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Comment Re:How long? (Score 1) 455

I get it's useful. I know people love it. I've used it myself. I realize that may be 95% of what X has that Wayland doesn't that people are interested in.

My question is, what is that other 5%. He said "every advantage", I'm trying to find out if there is only one advantage or if there are others.

Comment Re:How long? (Score 4, Insightful) 455

Seriously, though, the Wayland effort appears to be throwing out every advantage the X11 display had over the Windows display for a replacement that will probably never be quite as good as a Windows.

Emphasis is mine. Other than network transparency, what advantages did X11 have that Wayland doesn't? What other advantages did X11 have period?

Losing network transparency will effect some people, but there are some solutions to that. I'd wager the majority of linux GUIs deployed in the world don't use that feature (between embedded stuff like TiVos, normal desktops, TVs running Linux, etc). But I can tell you from more than 10 years of following Linux development that no one seems to actually like X11. From what I've read the various GUI developers seem to love Wayland compared X and can't wait for it to take over. X seems to be a giant ball of mud that's always getting in peoples way, hampering performance, and a pain in the ass to configure. The fact that it handles hardware setup, drawing, input, network transparency, fonts, 3D, and so much more it's clearly not following the unix philosophy of small tools doing one job.

Every time Wayland comes up, people come out of the woodwork to declare it a failure because it won't run over a network, but that's the only real gripe I've seen. You say there are others, I'm curious to know what they are.

Linux

Submission + - Wayland 1.0 Released, Not Yet Ready To Replace X11 (phoronix.com)

An anonymous reader writes: After being talked about for four years, Wayland 1.0 was released today. The Wayland 1.0 release doesn't mark it yet as being ready for Linux desktop usage but just being API/protocol stable for future expansion. Wayland will now maintain backwards compatibility going forward, but how much longer will it take to replace X11 on the Linux desktop? Quite a while seems likely.

Comment Re:I don't get it (Score 0) 283

I guess I was thinking of the iPad 1, although you might be able to get closer refurb. I still think the battery life is a big issue. An extra $50 to add another 4 or 5 hours of battery life would have easily been worth it.

Given that you can get generic "real" laptops for about that price, I'm still don't see a real compelling argument. The 3G is nice, but you don't get much data. At this point the average user has no idea these things exist, and I'm don't think this new model is really going to change that.

It feels more like a "we can make cheap computer and OS too!" kind of project than a real effort at making a dent in the market.

Comment Re:I don't get it (Score 1) 283

So it's slightly cheaper than an older iPad, but gets worse battery life. It has a fraction of the software of an iPad, and isn't as easy to whip out and use since you have to fold out the keyboard. It's less features than an netbook (which you could restrict down to be malware free) but at the same cost.

I'm just not sure about the value on these things.

Government

Submission + - FTC throws down robocall gauntlet: $50,000 for best way to stop annoying calls (networkworld.com) 4

coondoggie writes: "It's not clear if the Federal Trade Commission is throwing up its hands at the problem or just wants some new ideas about how to combat it, but the agency is now offering $50,000 to anyone who can create what it calls an innovative way to block that will block illegal commercial robocalls on landlines and mobile phones."
NASA

Submission + - Curiosity discovers unidentified, metallic object on Mars (extremetech.com) 1

MrSeb writes: "A few hundred million miles away on the surface of the Red Planet, Mars rover Curiosity has discovered an unidentified, shiny, metallic object. Now, before you get too excited, the most likely explanation is that bright object is part of the rover that has fallen off — or perhaps some debris from MSL Curiosity’s landing on Mars, nine weeks ago. There is the distinct possibility, however, that this object is actually native to Mars, which would be far more exciting. It could be the tip of a larger object, or perhaps some kind of exotic, metallic Martian pebble (a piece of metal ore, perhaps). Close-up imagery will now be captured and analyzed, and within the next few days we should know if it's simply a piece of Curiosity — or something a whole lot more exciting indeed."
Debian

Submission + - Steam for Linux to Arrive 'In a Few Days' (omgubuntu.co.uk)

sharksfan98 writes: "Steam’s arrival on Linux isn’t a secret – and even when it was it was a poorly kept one.

The company have been internally testing the Linux client for a while, and recently announced that an ‘external’ beta Linux users would be coming out ‘sometime in October’. No specific date was given.

But, today, a request from Canonical’s Bryce H. to Ubuntu developers has offered up a more definite time-frame – one that seems to be happening this week

He wrote in his request:

“Could an archive or SRU admin accept nvidia-common and jockey from the upload queue?

  These are needed for the Valve Steam release that happens in a few days.”

