Tree-style tabs are amazing. I like Opera better as a whole, but I often use Firefox *just* for that one extension. I'm off it right now, because there's a weird bug where when the tree-style tab bar is docked on the right and you try to scroll the bar, it treats the entire bar as a draggable image (that's in opensuse 11.x, FF3.x, darnedest thing).

Although adblocking is only available in Mozilla variants and Opera and Konqueror, et al, there is still the option of using a proxy app that blocks ad banners and soforth. So, in effect, all browsers can be used to view adblocked sites.

The most moden OSS engine out there, perhaps. I'd bet that Opera revises theirs just as frequently, and they seem incredibly adamant and aggressive about adhering to standards and trying out new methodologies.

Same here. 2001-2005, it was amazing. It's one of the reasons I stayed using linux after briefly trying with Redhat around '98 (I couldn't get X86Config, or whatever it used to be named, set up right for my Matrox card). It got all my hardware done perfectly out of the box, including the sound hardware (and that at a time when everybody at the local LUG was complaining about also and oss constantly), with every application I threw at it. This is something that I didn't even get out of Windows.

It kind of went blah for a while, around the time that they de-draked and became Mandriva. rpmdrake (the graphical program installer, more elegant than but equivalent to Synaptic) was changed around to become slightly maddening, things suddenly stopped Just Working..... I've tried a few distros since, but nothing's been quite as perfect. I'm on opensuse right now, and Mint looks like it could be fun, but I think I'll pop back to this one for a trial. :)

Maybe they stopped using the name because it infringed on a copyright. At the very least, they got rid of their logo/mascot, because it was a wizard, and that was too similar conceptually to the fictional character http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandrake_the_Magician for them to keep it without legality becoming a concern.

I, for one, am happy that their apps are still named drak____ and not driva____. :)

On my machine here, in Konqueror, you can go to the View Menu, select "View Mode", then click on "WebKit", to change Konqueror's renderer. So yes, it does. It just doesn't do so by default.

explorer.exe does more than that. It is also the handler for the Windows equivalent of gnome-panel. That's why when (in 2k and XP, at least) your file manager in Windows freezes and you tell it to force quit that window, your entire startbar/desktop vanishes for a few seconds.

Gamecube's Z button is horrible, you have to keep your hands close together when using the controller. That last one is sort of a PC/Wii thing, but it's turning into a game breaker for me lately. A controller feels annoying to me nowadays if I can't just dangle my hands at my side or have them both resting on the arms of my chair.

But that aside ... yeah, the Z button. Breaks easily (on some controllers I've had, you have to press the fuck out of the button to get it to register, set on a weird hinge that feels awkward. N64's Z button was genius, but this implementation of it was a poor afterthought.

(other than that, it's a pretty great controller!)

"it's almost impossible without straps to keep yourself in place and a really high drive that will overcome all of the other problems."

One could say the same thing for the more fun styles of sex here on Earth.

You're pretty much in line about 360 not being quite overcome by PS3 in Europe and certainly not in America by a large stretch. We really don't have solid, verifiable numbers for the PAL (Europe plus a few other areas glomped together) region, but given that Sony and Microsoft claim to be beating each other overall in this area with only slightly different wording suggests that they're roughly level there. So you're totally on the ball with your hardware comments.

But be careful about using attach rate as a metric for success. During the early to middle years of a generation, it is normal for *less* successful consoles to have higher attach rates. In terms of software, from the various piddly NPD leaks that we get beyond the top ten and that summary blurb, it looks like the Wii is selling roughly twice the amount of software as the 360 in terms of units in the US. It is difficult to determine ratio of first to third party sales, but from previous years' financial reports, the general trend is that slightly under half of Wii games are third party in the first half of the year, and somewhat over half of Wii games are third party in the second half of the year.

My suspicion would be that Wii third party sales this particular second half are greater than those for the 360, especially since the 360's highest seller was a first party title. It'd still be somewhat close, but given the trend, this might have been the last Autumn where you could reasonably use the term "holding it's[sic] own" when speaking of the 360's 3rd party sales.

(now, 3rd party game quality is another story)

I'm guessing IHBT, but here's an explanation for those who don't quite get it:

He typed: at midnight `shutdown -r now`
He meant to type: at midnight "shutdown -r now"
The "at" command schedules the command in quotes to run at midnight. Putting backquotes around the command, as he actually typed, causes the command to be run immediately.

Unless he meant that there are only about thirteen hundred of them out there. It sure would explain why people ask me to fix their computers so darn often.