinction.
Now define "Open Architecture"
I'll just keep building my own computers out of parts, like I've been doing for the last 30 years or so, and I can build several computers for what Apple would have me pay for a single one of theirs.
Good luck building that tablet!
Apple is now the top politically correct vendor. That must be because they censor apps.
So does Google Play, and if the Microsoft App Store had any to censor, I'm sure they would/will do it, too...
In what universe does someone consider an iPad to be a personal computer?
Well, the Slashdot universe, for one. Well, at least they consider Android tablets and phones to be "Personal Computers"; so it should follow for (at least jailbroken) iPads/iPhones, too.
So we should include phones and game consoles as well. Got it.
Why not?
There's a longstanding geek tradition of trying to get Linux to run on everything from toaster-ovens to televisions. And with a (sort-of) Linux already running on a fairly-popular phone-platform (guess which one), and a (sort-of) Unix already running on another, why not?
Then there's all those console-modders...
Do tablets really count as a "PC"? If that's the case we might as well start considering smart phones PCs, since a modern tablet is basically just a scaled up smart phone.
Are you new here?
Slahdot-think considers ANYTHING with a microcontroller/microprocessor in it a "computer".
Now, let's sit back and watch as they try to argue the opposite in 3... 2... 1