I would agree, if only the installer had the option not to install the plugin and the option was kept when updating.

This only works if the number is already visible/public.

You think this is bad? Dell did the same to me, even though my machine has (came from factory with) 4GB of RAM! And the combination of their BIOS + drivers only allow 2.9 GB of usable RAM on the default OS (Win7 32-bit)! I've seen some posts saying that you're now allowed to install a Win7 64-bit with a key from 32-bit OS, but anyway you can't just upgrade a 32-bit installation to 64-bit (you have to reinstall).

General programming for personal uses or your own company: Object Pascal with Free Pascal (and Lazarus).
http://freepascal.org/
http://lazarus.freepascal.org/

I hope you're drunk (I sure am :D ). It's not the question whether the medium is "real" or "virtual", the matter is whether the "fact" is real or virtual.

Doh. Everything needs an equilibrium; maybe if MS didn't force them to have that low margins they wouldn't have to push that bunch of crap on us.
Razor-thin margins on software would be a good thing for consumers, too. But since MS is a monopoly we can't have it, right? And it's not like Windows doesn't come bundled with a bunch of useless crap.

PulseAudio is not about fixing ALSA, it's about fixing the parts the distros/people think are missing in the Linux audio stack.
Please try these:
http://ossguy.com/?p=347
And from the previous article: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DesktopTeam/Specs/CleanupAudioJumble#Use%20cases
http://www.cio.com.au/article/320807/open_source_identity_pulseaudio_creator_lennart_poettering

> Again I will reiterate. PulseAudio is a middleman standing between the applicating wanting to play
> sound, and ALSA. How exactly is that going to fix an inherent flaw in the underlying ALSA system?

What "inherent ALSA flaw" are you talking about? PA was not created to fix any ALSA flaw, other people have already stated several features it introduces *on top of* ALSA. I'll cite two more: reduce power consumption and provide multi-user/seat policy.

> Hint: it will not and cannot.

You can't affirm a middleman can fix all possible flaws of the lower layer, but of course it can work-around some kinds of flaws.

> If there are such horrible problems with Dmix (that somehow I won the lottery of never personally
> encountering), that kind of development effort should be put towards fixing Dmix. Doesn't that
> make a lot more sense?

Lots of influential people didn't think dmix was the way to go, that's why there are so many alternatives.

Agreed. Of course I hated PulseAudio (in Ubuntu) at first, but I've read enough to know it wasn't Lennart's fault and anyway now it just works.
These "Linus' Moments" of him doesn't help much, but I always found reason in them.
I think this might be the article with the worst ratio of uninformed and nonsense comment (per total comments) I've ever saw. "I replaced PA with ALSA", "cgroups -> jails", "BSD is relevant, it's used by Apple", etc, and all of them voted +5, Informative! WTF?!

And people moderate this Insightful? Sigh. The poster blatantly assume stuff just to disagree with the thread and provide a lame answer.
Every of the 5 makers (not models) suggested have wildly differing "good enough" models, but picking a "very good" one is getting harder and harder with the lame modifications all makers are doing to the keyboards on every fscking new model.
PS. I never had/bought an Apple product.

The intention of patents is to not spur competition, it's to encourage innovation by justifying/giving ROI to research. The examples you cite are demerits of the patent system: divergent formats were created, duplicating efforts and worsening user experience, not for technical reasons, but to avoid the patent costs and pitfalls.

Just proves that's something very odd about this whole story. Every 5-buck chinese mp3 player supports vorbis, but the brand ones don't.

Silverlight is almost shoved down the throat of anybody who enables Windows Update or visits microsoft.com. I can't find any number on SL user base, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's over 90%.
It's just people like you and like me who won't install SL (just out of distrust in MS' security).

OT: And that _was_ me, because fortunately in Brazil the price wars caused several vendors to start selling notebooks with Linux and my last one is one of those - to avoid the possibility of starting a war about Linux distros ;)

Wrong. This is just a disingenuous twist used by immoral people. The job of the lawyer if to defend the client so that they get a just trial.
Just like that "enterprises are meant to profit" thing. No. They're meant to generate capital, and in the way, jobs.

to hell with karma...