#97 Kevin Carmony - Linspire/Freespire
Guiding Linux distribution to be among the most popular on the desktop.
I think Linspire users must be as rare as hen's teeth, I've certainly never even heard
of a single person using it, other than the guy who reviewed it for distrowatch. Same goes for
Xandros. though I did download that one once to check it out with a windows-stranded friend in mind,
but saw no advantage over Ubuntu.
Come to think of it, who the heck is eweek?
I believe he meant that this announcement from MS would give some "hostages" who wish to feel more optimistic about MS becoming less evil some false hope to brighten their dreary day.
Really, Microsoft has no chance of pleasing you,
do they?
Sure they do -- and it's not
even very difficult! All they have to do to please me is stick
to open standards, formats, and protocols. I really don't mind
closed source software, OSs, etc -- I'm not anti-capitalism, but
capitalism shouldn't be a religion, either. Standards, protocols,
and formats should always be open, period*. Otherwise, where is the
balance? If MS ever complies with that I would be more than happy
to support them and their products. Until then, I and others will continue
to point out for the benefit of the general public that MS is a predatory monopolist screwing up our economy and stifling innovation, therefore it is best to steer clear of MS products.
*I have a similar gripe with Apple, though I am a Mac user. If I didn't need the Mac for multimedia production I'd use FBSD and Linux exclusively, but unfortunately ALSA and OSS are not quite ready yet for serious MM production.
...to finally share proper doc of the old standards. This just means they feel confident that MS Office 2007 will take firm enough root to ensure that the old game of catch up for FOSS projects will stay the same. And wasn't it just yesterday some twits had an artice about how MS is changing/will change? I sure wouldn't hold my breath!
RSS, especially with Google's customizable news feeds, totally rocks. It is by far the very best and easiest way to scan news that matters to me -- at least, using Safari on OS X it is. (I've heard Safari on win sucks, but wouldn't know personally). For the uninitiated, Safari on OS X renders feeds just beautifully, like a web page of all your feeds. Very simple, usable, and obviously without need for some contrived "browser integration" scheme. I also use FF2 with a plugin called Brief on FBSD, that works very much like Safari's integrated reader (though unfortunately *much* slower). If they get that Brief add-on working well in FF3 and fix the crashing on OS X (for those of us using OS X and Shapeshifter) I would happily switch to FF3 for all my machines.
So then, your two reasons for thinking this is a good thing pretty much boil down to "fear of terrorism" and "people are stupid and need to be protected from themselves".
I absolutely hate people who tell me to "relax" when it's clear I am not in the mood.
You strike me as one of those. Best be careful with that, it's right at the top of most people's list of pet peeves.
Oh sure, it's in FBSD ports. You can build it if you're so inclined and have the time, very easily. The point is that many of us simply don't have the time to build a new browser version for each and every bugfix. I'm sure many of us find the very easiest way is to use Opera's binary for FBSD and Safari for OS X. It's just annoying to me that FF1.x and FF2 were so buggy and slow and like many others I eagerly awaited the release of FF3. I had even begun coding a theme for it. Now it's here and doesn't work right for me. Meanwhile, everyone else uses it so I have to at least use it for testing sites I build. Now as I've found, I can run FF3 on my Mac, at the expense of disrupting my entire desktop to have my eyes gouged by hideous theme non-compliance (and before you say it, themes in OS X are not like themes in Xorg or win -- it's kind of a big mess with no easy fix, but that's another rant). So okay, it's not a big deal to use FF3 in OS X for site testing purposes, but this isn't the way to make me want to switch. After all, Shapeshifter is perhaps the most common 3rd party app there is for OS X. Maybe they'll fix it someday, but more likely some Mac user with time to kill will fix it. The point is, there is not really a 3.0 release for Mac, it should still be in beta until it works properly. It should certainly be in the release notes. It isn't a new problem, we've had it at least since RC1. They just chose to ignore it guess.
Actually, I just found out it is because FF3 clashes with some fonts in
Shapeshifter. Just verified one "fix" is to put it on Shapeshifter's exclude
list but unfortunately, that doesn't help me much. My eyes are quite
photosensitive so no way am I going to tolerate the gouge-your-eyes-out all
white standard mac theme just for more than a minute or two.
Very poor planning on the part of Mozilla, IMO.
But at least now I can use it for a moment to test compatability of pages I'm
building without switching machines. That's a bit useful anyway.
New fastest way to get modded down on/.: say Firefox isn't as
great as people claim it is.
