This was the one for me: "To be fair though, when confronted by the sheer enormity of distances between the stars, better minds than the one responsible for the Guide's introduction have faltered. Some invite you to consider for a moment a peanut in reading and a small walnut in Johannesburg, and other such dizzying concepts."
Like TP, he had an amazing penchant for explaining the unexplainable :)
Ah, ok, I was thinking along the lines of Richard Feynman, Carl Sagan or Stephen Hawking...
Terry Pratchett is entertaining but he can't hold a candle to Douglas Adams. It's more like he's found a formula and markets the hell out of it (he's a good businessman though!).
Terry Pratchett is correct. The man has created an imaginary universe, interlinked and interweaved across dozens of stories. His definitions on quantum and time are interesting and amusing at the same time. His frustration at the limitation of language with regard to these subjects too: "It is very difficult to explain quantum in a language designed to tell other monkeys where the ripe fruit is". Apologies for the OT post :)
If our language (I'm thinking English, I'd be interested to hear of variations) is for telling people where the ripe fruit is, how come we don't have specific [common] words for so-unripe-it-will-give-you-indigestion, not-quite-ripe, ripe-enough, still-needs-to-ripen and so-ripe-you-can't-pick-it - they'd be very useful in foraging situations?
I guess /auf Deutsch/ they'd all just be compound words?
This is brilliant. Not cheap, not practical, but it'll add some big brand credence to EV technology that nobody else can muster, given the world wide fan base that OCC enjoys. Nice work junior :-)
You link to a sane, rational tech journo who took the time to test the issue and consider his results? No sensationalism? No foaming at the mouth, running in circles panic? I must have slipped into the Twilight Zone. Cue the funky music and the thing on the wing.
The problem here is two fold. Apple conduct a deliberate search for swear words and slang, find it, flag it to the developer, and bounce the app. Technorati goes mad, sets the blogosphere alight with vitriol and damns Apple to hell, scant months after worshipping the self-same company. Alternatively, Apple fail to conduct said search, pass the app, and someone's rosy cheeked darling is caught scanning naughty words on their iPhone. Consumer advocacy groups and parental groups set the blogosphere alight with vitriol and damns Apple to hell. The honeymoon for Apple is over. They fought, they gained market and mindshare, and now they find themselves in a position where their former fans wish to slay them, and they're high profile enough to piss off the non-techs who buy their tech. Will be watching the Apple hate with interest in the coming months, same as with the Google hate. How we do loathe a victor.
So, who will you be cheering for in these Apple/Google vs. the people fights?
Personally in the Apple vs. the people fight, I'll be cheering for the people who decide that they can do a better job policing themselves and their children than Apple can. I know it's not easy, but it is a parent's job to prepare their children to live in the world as it actually is. That includes the vulgar, violent, and hateful things in the world.
+1 for the sentiment, and because I am in agreement with the general principle. However, I can't find it in myself to cheer for either side. Apple will continue to make ham fisted attempts to self-police in an effort to mitigate one type of fallout, while embroiling themselves in completely different fallout. The nett result is going to be an ugly, mudslinging cluster fk in which no winner can, or will, emerge. Google is up the same creek, similarly lacking an adequate paddle. Blending corporate prerogatives and social responsibility / community perception is like mixing magnesium and water, a bright flash and a funny smell are all that get left over.
"I know it's not easy, but it is a parent's job to prepare their children to live in the world as it actually is. That includes the vulgar, violent, and hateful things in the world."
<sarcasm>That must mean children growing up in war zones and neighborhoods with a lot of crime must be the best "prepared" children, and parents should try to emulate such environments for their children's benefit.</sarcasm>
That's not what I was implying. I was talking about the over-protective parents and adults who try so hard to shield their children from the bad things in the world (a noble idea), that they may unintentionally fail to prepare them for such encounters.
When this happens, who knows how these children will respond? We hope positively, but it could also be negatively or indifferently. Whatever it is, by this time, it's usually too late for a parent to provide meaningful advice.
Adults can still provide a positive, nurturing environment at home for their children and, at the same time, teach them about the right ways to handle unpleasant situations they may encounter in their lives. These "unpleasant situations" can occur in even the nicest of neighborhoods.
Retrospectively, this "content" flagging could apply to Mail, Safari, multimedia apps etc, so I guess my argument doesn't hold much water. I do maintain that the brouhaha and anger at Apple at the moment is interesting to behold. 'Scuse me while I return to panel beating FOSS from source onto my belligerent MacBook ;)
No drive? The reassembly part of the video a reverse of the disassembly? I have an awesome gadget which refuels my car as I drive, or I will, as soon as I locate a black box with some wires and pipes sticking out of it, and splice together some video that shows the rev counter and speedo going the right way, while super-imposing the fuel gauge returning to full. Maybe I'm just a cynic and the video doesn't reveal all the secrets.
I am the only one who thinks that if you think you're smart enough to do something you know is illegal, then you should be big enough to handle what comes your way when you get caught? Bollocks to his mental state and his frailty and the other excuses being trotted out on his behalf. He knew he was doing wrong when he committed the hack, and he should grow the necessaries to deal with the consequences now. Too late to cry about.
I've often wondered about the sanity of using VC funding as a metric for measuring the success of a start up. If your business is simply developing tech to raise funding, then you're existing in a vacuum. Abraham Lincoln would have made a create start up founder:
"Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights."
"The penniless beginner in the world," he once explained, "labors for wages awhile, saves a surplus with which to buy tools or land, for himself; then labors on his own account another while, and at length hires another new beginner to help him." This steady, gradual advance, Lincoln insisted, is "the prosperous system, which opens the way for all — gives hope to all, and energy, and progress, and improvement of condition to all."
Well, copies of K&R and C Puzzle Book are on their way, with CII and Advanced Programming In The Unix Environment (2ed) wishlisted for later. Can't find a copy of Deep C Secrets on our local Amazon equivalent, but I'll keep searching.
I actually picked up and then put down a good looking book on Unix systems programming either by Stevens, or by someone who worked very closely with him and wrote an updated version. I think I'll scream off to the book store and track it down.
It's the updated version of APUE done by Rago (the guy who did Unix System V Network Programming; a fairly good book but with a narrow and almost obselete focus; sysv STREAMS -- a very good idea whose time hasn't come.)
