Apple doesn't hire the workers and run the factories, Foxconn does. Apple can try to influence Foxconn, but they don't own it. I know it's very fashionable on slashdot to hate Apple and blame them for everything wrong in the world, but let's at least try to be rational.
Cars are a great example -- you can't buy a new car that doesn't come equipped with $10k worth of pointless passive "safety" features, because the government knows most people can't drive so we must all pay the price to shield the incompetents from the consequences of their actions.
That's what's happening now to the internet, the powers that be are trying to make it idiot-proof and criminal-proof. That, obviously, will severely limit the utility for those of us who are responsible and know what we are doing, but most people will not care because incompetent people are selfish as only the infantile can be.
As someone pointed out elsewhere in this discussion, this is what comes of trying to "protect" people from the "cruelty" of nature. We keep morons alive by legislating to the lowest common denominator, encourage them to breed more morons, and before you know it we've achieved idiocracy.
OK, I think the caffeine levels are sufficient now. Time to go get 'em.
But I'm not even talking about something being broken, this is what I have to go through when all that's needed from them is, "excuse me, could you tell me again -- how do I do X?". Instead I get this long, drawn-out, drama-laden story that usually goes something like this: "You know, I was surfing the web and I saw the cutest picture and wanted to send it in my email. So I highlighted some of the the text and the picture from the web page, and right clicked and selected 'copy'. Then I went to paste it in the email but NO PICTURES APPEARED!!! I mean, my god, isn't that just so stupid? It's perfectly logical that when I copy and paste something...". On and on, you get the idea. These people are less teachable than my 11 year old dog, and what they want is someone to magically make the computer work to suit their delusions of how it "should" work. When they finally stop whining and bitching and I tell them how to copy the jpg and put it in the email then they basically erase what I just told them from their brain by repeating the same stupid story again (unconscious self-indoctrination), then try to find validation by insisting I agree that the way it works is "stupid", and that it *should* work like they think it should work, that would be only plain, common sense, and so on. Then they go back to work, and have the same exact problem with the same exact story within 4 or 5 days. And these are perfectly sensible people so long as they're not dealing with any tech.
It's really exasperating sometimes. I'm extremely patient and indulgent with them, and always keep my good humor -- but it's an act, they make me crazy! I hate having to support perpetual n00bs...
I think you're right. Reasonable people who have interest and aptitude can learn whatever interface they need to learn. Nowadays one gets the impression that most people hate computers, they want magic. I particularly loathe it when some user goes on and on trying to make sure I understand what it was they did wrong and why the result was unsatisfactory. After you tell me once, I can tell you what you need to do -- that's the important information the user needs to focus on. But so many otherwise intelligent people have to be told again and again and every single time you have to hear the same stupid story about what they did, what they expected to happen, what happened instead, and so forth. It's as if some people drop 50 IQ points just looking at a computer or smart phone.
Since you obviously don't live in a Middle-eastern country where Blackberry caved and allowed personal communications of BB users to be monitored. So what was your point again?
That is profoundly ignorant. Yes, RIM caved -- unlike Google, Apple, and everyone else who didn't have to cave because they never withheld the private data governments demand. Look it up, since you won't believe me and then stop the FUD.
Should people care about viruses and identity theft on phones? No, they should not.
Should a platform restrict operations in favor of security for such an audience? Yes, it should.
Except that there tends to be an inversely proportional relationship between "power and flexibility" and "lockdown", so it comes down to individual choice. Yes, the average techphobic user will not do as well with Android as with an iPhone. BTW WP7 is too new to call, but the history of utterly screwing users over on any kind of data service deal (sidekick, playforsure, etc) should give anyone with any sense visions of great red flags...
Then don't say idiotic things like being a wmaker user means constantly having to futz with the desktop -- it's a lie and either you know that or you're talking about things you don't have experience with. Don't blame me for calling as I see it, ok? Besides if you're sincere, then you'd be what we call a "perpetual n00b". It's gnome and kde that have stability issues and constant config revisions, obvioulsy -- not wmaker.
Actually it's because I've endured numerous desktops under UNIX / Linux over the 20+ years I've been using them and I dislike those that make me spend more time fixing & tweaking the desktop than doing the things I'm running the desktop for in the first place. The desktop's job is to facilitate stuff the user wants to do, to adopt a sensible set of defaults, to provide a reasonable amount of customization, to be forgiving of errors, to provide all the functionality a normal user needs through a GUI (i.e. no trips to bash to edit files), to provide services & facilities to apps such as drag & drop, notifications etc., to allow users to efficiently managed files and apps and to generally stay the fuck out of the way thereafter.
Then by your own standard wmaker is far better than kde or gnome. Stop pretending you know things you clearly do not and let the grownups speak.