The bad-ish news is that only 1000 people will have access to the external beta to begin with. So as close as its release is it won’t be landing in the laps of everyone quite yet.

But it’s still exciting, no?"

Submission + - Hiring Smokers – Banned In South Florida City (huffingtonpost.com) 3

Penurious Penguin writes: On October 2, City Commissioners of Delray Beach finalized a policy which prohibits agencies from hiring employees who use tobacco products. Delray Beach isn't alone though; other Florida cities such as Hollywood and Hallandale Beach, require prospective employees to sign affidavits declaring themselves tobacco-free for 12 months prior to the date of application. Throughout the states, both government and businesses are moving to ban tobacco-use beyond working hours. Many medical facilities, e.g. hospitals, have already, or intend to implement similar policy. In some more-aggressive environments referred to as nicotine-free, employee urine-samples can be taken and tested for any presence of nicotine, not excluding that from gum or patches. Employees testing positive can be terminated.

The primary rationale behind these policies has been frugality, citing greater insurance-costs for smokers, and the savings implied by eliminating them from the workforce. In some less aggressive situations, persistent smokers are imposed a "Tobacco User Surcharge" of $20 per paycheck and offered waived co-payments for smoking-cessation drugs.

Efforts to cut expenses and encourage better health seem perfectly normal. Policy prohibiting activities otherwise legal, but unbefitting a workplace environment also seem normal. However, employers or government defining employee's domestic lifestyles is a relatively new concept, especially when nothing illegal is involved. It would be difficult, if not impossible to argue that smoking is without consequences; but is breeching the boundaries of the household inconsequential?

Times do change, and adaptation is often a necessary burden. But have they changed so much that we'd now postpone the Manhattan project for 12 months because Oppenheimer had toked his pipe? Would we confine our vision to the Milky Way or snub the 1373 Cincinnati because Hubble smoked his? Would we shun relativity, or shelve the works of Tolkien because he and C. S. Lewis had done the same? If so, then where will it stop? Will we soon scan employees for signs of excessive sugar, trans-fats and cholesterol? Will we have authenticated and logged aerobics classes? I, for one, welcome answers from our new salubrious overlords.

Google

Submission + - Steve Jobs Wanted Google Search Eradicated From iOS (gizmodo.com.au)

Cute and Cuddly writes: Bloomberg Businessweek’s analytical dissection of Apple post-iPhone 5 launch is mostly full of things we already knew: Tim Cook is different to Steve Jobs. Apple is still doing phenomenally well. Everyone hates Apple Maps. But one thing that stood out was the fact that Steve Jobs was so incensed with Google that he not only wanted to remove Maps from iOS, but also Google search. Whoa.
Android

Submission + - Hidden HTML Can Wipe Some Samsung Galaxy S3's

Hugh Pickens writes writes: "The Telegraph reports that security researcher Ravi Borgaonkar, demonstrated code, now circulating freely online and comprising just 11 digits and symbols, that can be embedded in HTML code that will wipe some Galaxy S3's, Samsung's flagship Android smartphones and restore the phone to its factory settings without permission. The whole attack takes just two or three seconds and once launched there is nothing a Samsung owner can do to stop it, Borgaonkar says. The demonstration drew gasps and applause from assembled security experts at a computer security conference in Argentina and raises the threat that malicious hackers could trick Samsung smartphone owners into wiping gigabytes of data, simply by clicking a link. Borgaonkar says he has uncovered more codes built into Samsung devices that could be used in says attacks but says he did not want to reveal them because they could be useful to criminals. One code will “kill the SIM card and that the only way to guard against the attacks is to switch off "service loading" in settings, and disable QR code and NFC apps. Pau Oliva, a Spanish telecoms engineer and security blogger who tested the attack, demanded to know “what were Samsung engineers smoking when they set a code to do a factory reset?” Teri Daley, senior director of public relations at Samsung, said in an interview that the company had found that the problem was addressed in a software update issued months ago, so only customers using older versions of the software would be vulnerable and that the company was now trying to determine the specific models and software versions that were affected by the vulnerability."

Comment Re:Always with the jabs (Score 1) 513

For the record, I just Googled "Samsung Jelly Bean" and found that story. I wanted to choose a phone I knew was popular so there was a chance at having data. I didn't know it had compatibility issues, I simply recognized the name and figured it might make a decent comparison.

By "across all their devices" I simply meant that people were upgrading. I didn't mean that as a jab against the Android release process (which I know is a disaster due to the carriers, what isn't that carriers touch).

I simply meant "this well known Android phone got an update, in a similar time frame to Apple, how many people updated that phone"? I wasn't trying to compare the full platforms.

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