We have a Dell XPS 13 (9343) (originally came with Windows) at work. I used Ubuntu on it and couldn't get the display set up so that menus on IDEs etc. was a readable size. Attaching an external display was a disaster. Then a colleague took it over and put Windows 10 on it. Exact same issue. Anyone else experience this?
HN user
random778
I'd like an easy-to-use plugin for FF to call youtube-dl.
It's sad that books and blog posts on this topic needs to be written.
Not sure, but it doesn't beat a fully loaded Thinkpad from 4+ years ago. I hope Lenovo rolls out the retro design they are teasing.
Could you give examples of tools which make your easier vs. those that make it hard / are impossible to use? This seems like a good additional argument for open / interoperable systems vs. closed, tightly controlled systems.
This.
I'm not sure that I follow your argument. Are you saying that because a similar research project was successfully commercialized Plan-9 should be judged akin?
Even if you accept that, UNIX was not developed to what it became by AT&T. Let arguments about how they managed licensing UNIX vs how Plan-9 was licenced commense!
++ for picking out the +Fravia reference, and a middle finger to Google Plus for using the same thing.
http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/about.html
"Introduction
Plan 9 from Bell Labs is a research system..."
It does not seem that it was ever meant to compete with or replace commercialized operating systems. The direct output of research is not something you sell - but it does give the world better things which can be industrialized.
Do you have experienced engineers/developers who can mentor junior employees?
I don't see how the discussion around an open plan office is tricky. Simply googling it will give you droves of articles like this one
http://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/why-your-company-will-bene...
as well as research such as this review of research on the topic:
http://www.lapa.co.nz/assets/NewsAttachments/openplanoffices...
Can't support this enough. Management bullshit. Appoint an engineer who has developed some empathy and START TRUSTING HIM. If you're not an engineer you will very like fuck this up. Getting someone to give you the right words for recruitment doesn't translate into understanding what drives an engineer.
I use the MX500. Had it for 12 years. Took it apart two years ago and washed the plastic parts in dishwashing liquid, still good as new - only the black background of the logo is worn.
How do you think things would have played out had he become president 10 years earlier, 5 years before the revolutions of 1989?
Hacker News: Mark All Read [1]
I'd like to see HN, actually.
Anecdotally the taste is lost when they breed tomatoes to not burst when falling 3 feet to the floor.
When it comes to a textual user interface, have you considered Rob Pike's Acme?
Mediatek :(
(My reply is specific to this happening in 2016. There will one day be Judge Dredd-like firearms. I don't see that being widespread in my lifetime, though.)
If you work in a company developing a hardware product you will learn, amongst other things, this:
1) The demonstration item is very likely hacked together at the last moment, and would 100% fail in the market if it was put into production at the time of the demo. (Even if your company does everything right, you are frequently only a part of the total product).
2) You never use the latest, shiniest, unproven technology. You use the simplest, production-friendly technology that will perform the job. Otherwise you are building a product higher than necessary failure rates.
(This is assuming that you aren't working for Google, Apple, Elon Musk or someone else who can put 100+ engineers on a sub-project and/or invent new meterials etc).
My assumptions are thus:
1) The manufacturers probably did the demonstrations to a) not be outdone by the competition and b) gauge demand.
2) No arms manufacturer has a robust, proven design that is affordable for civilian small arms. Going out on a limb I would also guess that none of them have either an experienced embedded engineering team or an intimate, effective working relationship with an external team. This is a significant expense (as opposed to a mockup for demonstration purposes), from which (3) follows:
3) The only way that a majority of customers will pay extra for this (anti-)feature is if legislation forces them to. California (and a few other states?) might try this, but given the NRA's lobbying power (and other factors) it won't be federal. If California tries it, it will be only for new firearms and perhaps even only for a certain group of sales/type of firearms, as a test. I don't see many such firearms being sold in the next 20 (at least) years.
Now, everything up to here has been some nice mental masturbation, rendered moot by the reality of a biometric-restricted firearm. These problems are non-exhaustive and can be solved, but it won't be cheap, easy or quick to market.
1) When the cheap "fingerprint" sensor with barely functioning, insecure firmware in your phone fails, no problem. If that happens on a firearm, big problem.