This is how I feel about it after 10 years. , so your unwarranted assumptions fall flat.
Also, you clearly have very little experience with wmaker. Otherwise you'd know just how out of line your "criticism" is. In reality, I haven't had to make any big changes in my wmaker config since 2004. From what I've seen, gnome and kde can't even go one year without making changes that muck up everyone's previous config. In light of that, you have a most curious POV.
Besides, I never claimed to be an "average user", nor is my advice targeting said mythical creature.
The point is that this is being hyped as a CLI replacement. It isn't any such thing. Sorry, I have no interest in the misconceptions, wild tangents, and manifestos you seem to be embracing. But just so you know, plan9 also has a CLI distinct from it's GUI. Sometimes it doesn't work, then you have to know how to use the plan9 CLI. Yes, I *have* used plan9...
Gnome 3.0 has its faults but taken in its entirety it is a bold and will be ultimately successful in making the desktop more task centric and attractive. As I said it has problems, some of which I've ranted about myself but I believe given a.1 release or two people will be wondering what the fuss was about. Same goes for Unity.
You may believe you're psychic, but I don't.
I'm sure some masochists would prefer to use Window Maker or similar, but hey Linux allows that too.
Calling users of lean, efficient interfaces (who often script in additional functionality to fit our needs) "masochists" just makes you look like a n00b.
I did read it, and as impressed as you seem to be with "this is implemented in HTML on top of a small NodeJS HTTP server", that really doesn't tell us much. I gather you're not someone who groks the CLI, because you seem to be unclear about what comprises the difference between GUI and CLI environments.
The distinction IMO (and probably the opinion of most CLI-centric users) is "this runs in a GUI, therefore it's a terminal emulator". Not vt100, but still a terminal emulator, as in it runs on top of the real interface, the CLI . So it might replace xterm or Terminal.app for some people some day, but it isn't going to revolutionize the CLI as some are thinking.
In short, I think you've completely misunderstood what's going on here, and that's why you're missing the point.
No, I don't think so... It's interesting, and I'm glad when people look into new and different ways of doing things, but it's doomed because adding yet another layer of abstraction for users to learn is not the way CLI geeks like to work, and everyone else just wants pointy-clicky-shiny and would rather die of festering boils than try to remember the string of text to type in.
I do applaud the effort, and maybe His Steveness will even be sold and replace Terminal.app with it, who knows? Most Apple users have never even seen Temrinal.app anyway, and there's already iTerm for serious CLI geeks using OS X, so it could probably be done.
In fact, it sort of fits that the company that brought us AppleScript would do something like this.
But as someone who already has zsh it's not very exciting to me at this time. Maybe that will change, but I doubt it.
Well then it doesn't live up to its billing, does it? I get the distinct impression this is being touted as a "replacement for the tired, old CLI", but if you're on a server, embedded, or other platform where x simply doesn't make sense you'll still be using a real shell.
This is a terminal emulator app, not a "CLI replacement".
But anyway, having used powershell I don't really see the big deal. People go on lengthy diatribes all the time about "the CLI is dead, you're so 1980s" but in reality the CLI is where the power and flexibility live. Powershell brings nothing to the table I can't already get in bash or zsh. I can run fbida and see graphics in the CLI if I want, or use the svgalib driver to watch a video with mplayer. So graphics in the terminal is not a revolutionary concept, and this is nothing but gingerbread, AFAICT.
No, there's plenty of copycat software in the *nix world.
But back on topic, I think that to be taken seriously this has to be able to actually replace the console, which of course it can't as it runs in X. If it could do what he's shown with the framebuffer and no xserver it'd be more exciting, at least to me. Implement it as a real shell, so I can edit inittab and use on one or more ttys. I'd be impressed then.:)
Sorry about that! Try this one, and if slashdot is killing URLs in posts now (why not, they were 403 for an hour this morning) it's pentadactyl you seek.
I was waiting to see if they screw up the 3.0 branch and piss everyone off like kde4 did, but I guess the anticipation was killing them so they had to find a way to start alienating users now, in spite of having no newly-designed crappy interface yet.
Actually the haters surpass the fanbois in terms of religious fervor, by far. The proof is in the discussions of the Apple-related stories. Nothing but a bitchfest every time.
I think you might be taking the "you" in my original statement too literally. I wasn't accusing anyone in particular of being CLI-phobic, just commenting on those who are.
BTW, you may be an "avid" terminal user, but when you're an "accomplished" terminal user you won't wonder how people find the files they need to edit anymore.:)
The Gavin Nuisance had to go visitc Child in jail. Surely he expects at least $100K for that... But I digress, obviously.:) If the version you give is true, then Childs was wrongly convicted and should have ample grounds for an appeal. I suspect though that the details of the situation may not be quite what you think they are, or there'd be at least one high profile lawyer courting that case.
he's paying it to the department of technology, not justice.. so... no...