For those of us still
using OS X on powerpc (that's many thousands of users, BTW, my machine's from
November 2005) FF3 crashes instantly -- and then the crash reporter exits
without being able to send a report. And Moz has never provided a binary of FF
for those of us who like to use FreeBSD. Because of course we've got nothing
more important to do with our time than compile a huge pile of browser code,
right?
I love Firefox on Linux, but most of my time is spent on OS X and FreeBSD.
I guess they're big enough now they just don't care...
At least seamonkey still works fine on my Mac, but looks like I have to wait
until next spring's ugrade to install FF3. Think I'll still want to?
I thought about building it for the Mac from source, but if Moz devs can't even
get that right then I'd probably just be wasting my time.
Meh. Opera's a lot faster anyway, and they even give you a binary for FBSD.
I wouldn't sweat it. Slashdot has always been comically irrational that way, it's part of the charm. I'm still looking forward to my first "+5 Troll" mod.
Also I'm sure we Apple users are accustomed to the haters on/., though I've never really understood them. It's just a fact that if you defend an Apple product some jackasses will mod you down, no matter how factual your information. You can really see their desperation in the rush to report every little blog post in which some "security software" producer claims to have found an OS X issue. I guess the real news is that with so many people switching to Mac or Linux the anti-malware dog-and-pony show operators find their market dwindling, but apparently the Mac haters wouldn't want to look at that. Of course many of them are probably foolish enough to actually tie up half their system resources running antivirus software, as if it will help. Superstitious people are not usually terribly bright. Oh well, sucks to be them.
Meanwhile, laughably incorrect reporting aside -- still no malware in the wild for OS X. Ha Ha!:)
P.S. Now that was a proper demonstration of flamebait!
Whoops, it's me with foot in mouth, darn! I was thinking I couldn't change perms on the executable without also changing them on the.app or it would disable the.app, but I was mistaken, and you are correct. Of course, the fix (sudo chmod -R u-s/System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app does still cover that).
Slashdot Mirror
I think Linspire users must be as rare as hen's teeth, I've certainly never even heard of a single person using it, other than the guy who reviewed it for distrowatch. Same goes for Xandros. though I did download that one once to check it out with a windows-stranded friend in mind, but saw no advantage over Ubuntu.
Come to think of it, who the heck is eweek?
I believe he meant that this announcement from MS would give some "hostages" who wish to feel more optimistic about MS becoming less evil some false hope to brighten their dreary day.
Sure they do -- and it's not even very difficult! All they have to do to please me is stick to open standards, formats, and protocols. I really don't mind closed source software, OSs, etc -- I'm not anti-capitalism, but capitalism shouldn't be a religion, either. Standards, protocols, and formats should always be open, period*. Otherwise, where is the balance? If MS ever complies with that I would be more than happy to support them and their products. Until then, I and others will continue to point out for the benefit of the general public that MS is a predatory monopolist screwing up our economy and stifling innovation, therefore it is best to steer clear of MS products.
*I have a similar gripe with Apple, though I am a Mac user. If I didn't need the Mac for multimedia production I'd use FBSD and Linux exclusively, but unfortunately ALSA and OSS are not quite ready yet for serious MM production.
Thanks, good info for those who will not RTFA. Same old self-serving MS...
...to finally share proper doc of the old standards. This just means they feel confident that MS Office 2007 will take firm enough root to ensure that the old game of catch up for FOSS projects will stay the same.
And wasn't it just yesterday some twits had an artice about how MS is changing/will change? I sure wouldn't hold my breath!
RSS, especially with Google's customizable news feeds, totally rocks. It is by far the very best and easiest way to scan news that matters to me -- at least, using Safari on OS X it is. (I've heard Safari on win sucks, but wouldn't know personally). For the uninitiated, Safari on OS X renders feeds just beautifully, like a web page of all your feeds. Very simple, usable, and obviously without need for some contrived "browser integration" scheme. I also use FF2 with a plugin called Brief on FBSD, that works very much like Safari's integrated reader (though unfortunately *much* slower). If they get that Brief add-on working well in FF3 and fix the crashing on OS X (for those of us using OS X and Shapeshifter) I would happily switch to FF3 for all my machines.
or: /usr/ports/sysutils/screen && sudo make install clean
cd
That or:
sudo port -v install screen
So then, your two reasons for thinking this is a good thing pretty much boil down to "fear of terrorism" and "people are stupid and need to be protected from themselves".
Wow. You got me there!
Now that's just plain silly. Everyone knows it's turtles all the way down !
Get your trunks off me, you damned, filthy, elephants !
