Linux-Advocacy Digest #743, Volume #32 Sat, 10 Mar 01 15:13:03 EST
Contents:
Re: Why Open Source better be careful - The Microsoft Un-American (The Ghost In The
Machine)
Re: Macintosh as an alternative to Windows?? ("Erik Funkenbusch")
Re: Why Open Source better be careful - The Microsoft Un-American (The Ghost In The
Machine)
Re: Macintosh as an alternative to Windows?? ("Erik Funkenbusch")
Re: Windows API (Was Re: Mircosoft Tax) (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
(Bloody Viking)
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
(Bloody Viking)
Re: What does IQ measure? (Chris Ahlstrom)
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your (Bloody
Viking)
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
(Bloody Viking)
Remain free (was: Re: definition of "free" for N-millionth time) (Per Abrahamsen)
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
("Ayende Rahien")
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
("Ayende Rahien")
Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your computer")
(The Ghost In The Machine)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Subject: Re: Why Open Source better be careful - The Microsoft Un-American
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 18:28:52 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Interconnect
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on Wed, 7 Mar 2001 09:18:19 +1100
<983nev$96l$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>
>> > Oil production WILL max out - and soon. The car companies know
>> > it. THAT is why only now do you see petrol-electric cars on sale.
>Not True.
>There is more Oil than ever before, Siberia, Alaska, Canada. It is more
>expensive to extract however.
Sweet light crude is the preferred oil; that's the kind Saudi Arabia
and Iraq and others in that area sell. Alaskan crude is quite different
and IIRC far thicker and harder to refine. Dunno about Siberia.
The oil companies are also making noises about extracting oil from shale.
Dunno how good that is, or how easy it is to extract from permafrost
and/or shale compared to drilling in open desert.
>
>The fuel of the future will be Fusion power.
The far future, perhaps. We can barely break even (more power out than
in) and will not be profitable energy-generation wise unless oil prices
become ten times what they are now, if I'm not mistaken (I haven't checked
the cost per fusion-kW, though).
I think we'd be better off with a variant of Carter's synthetic
oils program before then (the original, unfortunately, turned into
or started as a large boondoggle). In a sense, biopower is fusion
power through one level of indirection. :-) Ditto for wind, solar
(sunboiler/heat exchanger, not amorphous silicon), and to some extent
tidal. We can even extract methane gas from old garbage dumps.
>
>The US govt. will spend billions on the space station and yet they pull out
>of the international venture aimed at developing fusion power. Go figure?
>
Just out of curiosity: is there a cite for this? First I've heard of it
(but then, I wasn't aware there was an international venture, either;
not that it surprises me all that much -- the goal is a worthy one if
it can be done).
Of course, the US's stupidity in certain areas is well-known; it would
have cost less to complete the Superconducting Supercollider in Texas
(and presumably then let it sit idle) than it did to cancel it.
And yet, what did we do? Cancel it.
Bizarre.
(Sorry, I don't have a cite for this claim myself. I wish I did.)
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- insert random misquote here
EAC code #191 33d:05h:40m actually running Linux.
I was asleep at the switch the rest of the time.
------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Macintosh as an alternative to Windows??
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 12:46:30 -0600
"Peter K�hlmann" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Don't you think 2001 and is a little late to finally be coming out with
> > Pre-emptive multitasking, Memory protection, and full virtual memory?
> >
> > Cripes, Apple worked on their Next Generation OS (Copeland) for close to
> > 10 years before finally giving up and admitting defeat that their
> > programmers
> > just couldn't "fix" the MacOS. They needed to start over from scratch.
> >
>
> Well, Apple in that case had the grace to give up. MS did not, they
> stuffed Win9X unto the world.
Win9X wasn't meant to "fix" windows. It was meant as a hack to move people
to NT. It wasn't supposed to stick around this long, but MS decided to
chase after the enterprise market which severely delayed the release of a
consumer version of NT.
You act like MS *WANTED* there to be a Windows 95. They didn't. They would
have much rather had you switch to NT back in 93 than maintain two OS's for
another 8 years.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Subject: Re: Why Open Source better be careful - The Microsoft Un-American
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 18:47:53 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Peter Hayes
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on Sat, 10 Mar 2001 12:46:54 +0000
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>On Thu, 8 Mar 2001 01:16:55 -0800, "GreyCloud" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
><...>
>
>> I find this topic of great interest! You have a very strong point here! Do
>> you realize that only 10% of
>> earths' biomass is on the surface and that the rest is deep down under foot?