How can it fail? Battery runs out. Sensor gets smashed. Blood on your fingers. Finger cut/crushed AND blood on it. / Gelatine fingerprint. Real finger severed by criminals. Attacker owns a screwdriver.
2) RFID.
How can it fail? Battery runs out. Backup battery runs out. Tag gets smashed. RFID frequency gets jammed. / Tag gets recorded by someone walking past you. Tag gets recorded by someone with a directional antenna. When strong encryption is finally added, the implementation is flawed and gets cracked. One of numerous other RFID issues gets exploited (see Defcon, Chaos Communication Congress et al.). Attacker owns a screwdriver.
3) Dynamic Grip Recognition
How can it fail? Owner weakened by attack, fatigue or medical condition. Dominant hand damaged.
4) Conversion kits using any of the above
Since the aren't integral to the weapon, disabling or removing them will likely be very easy.
5) Source code of the firearm
You want to put a binary blob on my firearm? Firstly, no. Secondly I envision some interesting "unintended acceleration"-like lawsuits. (That reportedly cost Toyota about $1000 per line of source code)
Addressing all of these issues will take a long time and will be really expensive. And I'll bet the market will then end up with a DRM'd firearm that the owner won't really own. Maybe even connected to the internet, with a GPS and geographic fencing. There is a final addition which I would actually support: a screen and loudspeaker. Because then you can force the owner to view educational material on firearm safety, anger management, conflict resolution, the results of employing violence, responsible drug use and where they can find counselling w.r.t. all of the above.
Some things I would keep pushing for instead of an unreasonable electromechanical technological solution:
1) Firearm safety training in school / pre-school (ie. that it's not a toy, don't point it at people etc.). You should be training your kids regardless of your views on firearm ownership, you're not hiding the dangers of knives or cars from them, neither should you hide the dangers of firearms from them. The Brady terrorists will be against this, the practical result will be a contribution to continued accidental discharges by children.
2) Require all firearms, in all states, to be stored in a safe (which can't be opened (without a key!) by a three year old) when not in use. The NRA extremists need to stop politicking when it comes to requiring training and safe storage. Once again, a contribution to continued accidental discharges by children.
3) Instead of the planned invasion of Syria, put money into education in an intelligent way. Not into arguing about the math curriculum, but into social programs etc. to make finishing school and contributing to society more profitable (both in tangible and non-tangible ways) than doing drive-by shootings.
4) Decriminalize all drugs and let gangsters register their illegal firearms and join newly set-up shooting clubs with competitions and other places they can find stimulating jobs.
There, I've solved the USA. What's next?
PS. Something I think will (are?) sell(ling) are biometric trigger locks. People won't care that they don't work, since current trigger locks don't work either.
Can you please point me to communities / sources around these topics? Super interesting!
I was with you until nr. 7. Definitely not going to happen. If some genius makes it happen, expect it to be an epic failure. 8 and 10 maybe, 9 I don't know...
EPUB: https://transfer.sh/zIKhO/gsglgl-piotrwozniak.epub (3.7 MiB)
PDF: https://transfer.sh/17RsID/gsglgl-piotrwozniak.pdf (13 MiB)
btw transfer.sh is great thus far.
How do you define freedom w.r.t. software? Based on your examples, you differ from Stallman, but it is unclear to me how you see it.
It seems you want open source software and the positive things that that entails. The GPL does not want that, it wants free-as-in-freedom-as-defined-by-RMS. There are naturally pros and cons to each. People seem to forget the cons of a non-free(libre) license coupled with open source. Especially the long-term effects.
For the uninitiated/"unbrainwashed", the difference between open source software and free-as-in-freedom software:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.h...
Possible to upload an example image + result?
True (to an extent), but take into account how much more expensive putting together a small amount of units (compared to say Dell) is. One really needs to go through the costing of something, even a simple PCB, to realize the orders of magnitude difference there is. Unfortunately the firmware issue is also true. If a million people bought this laptop (at 2x the price of a XPS 13) they might be able to convince someone to open up some of that firmware. But that's not going to happen.
Yep, it's double what a similar Dell XPS 13 costs.
I would argue that it's really powerful for certain, niche applications. Having an FPGA onboard is awesome. Now if we can get software everyone uses (office apps, browsers, and the big ones, not specialized ones 1% of people use) maybe the Novena will be fine. We should get that anyway so mid/low-range smartphones can replace the PC for most people.