Slashdot

James 1:26-27 writes "A bar trial judge has released a report recommending that Jack Thompson be found guilty of 27 of the 31 misconduct charges levied against him. There's a hearing scheduled for June 4th and Judge Tunis will make a final report in early September, but this would seem to indicate that his legal career is in jeopardy. It was, perhaps, imprudent of him to send the court a picture book containing swastikas, a copied dollar bill, monkeys, cartoon squirrels, and a handprint with the word 'slap' written under it to help the court understand his arguments after the court originally found his pleadings to be incomprehensible. When asked for comment on the case, he was quoted as saying, 'I don't have to relive [the nine day trial] for a twit who couldn't care less what really happened there, asshole.'"
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080520-judges-report-in-jack-thompson-case-guilty-on-27-charges.html

"Continuing its strategy to fight against FOSS application on the Windows platform, Microsoft mailed the Blender developers asking how they could help improve the user experience on Windows so they could laugh at it. Groklaw puts it in perspective using Steve Ballmer's own words."

There, fixed it for you. Microsoft doesn't want "open sores" (as microsoft shills used to call it), which Ballmer once likened to cancer, on their operating system.

If they could make Windows so it only ran Microsoft programs without losing any Windows sales, they would.

-mcgrew

MS normally reaches out to developers through the paid developer channels. As a result, OSS developers were ignored by Microsoft. Microsoft creates a new position to reach out to them, and contacts them saying, "How can we help? Is there a file format problem? We're working on making our file formats more open, is there something that we can speed up that would help," and you all make snide remarks.

If file formats are not a problem, than a simple, "We're fine for now, but when the issue comes up, I will pass your contact information on to developer with trouble, here's my vCard, let's keep in touch," would be fine.

Microsoft isn't passing any judgment here. Windows competes with Linux in the marketplace, Blender is an application that runs on Windows and Linux, the company that makes Windows reaches out offering to help because they want Blender to run really well on Windows.

It's not about Microsoft WANTING the software for free, the Blender guys GIVE the software away for free, to Microsoft and everyone else. This is simply Microsoft realizing that their competition with Linux and other Open Source PROJECTS doesn't mean that other applications should be supported as well as other third party developers. I'm sure that Microsoft gives Adobe support because they want Adobe products to run as well or better on Windows as Mac OS X, now they are offering support to Blender.

The Blender guys may not need/want that support, but this is Microsoft "getting it," and Slashdot users NOT "getting it." The software marketplace is not proprietary vs. open source, it's not non-Free vs. free, it's product area by product area. I find it unlikely that Microsoft would offer support to the Open Office guys, because OO running better on Windows hurts their market leading Microsoft Office product, but other areas that Microsoft doesn't compete in, they can offer them support.

I would expect MS to be willing to support The Gimp writers as that program gets better, because Microsoft is indifferent between users running Windows/Photoshop and Windows/Gimp, and would like EITHER scenario better than OSX/Photoshop, OSX/Gimp, or Linux/Gimp.

An anonymous reader writes "Two years ago, I flunked out of college, where I was studying computer science, and had the ultimate goal of becoming a software developer. Since then, I've been working in IT, and enjoy it, but still love to program. Every time I peruse job sites, they list a bachelors' degree as a requirement. In your experience, is it really necessary to have a degree to get a development job? Are there any slashdotters currently working as developers who don't have a degree (or didn't when you started), and how much did you find that your lack of a degree hindered you? Is it even possible, or should I give up on the idea until I can finish my bachelors'?"

Phil(i think) writes "Quake 3 arena is now officially ported to .NET http://gregs-blog.com/2008/01/22/update-quake-3-arena-net-port-is-done/"

jerbenn writes "I have recently decided to make the move from being a generalist IT professional in government, currently involved in maintenance programming in several different languages, some project management, some admin work (both MS and Unix), user support, etc., to strictly development. I have two opportunities; one consisting as a Java Web Developer, the other being an ASP.NET Web Developer primarily using VB 2005. Considering that the benefits/corporate culture are fairly equal, and forgetting the "Do what makes you happy" philosophy, what do you think is the best alternative? Looking into the future, which of the 2 development environments will offer the most stability, marketability, and personal growth? What do you think Slashdot Community?"