>> There is a fellow that is
>> researching a new theory that I believe to be true and also seems to drive
>> the political engine of oil.
>> This scientists' claim is that oil is produced by the underground bio-mass
>> of bacteria. Its a self renewing resource
>> and I suspect the oil industry top execs know this
>
>I've read something about this elsewhere, and the ecological implications
>are immense. We're already detecting the effects of global warming. The sea
>off Scotland's west coast is 1 deg C warmer than 10-15 years ago.
>
>http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/scotland/newsid_1208000/1208372.stm
>
>So an inexaustible supply of crude oil may well soon (within <50-100 years)
>tip the global climate into a hothouse to rival Venus'.
>
>But the oil execs are only interested in profit and bigger BMWs.
Um...just as a dumb observation, the crude oil supply is not inexhaustible;
there's only so much carbon in the world. :-)
Mind you, an accurate measure of the biomass might be of assistance;
I can't say I know how that might be done. I would suggest that, if
the political wills permit, one could bubble CO2 gas through the top
layer of the oceans and seed those layers with phytoplankton somehow.
Of course, the technical problems are considerable (how does one maintain
a raft of piping through ocean storms, for example?).
The phytoplankton might even generate oil as a side effect, as well
as various other things such as raw sugar. But it might look ugly
and interfere with whale migrations and native life.
But if the 10% figure is correct, we are going to have major problems
as we pull more of this bacteria-generated oil out of the ground;
that carbon, after all, is being unlocked from its ancestral resting place.
Hmmm....
>
>Peter
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- insert random misquote here
EAC code #191 33d:06h:03m actually running Linux.
This is not a .sig.
------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Macintosh as an alternative to Windows??
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 12:52:28 -0600
"Bob Hauck" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > In addition, since the Mac didn't have virtual memory, they had to
> > have some way to move memory around with the app going bezerk, so they
> > created something called "Handles" (only slightly similar to
> > descriptors) in which they were pointers to pointers.
>
> Golly, that sounds really familiar. In fact, it is identical to Windows
> in real mode.
Not really. Windows uses the concept of handles very differently. With
Windows, you allocate memory and get a handle, then you "lock" the memory
and get a pointer to it. No double dereference. If you store the point to
the memory in the MacOS, you can find the memory disappears on you.
> Then, when Win 3.1 came out and real mode was declared dead, we still
> had a bunch of limitations related to the real mode architecture. How
> about near vs far heaps, limited "system resources", only one instance
> of large- model programs, and reliance on DOS memory for system data
> structures? Those lived on even in Win95 to some degree.
You still had near/far memory because it was 16 bit, even in protected mode.
With Win95 most programmers didn't have to concern themselves with the
legacy stuff. In fact, I know lots of programmers that don't even know what
a segmented address is, much less how to call a DOS interrupt.
> Seems to me that if what you say is true, Windows copied much of it's
> badness from the Mac. MS can't even improve that which it steals.
No, the 16 bit windows method, while still ugly, wasn't nearly the pain the
MacOS was.
> > In addition, most major revisions of the OS up until about MacOS 7
> > caused significant backwards compatiblity issues. Apple broke API's
> > at their whim
>
> For crying out loud man, they changed cpu families in there! MS has had
> the benefit of running on the same cpu family the whole time and still
> has had many of the same issues.
I'm talking about before they switch CPU's. For instance, the switch to
System 6 cause all kinds of problems where Apple officially broke many of
their documented API's and simply said "tough, live with it".
> >Don't you think 2001 and is a little late to finally be coming out with
> >Pre-emptive multitasking, Memory protection, and full virtual memory?
>
> Finally he has a point. Yes, they should have done OS-X years ago.
> And, in fact, they tried. Several times.
Yes, which shows that Apple is simply incapable of doing any real systems
level programming themselves. They can do GUI's and apps well, but at
systems work, they suck. They had to buy NeXT to get the talent they
needed, and even then it's still taken what, 3 years?
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Crossposted-To: alt.linux.sux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Windows API (Was Re: Mircosoft Tax)
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 18:55:30 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Aaron Kulkis
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on Fri, 09 Mar 2001 16:44:53 -0500
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>>
>> "David Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>> news:986e6q$dd6$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> > Then we agree on the raw APIs of the basic system (Linux + X and
>> Windows) -
>> > both are unusable as they stand for making nice GUI programs (although
>> Linux
>> > API is fine for non-GUI stuff, while Windows API is unpleasant even for
>> the
>> > simplest of tasks).
