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Comment Re:Debian (Score 1) 252

by JK_the_Slacker (#39833211) Attached to: Slackware: I'm Not Dead Yet!
July 16, 1993: Patrick Volkerding releases Slackware 1.00. 16 August, 1993: Ian Murdock announces that he wants to create a distro called Debian. No code is forthcoming. 15 September, 1993: Debian 0.01 ALPHA is 'released'. 17 October, 1993: Debian 0.02 ALPHA is 'released'. 02 November, 1993: Debian 0.03 ALPHA is 'released'. 05 November, 1993: Slackware 1.1.0 is released. 07 November, 1993: Debian 0.04 ALPHA is 'released'. 23 November, 1993: Debian 0.80 BETA is 'released' (limited beta). 28 November, 1993: Debian 0.81 BETA is 'released' (limited beta). 26 January, 1994: Debian 0.90 BETA is 'released' (public beta). 29 January, 1994: Debian 0.91 BETA is 'released' (public beta). I keep hearing this 'only by a matter of weeks' line. It looks to me like the first public 'release' of Debian occurred in January of 1994, six months after the first release of Slackware. Or does anyone want to argue that Duke Nukem Forever came out in 1997? Note that I'm giving Debian the benefit of the doubt here, by calling a 'public beta' a 'public release'.

Comment Re:Long term... (Score 1) 585

by JK_the_Slacker (#36176236) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: DOSBox, or DOS Box?

Amazon says hello.

Classic gaming, at least from a hardware perspective, is a pretty big business. If you can't find an adapter for your controller, you can almost always find somebody who built one in an afternoon from ten dollars worth of parts.

As far as special keys on emulated systems, it's very rare that they aren't provided for. This specifically talks about the Commodore 64 emulators available and how they provide for special Commodore keys.

The lesson here? For every one of us that has two pieces of old hardware sitting in a crate in the corner, there's some crazy guy still writing software for it, another crazy guy building hardware for it, and a third writing an emulator or driver for a modern system/OS.
America Online

When AIM Was Our Facebook 395

Posted by CmdrTaco from the something-to-think-about dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "Gizmodo reports that there was a stretch of time in the 90s and early 00s when AOL was a social requisite. 'Everyone had an AIM handle,' write Adrian Covert and Sam Biddle. 'You didn't have to worry about who used what. Saying "what's your screenname" was tantamount to asking for someone's number — everyone owned it, everyone used it, it was simple, and it worked.' When we all finally got broadband, it was always on and your friends were always right there on your buddy list, around the clock. AIM was the first time that it felt like we had presences online, making it normal, for the first time ever, to make public what you were doing. 'Growing up with AIM, it became more than just a program we used. It turned into a culture all its own—long before we realized we'd been living it.'"
Australia

Tasmanian Dept. of Education Wants Anti-Virus for Linux, OS X 396

Posted by timothy from the belt-and-suspenders-and-pants-full-of-glue dept.
An anonymous reader writes "One of Australia's largest government technology buyers, the Tasmanian Department of Education, has gone to market for a security vendor to supply anti-virus software for its 40,000-odd desktop PCs and laptops, as well as servers. But the department's not just running Windows — it runs Mac OS X and Linux as well, and has requested that whatever solution it buys must be able to run on those platforms as well. But have we reached the stage were Mac OS X and Linux even need third-party security software? It seems like most Mac and Linux users don't run it."
Linux

Submission + - Linode Turns 7, Announces Big RAM Increase (linode.com)

Submitted by
palegray.net
palegray.net writes: "For anyone interested in hosting, Linode turns seven today and has announced an impressive RAM increase across all plans (512 MB at the low end, 20 GB on the high end). There's an ongoing discussion of the announcement over at Hacker News for those interested. As a disclaimer, I have worked for Linode for a little over a year now, but I was a very happy customer for five years. For Slashdotters who already have a Linode, you'll need to issue a reboot to use the new memory; sorry about ruining your uptime ;)."

Comment Re:it flies in the face of common sense (Score 1) 306

by JK_the_Slacker (#28254163) Attached to: RIAA Wants To Bar Jammie From Making Objections

What's the point in having a second trial or an appeal if you aren't allowed to do things differently? Then again, this is law we're talking about, so logic and common sense probably don't apply.

This is NOT law; this is baloney. The RIAA lawyers wouldn't know the law if it hit them on the head.

I thought hitting people on the head WAS the RIAA legal strategy.

Comment Re:users... (Score 1) 958

by JK_the_Slacker (#27314939) Attached to: How Do You Deal With Pirated Programs At Work?

And let me chime in on the ZOMG install FOSS tip -- this is a great opportunity. You've already got a tailor-made excuse. "X user is using X software and we do not have a license. We can either pay X dollars for a license or use this freely available alternative that will provide the same functionality." In this economic climate, they won't even consider the pay software in most cases.

"Photoshop user is using Photoshop software and we do not have a license. We can either pay Photoshop dollars for a license or use this freely available alternative that will provide the same functionality."

"Joe Blow user is using Joe Bloe software and we do not have a license. We can either pay Joe Blow dollars for a license or use this freely available alternative that will provide the same functionality."

"700 user is using 700 software and we do not have a license. We can either pay 700 dollars for a license or use this freely available alternative that will provide the same functionality."

These equations make no sense!

Comment Re:Offtopic (Score 1) 90

by JK_the_Slacker (#27304301) Attached to: <em>Battle For Wesnoth</em> Version 1.6 Released

Ontopic: All open source games suck. I have played many of them and they are all horrible. I suspect that this is only "news" because of the game's license and not because the game is even remotely good.

As an open source game programmer, I take offense to this. Heavy offense. As an open source gamer, I disagree. Open source games are great because if you find a problem, you can dig and and fix it. You're free to improve them.

Contrast this with, for example, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. I love the concept, I love the gameplay, but what I don't love is the huge number of typos in the dialog. I can't do a thing about it. On the other hand, I was able to do a complete overhaul of the dialog in FreedroidRPG, and I'm now a member of the dev team.

As far as your experience with open source games, I doubt you've played a significant portion of them, and I highly doubt you've kept up with the updates. Yes, updates, new developments that get pushed out for public consumption. You don't get that with many proprietary games. You might get 3 patches, and that's it. No new content, just bugfixes. *That* sucks.

Comment Re:The 3 patents (Score 1) 644

by JK_the_Slacker (#27004737) Attached to: Has Microsoft's Patent War Against Linux Begun?

I'll grant I'm using Debian Etch, so I'm probably a little behind the curve in terms of what's available in cutting-edge Linux,

That could be a very good reason.

By the way, for the record, I'm using Slackware with the default kernel, and have been for a couple of years now. That's just in case anyone wants to accuse me of using some bleeding edge distro or kernel.

Comment Re:The 3 patents (Score 3, Informative) 644

by JK_the_Slacker (#26991029) Attached to: Has Microsoft's Patent War Against Linux Begun?

TomTom needs this driver because they store the system on an SD card with the aim that systems can be upgraded/fixed by directly accessing the filesystem from a Windows PC, so they have to use either FAT32 or NTFS, and as Linux's support of NTFS is essentially a joke

Linux's NTFS support is a joke? When did it stop working? I've been using it without problems for a couple of years now.

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