OS24Ever writes "From the site (having server issues already): It is with great sadness that I tell you that the Dragon is gone. RJ left us today at 2:45 PM. He fought a valiant fight against this most horrid disease. In the end, he left peacefully and in no pain.

Robert Jordan had amyloidosis, a disease characterized by extracellular accumulation of amyloid in various organs and tissues of the body"
http://www.dragonmount.com/RobertJordan/?p=90

Imabug writes "Just saw news of Robert Jordan's (author of the Wheel of Time series) passing coming through my feedreader. An excerpt of the posting on the Dragonmount website (which seems to be down at the moment)

It is with great sadness that I tell you that the Dragon is gone. RJ left us today at 2:45 PM. He fought a valiant fight against this most horrid disease. In the end, he left peacefully and in no pain. In the years he had fought this, he taught me much about living and about facing death. He never waivered in his faith, nor questioned our God's timing. I could not possibly be more proud of anyone. I am eternally grateful for the time that I had with him on this earth and look forward to our reunion, though as I told him this afternoon, not yet. I love you bubba. Our beloved Harriet was at his side through the entire fight and to the end. The last words from his mouth were to tell her that he loved her. Thank each and everyone of you for your prayers and support through this ordeal. He knew you were there. Harriet reminded him today that she was very proud of the many lives he had touched through his work. We've all felt the love that you've been sending my brother/cousin. Please keep it coming as our Harriet could use the support.

Original posting"
http://www.dragonmount.com/RobertJordan/?p=90

For the past day, Wizards of the Coast has had a countdown to "4dventure" on their web site. The countdown ran out at 6:30 eastern time today (and the web site promptly crashed), but stories are already appearing on the rest of the web. Wizards also has had their 4th edition forums up for a couple of days.

Geir Isene writes "SUN's Jon Bosak explains the reasons for SUN's vote and why he believes that OOXML is not ready — see the link (pdf) at the bottom of the page: http://www.freecode.no/news/"
http://www.freecode.no/news/

Filed under: Ask Engadget, Features, GPS

There was no shortage of opinion last week on Ask Engadget, when Ebzy was in search of some guidance in the digital camera market. You can get your own question answered by sending in to ask at engadget dawt com. Today Perry's in search of a GPS unit:

"I'm thinking of buying a GPS for my car, and am totally confused with the options. I'm not interested in ones with JPG viewers, MPEG players... I just want the best GPS that I can get. What do you recommend in various price ranges, and if money were no object?"

So Perry isn't exactly into the frills, but can he find a top-shelf unit without them? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/142510020/

An anonymous reader writes "After concluding our Sunday night show at Lollapalooza, fans informed us that portions of that performance were missing and may have been censored by AT&T during the "Blue Room" Live Lollapalooza Webcast. When asked about the missing performance, AT&T informed Lollapalooza that portions of the show were in fact missing from the webcast, and that their content monitor had made a mistake in cutting them. During the performance of "Daughter" the following lyrics were sung to the tune of Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall" but were cut from the webcast: — "George Bush, leave this world alone." (the second time it was sung); and — "George Bush find yourself another home." This, of course, troubles us as artists but also as citizens concerned with the issue of censorship and the increasingly consolidated control of the media. More Here: http://pearljam.com/news/index.php?what=News#195"

thc69 writes "The most common education problem I find in users is that they don't know where their files are. They don't understand the file system. They save a file and then wonder how to find it. If I ask them where a file is, they either say "It's in Word" or "I don't know."

"Introduction To Computers" courses apparently don't teach the concept, because users who aced such courses still have no clue. Even people who know lots of advanced stuff sometimes don't understand that their files are in a folder on their C: drive or whatever — I have a friend who knows SQL, C++, and Linux, but doesn't know the locations of her files.

Could it be a gender thing? It seems that the people who I've observed having this problem are all female. I remember reading about studies that show men and women navigate roads very differently; perhaps file system navigation is incompatible with the intuitive navigation method that women use?

It's a very important concept. Once you understand how files and folders (which I still like to call "directories", but I digress) work, everything on the computer becomes much easier. You become less dependent on your applications to keep track of everything for you. Backing up and restoring files becomes much easier.

How can I teach people this concept in a way that will stick? It's so intuitive to me that I don't know how to make it into lessons, it's just second-nature."