>>
>> While creating and managing windows under the raw API isn't nearly as easy
>> as using a framework, it's certainly nowhere near the headache that X is
>> when you do it raw.
>
>And how many programmers interact with X directly rather than using toolkits?
I do. :-)
Of course, I'm trying to build my own toolkit. :-) :-) (When I have time,
admittedly.)
>
>I'm willing to bet that I could invite the entire lot of them over to
>my house for a party and still have food leftover in the refrigerator.
Depends on the size of the house, the refrigerator, and the food. :-)
[.sigsnip]
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- will code for pizza and wages
EAC code #191 33d:07h:26m actually running Linux.
All hail the Invisible Pink Unicorn (pbuh)!
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: 10 Mar 2001 19:17:21 GMT
Ayende Rahien ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: Why won't you get Solaris? A true Unix, free (unless you got a monster for a
: workstation) and work on x86.
Why bother when Linux is around? Linux is certainly UNIXy enough. I find more
difference between machines than across flavours of UNIX. A Linux install is
never quite the same after a reinstall, as though every UNIX box has its own
personality. Off the net I often use "Linux" and "UNIX" as near-synonyms. Yep,
I'm a happy camper when it comes to Linux.
Another freeware true UNIX is FreeBSD. I came close to using it, but Linux won
out on my desktop. I've used shell accounts over the years with different
flavours of UNIX, and Linux is not hardly different than a "true" UNIX.
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: 10 Mar 2001 19:25:14 GMT
The Ghost In The Machine ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: Dunno if "mode co80" works anymore. :-)
It works on Windows 95 just fine. Don't know about 98, ME, or other newer
flavours of Winblows. What I do know is that it works on my dual-boot box.
: What's wrong with Linux? Solaris is good, admittedly, but there's
: nothing wrong with Linux, and it's probably more readily available.
Linux is certainly more readily available than Solaris. You can buy Linux at a
Best Buy, Red Hat of course. And now you can go to a computer store and buy
Slackware and other major distros. Nope, you don't see Solaris on the shelf.
In terms of "look and feel", Linux _IS_ UNIX.
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
From: Chris Ahlstrom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,soc.singles
Subject: Re: What does IQ measure?
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 19:33:28 GMT
The Ghost In The Machine wrote:
>
> But yes, I've seen Plan 9. It was terrible.
Hey! Plan 9 is a /nifty/ OS!
Chris
--
[ Do Not Make Illegal Copies of This Message ]
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
Date: 10 Mar 2001 19:35:46 GMT
Mike Martinet ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: Oh man. You said it. I'm just a geek I guess, but I can't get over
: watching Linux (rarely) boot. No pretty clouds while you sit and wonder
: what's going on, instead, real ASCII text describing everything the OS
: is doing as it comes to life. It means business. The real deal. I
: still can't believe getting all this for almost nothing. I continue to
: be amazed. I wish I'd found it earlier. I sound like a cult member.
: "Big Iron OS on a PC" That about sums it up.
Yep. Someone has to finally say it. That was a second reason I set out to get
Linux in 1994. UNIX of any flavour will always have that Big Iron mystique to
it. Interestingly, Linux is used on modern Big Iron, as in Beowulf clusters to
make supercomputers.
While some people will like a "big iron" look n' feel, most desktop users
don't. (not to mention the mystique)
Before I found out about Linux, I heard of UNIX as a Big Iron OS, and was
curious, right at a time when I was getting fed up with software prices. I'm
not an owner of a money well by any means, and was looking for a freeware OS
with freeware that goes with it. Can't find a better deal than a freeware OS
with a "big iron" look n' feel and the functionality that comes with it.
I've had some growing pains over time, but it's plenty worth it.
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: 10 Mar 2001 19:40:47 GMT
GreyCloud ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: > MjM
: Now if you can re-program the BSOD to say "Help! I've fallen and I can't get
: up!"
There are utils to change the BSOD colours for 95! All the util does is change
two lines in either the SYSTEM.INI or WIN.INI file. Happily, I don't use 95
enough to have seen its BSOD, but I sure saw it with NT. I can't help but
think that NT is even more unstable than 95, which is bad enough.
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
From: Per Abrahamsen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: gnu.misc.discuss,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,misc.int-property
Subject: Remain free (was: Re: definition of "free" for N-millionth time)
Date: 10 Mar 2001 20:51:52 +0100
[ Stop the monster-crosspost! FUT: gnu.misc.discuss ]
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Peter Seebach) writes:
> Sure we do. You're just wrong. You *CANNOT* make BSDL code non-free.