Do you have any idea how much money you can burn through in just one day of providing network services to an entire city's government? Wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if the SF Dept of Technology spent that much or more trying to deal with the "rogue admin who absconded with all the data/access". The taxpayers *do* need to be reimbursed for that. This might actually be an example of the system working properly, though I do not know enough detail to say for sure.
Slashdot Mirror
Apple doesn't hire the workers and run the factories, Foxconn does. Apple can try to influence Foxconn, but they don't own it. I know it's very fashionable on slashdot to hate Apple and blame them for everything wrong in the world, but let's at least try to be rational.
Cars are a great example -- you can't buy a new car that doesn't come equipped with $10k worth of pointless passive "safety" features, because the government knows most people can't drive so we must all pay the price to shield the incompetents from the consequences of their actions.
That's what's happening now to the internet, the powers that be are trying to make it idiot-proof and criminal-proof. That, obviously, will severely limit the utility for those of us who are responsible and know what we are doing, but most people will not care because incompetent people are selfish as only the infantile can be.
As someone pointed out elsewhere in this discussion, this is what comes of trying to "protect" people from the "cruelty" of nature. We keep morons alive by legislating to the lowest common denominator, encourage them to breed more morons, and before you know it we've achieved idiocracy.
OK, I think the caffeine levels are sufficient now. Time to go get 'em.
But I'm not even talking about something being broken, this is what I have to go through when all that's needed from them is, "excuse me, could you tell me again -- how do I do X?". Instead I get this long, drawn-out, drama-laden story that usually goes something like this: "You know, I was surfing the web and I saw the cutest picture and wanted to send it in my email. So I highlighted some of the the text and the picture from the web page, and right clicked and selected 'copy'. Then I went to paste it in the email but NO PICTURES APPEARED!!! I mean, my god, isn't that just so stupid? It's perfectly logical that when I copy and paste something...". On and on, you get the idea. These people are less teachable than my 11 year old dog, and what they want is someone to magically make the computer work to suit their delusions of how it "should" work. When they finally stop whining and bitching and I tell them how to copy the jpg and put it in the email then they basically erase what I just told them from their brain by repeating the same stupid story again (unconscious self-indoctrination), then try to find validation by insisting I agree that the way it works is "stupid", and that it *should* work like they think it should work, that would be only plain, common sense, and so on. Then they go back to work, and have the same exact problem with the same exact story within 4 or 5 days. And these are perfectly sensible people so long as they're not dealing with any tech.
It's really exasperating sometimes. I'm extremely patient and indulgent with them, and always keep my good humor -- but it's an act, they make me crazy! I hate having to support perpetual n00bs...
I think you're right. Reasonable people who have interest and aptitude can learn whatever interface they need to learn. Nowadays one gets the impression that most people hate computers, they want magic. I particularly loathe it when some user goes on and on trying to make sure I understand what it was they did wrong and why the result was unsatisfactory. After you tell me once, I can tell you what you need to do -- that's the important information the user needs to focus on. But so many otherwise intelligent people have to be told again and again and every single time you have to hear the same stupid story about what they did, what they expected to happen, what happened instead, and so forth. It's as if some people drop 50 IQ points just looking at a computer or smart phone.
That is profoundly ignorant. Yes, RIM caved -- unlike Google, Apple, and everyone else who didn't have to cave because they never withheld the private data governments demand. Look it up, since you won't believe me and then stop the FUD.
Except that there tends to be an inversely proportional relationship between "power and flexibility" and "lockdown", so it comes down to individual choice. Yes, the average techphobic user will not do as well with Android as with an iPhone. BTW WP7 is too new to call, but the history of utterly screwing users over on any kind of data service deal (sidekick, playforsure, etc) should give anyone with any sense visions of great red flags...
Then don't say idiotic things like being a wmaker user means constantly having to futz with the desktop -- it's a lie and either you know that or you're talking about things you don't have experience with. Don't blame me for calling as I see it, ok? Besides if you're sincere, then you'd be what we call a "perpetual n00b". It's gnome and kde that have stability issues and constant config revisions, obvioulsy -- not wmaker.
Then by your own standard wmaker is far better than kde or gnome. Stop pretending you know things you clearly do not and let the grownups speak.
This is how I feel about it after 10 years. , so your unwarranted assumptions fall flat. Also, you clearly have very little experience with wmaker. Otherwise you'd know just how out of line your "criticism" is. In reality, I haven't had to make any big changes in my wmaker config since 2004. From what I've seen, gnome and kde can't even go one year without making changes that muck up everyone's previous config. In light of that, you have a most curious POV.