Wish I had mod points for you; I love that episode! "You think we are not smart. We're smart."
I absolutely hate people who tell me to "relax" when it's clear I am not in the mood. You strike me as one of those. Best be careful with that, it's right at the top of most people's list of pet peeves.
Maybe we should just build Imaginary Prisons for those who "steal" Imaginary Property? Then the punishment could truly fit the crime. :)
A shiny, new laptop loaded with Vista, of course. He's earned it!
Oh sure, it's in FBSD ports. You can build it if you're so inclined and have the time, very easily. The point is that many of us simply don't have the time to build a new browser version for each and every bugfix. I'm sure many of us find the very easiest way is to use Opera's binary for FBSD and Safari for OS X. It's just annoying to me that FF1.x and FF2 were so buggy and slow and like many others I eagerly awaited the release of FF3. I had even begun coding a theme for it. Now it's here and doesn't work right for me. Meanwhile, everyone else uses it so I have to at least use it for testing sites I build. Now as I've found, I can run FF3 on my Mac, at the expense of disrupting my entire desktop to have my eyes gouged by hideous theme non-compliance (and before you say it, themes in OS X are not like themes in Xorg or win -- it's kind of a big mess with no easy fix, but that's another rant). So okay, it's not a big deal to use FF3 in OS X for site testing purposes, but this isn't the way to make me want to switch. After all, Shapeshifter is perhaps the most common 3rd party app there is for OS X. Maybe they'll fix it someday, but more likely some Mac user with time to kill will fix it. The point is, there is not really a 3.0 release for Mac, it should still be in beta until it works properly. It should certainly be in the release notes. It isn't a new problem, we've had it at least since RC1. They just chose to ignore it guess.
Actually, I just found out it is because FF3 clashes with some fonts in Shapeshifter. Just verified one "fix" is to put it on Shapeshifter's exclude list but unfortunately, that doesn't help me much. My eyes are quite photosensitive so no way am I going to tolerate the gouge-your-eyes-out all white standard mac theme just for more than a minute or two. Very poor planning on the part of Mozilla, IMO. But at least now I can use it for a moment to test compatability of pages I'm building without switching machines. That's a bit useful anyway.
For those of us still using OS X on powerpc (that's many thousands of users, BTW, my machine's from November 2005) FF3 crashes instantly -- and then the crash reporter exits without being able to send a report. And Moz has never provided a binary of FF for those of us who like to use FreeBSD. Because of course we've got nothing more important to do with our time than compile a huge pile of browser code, right?
I love Firefox on Linux, but most of my time is spent on OS X and FreeBSD. I guess they're big enough now they just don't care... At least seamonkey still works fine on my Mac, but looks like I have to wait until next spring's ugrade to install FF3. Think I'll still want to? I thought about building it for the Mac from source, but if Moz devs can't even get that right then I'd probably just be wasting my time. Meh. Opera's a lot faster anyway, and they even give you a binary for FBSD.
What you just did is disgusting. I hope someday someone does that to you, you little troll.
Not necessarily -- you just change the goal to finding a faster connection.
I wouldn't sweat it. Slashdot has always been comically irrational that way, it's part of the charm. I'm still looking forward to my first "+5 Troll" mod.
/., though I've never really understood them. It's just a fact that if you defend an Apple product some jackasses will mod you down, no matter how factual your information. You can really see their desperation in the rush to report every little blog post in which some "security software" producer claims to have found an OS X issue. I guess the real news is that with so many people switching to Mac or Linux the anti-malware dog-and-pony show operators find their market dwindling, but apparently the Mac haters wouldn't want to look at that. Of course many of them are probably foolish enough to actually tie up half their system resources running antivirus software, as if it will help. Superstitious people are not usually terribly bright. Oh well, sucks to be them.
:)
Also I'm sure we Apple users are accustomed to the haters on
Meanwhile, laughably incorrect reporting aside -- still no malware in the wild for OS X. Ha Ha!
P.S. Now that was a proper demonstration of flamebait!
No, just female. We tend to own our mistakes. :)
***races off to avoid battle-of-the-sexes brawl***
Well, we already know it wants to be free, so maybe now it's just exercising its sentient status in other areas.
Whoops, it's me with foot in mouth, darn! I was thinking I couldn't change perms on the executable without also changing them on the .app or it would disable the .app, but I was mistaken, and you are correct. Of course, the fix (sudo chmod -R u-s /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app does still cover that).
Sorry about that, chief!
You fail. Next time investigate more thoroughly, helps avoid that foot-in-mouth thing.