> It is not possible. No action can ever revoke the freedoms given out.
True, and completely beside the point Steve is trying to make. I have
seen this happens a lot lately, the following is a general answer,
i.e. not specific to this thread.
============================================================
When a person say he prefer the GPL over BSDL because he want his code
to remain free, one can do three things:
1) Assume he is an idiot, and don't know that when someone
incorporates BSDL code in a proprietary program, the license of the
original work isn't changed.
2) Assume he does know the difference, and start a semantic argument
on whether the expression "remain free" only covers the original code,
or also derived works.
3) Assume he does know the difference, ignore the semantics, and
actually discuss the point the person is trying to get across.
Assuming the person one argue with is an idiot may often turn out to
be correct, but nonetheless I think it is best for the discussion to
avoid that assumption as long as possible.
Arguing semantics can be fascinating. RMS at least never seem to tire
of explaining the gnulitically correct use of words. However, I feel
that the really interesting debates usually involves people discussion
the essence of others positions, not just the wordings.
Thus, I prefer option #3.
Than you for listening. You may now continue to discuss the exact
meaning of the word "free", and how many angels can dance on a
pinhead.
------------------------------
From: "Ayende Rahien" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 21:32:08 +0200
"Bloody Viking" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:98dv2q$ma2$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>
> The Ghost In The Machine ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
>
> : Dunno if "mode co80" works anymore. :-)
>
> It works on Windows 95 just fine. Don't know about 98, ME, or other newer
> flavours of Winblows. What I do know is that it works on my dual-boot box.
It should work on all 9x versions.
NT versions (at least AFAIK), has the startup/shutdown fixed.
> : What's wrong with Linux? Solaris is good, admittedly, but there's
> : nothing wrong with Linux, and it's probably more readily available.
Solaris is better, YMMV, but that is what I think.
> Linux is certainly more readily available than Solaris. You can buy Linux
at a
> Best Buy, Red Hat of course. And now you can go to a computer store and
buy
> Slackware and other major distros. Nope, you don't see Solaris on the
shelf.
Not around here, at least.
For several reasons, Linux isn't very popular here for just about anything
but a server, and even then, commercial unixes are preffered.
> In terms of "look and feel", Linux _IS_ UNIX.
Of course, but since you can download both for free, I would rather get a
real Unix than a Linux.
------------------------------
From: "Ayende Rahien" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 21:34:15 +0200
"Bloody Viking" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:98duk1$ma2$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>
> Ayende Rahien ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
>
> : Why won't you get Solaris? A true Unix, free (unless you got a monster
for a
> : workstation) and work on x86.
>
> Why bother when Linux is around? Linux is certainly UNIXy enough. I find
more
> difference between machines than across flavours of UNIX. A Linux install
is
> never quite the same after a reinstall,
That is a bad thing, I would assume. Or did you mean something else.
> Another freeware true UNIX is FreeBSD. I came close to using it, but Linux
won
> out on my desktop. I've used shell accounts over the years with different
> flavours of UNIX, and Linux is not hardly different than a "true" UNIX.
Actually, BSD is not unix.
It's like Linux, a look-alike.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Customising Wrap-Up Screen. (WAS: "It is now safe to shut off your
computer")
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 20:01:37 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Bloody Viking
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on 10 Mar 2001 19:25:14 GMT
<98dv2q$ma2$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>
>The Ghost In The Machine ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
>
>: Dunno if "mode co80" works anymore. :-)
>
>It works on Windows 95 just fine. Don't know about 98, ME, or other newer
>flavours of Winblows. What I do know is that it works on my dual-boot box.
It's been so long since I've dual-booted into Win95 that I've forgotten
precisely when, at this point.
>
>: What's wrong with Linux? Solaris is good, admittedly, but there's
>: nothing wrong with Linux, and it's probably more readily available.
>
>Linux is certainly more readily available than Solaris. You can buy Linux at a
>Best Buy, Red Hat of course. And now you can go to a computer store and buy
>Slackware and other major distros. Nope, you don't see Solaris on the shelf.
>
>In terms of "look and feel", Linux _IS_ UNIX.
Except perhaps for lawyerly quibbling. I'll admit, if one programs
against Linux, porting to Unix is fairly minor, assuming one doesn't do
strange things such as writing to the I/O ports directly. :-)
(Mind you, at some point various Unix vendors are going to have
to fix some of the "bugs" in the include files.)
[.sigsnip]
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- insert random misquote here
EAC code #191 33d:10h:28m actually running Linux.
Hi. I'm a signature virus.
------------------------------
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