Besides, I never claimed to be an "average user", nor is my advice targeting said mythical creature.
The point is that this is being hyped as a CLI replacement. It isn't any such thing. Sorry, I have no interest in the misconceptions, wild tangents, and manifestos you seem to be embracing. But just so you know, plan9 also has a CLI distinct from it's GUI. Sometimes it doesn't work, then you have to know how to use the plan9 CLI. Yes, I *have* used plan9...
You may believe you're psychic, but I don't.
Calling users of lean, efficient interfaces (who often script in additional functionality to fit our needs) "masochists" just makes you look like a n00b.
I did read it, and as impressed as you seem to be with "this is implemented in HTML on top of a small NodeJS HTTP server", that really doesn't tell us much. I gather you're not someone who groks the CLI, because you seem to be unclear about what comprises the difference between GUI and CLI environments. The distinction IMO (and probably the opinion of most CLI-centric users) is "this runs in a GUI, therefore it's a terminal emulator". Not vt100, but still a terminal emulator, as in it runs on top of the real interface, the CLI . So it might replace xterm or Terminal.app for some people some day, but it isn't going to revolutionize the CLI as some are thinking.
No, I don't think so... It's interesting, and I'm glad when people look into new and different ways of doing things, but it's doomed because adding yet another layer of abstraction for users to learn is not the way CLI geeks like to work, and everyone else just wants pointy-clicky-shiny and would rather die of festering boils than try to remember the string of text to type in.
I do applaud the effort, and maybe His Steveness will even be sold and replace Terminal.app with it, who knows? Most Apple users have never even seen Temrinal.app anyway, and there's already iTerm for serious CLI geeks using OS X, so it could probably be done. In fact, it sort of fits that the company that brought us AppleScript would do something like this. But as someone who already has zsh it's not very exciting to me at this time. Maybe that will change, but I doubt it.
Well then it doesn't live up to its billing, does it? I get the distinct impression this is being touted as a "replacement for the tired, old CLI", but if you're on a server, embedded, or other platform where x simply doesn't make sense you'll still be using a real shell.
This is a terminal emulator app, not a "CLI replacement".
But anyway, having used powershell I don't really see the big deal. People go on lengthy diatribes all the time about "the CLI is dead, you're so 1980s" but in reality the CLI is where the power and flexibility live. Powershell brings nothing to the table I can't already get in bash or zsh. I can run fbida and see graphics in the CLI if I want, or use the svgalib driver to watch a video with mplayer. So graphics in the terminal is not a revolutionary concept, and this is nothing but gingerbread, AFAICT.
Oh, how did I not notice that? Well I guess they decided to one-up the KDE boys then.
No, there's plenty of copycat software in the *nix world.
:)
But back on topic, I think that to be taken seriously this has to be able to actually replace the console, which of course it can't as it runs in X. If it could do what he's shown with the framebuffer and no xserver it'd be more exciting, at least to me. Implement it as a real shell, so I can edit inittab and use on one or more ttys. I'd be impressed then.
Sorry about that! Try this one, and if slashdot is killing URLs in posts now (why not, they were 403 for an hour this morning) it's pentadactyl you seek.
The most vocal atheists are invariably unconscious reactionary religious fruitcakes. Atheism has terrible PR.
You can probably do the brushed metal theme yourself, for the rest here you go. Without it, I find firefox unusable.
I was waiting to see if they screw up the 3.0 branch and piss everyone off like kde4 did, but I guess the anticipation was killing them so they had to find a way to start alienating users now, in spite of having no newly-designed crappy interface yet.
Good time to be a wmaker and openbox user...
So we've gone from slashvertisements to just outright assisting scammers, Taco? Wonder what took you so long...
Actually the haters surpass the fanbois in terms of religious fervor, by far. The proof is in the discussions of the Apple-related stories. Nothing but a bitchfest every time.
I think you might be taking the "you" in my original statement too literally. I wasn't accusing anyone in particular of being CLI-phobic, just commenting on those who are.
:)
BTW, you may be an "avid" terminal user, but when you're an "accomplished" terminal user you won't wonder how people find the files they need to edit anymore.
The Gavin Nuisance had to go visitc Child in jail. Surely he expects at least $100K for that... But I digress, obviously. :) If the version you give is true, then Childs was wrongly convicted and should have ample grounds for an appeal. I suspect though that the details of the situation may not be quite what you think they are, or there'd be at least one high profile lawyer courting that case.
Do you have any idea how much money you can burn through in just one day of providing network services to an entire city's government? Wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if the SF Dept of Technology spent that much or more trying to deal with the "rogue admin who absconded with all the data/access". The taxpayers *do* need to be reimbursed for that. This might actually be an example of the system working properly, though I do not know enough detail to say for sure.