BTW, the reason inflation mostly stops after 3 dimensions is that three dimensions is the lowest number of dimensions where randomly distributed items are no longer on top of each other. (e.g., a 1d or 2d random walk will always return to its origin, but in 3D you can get lost for good). You can also hypothesize that a few more dimensions also expanded a little in the process, but not by very much. This is (very) basically what string theory holds.

MEH, I was about to suggest that the accelerated expansion of the universe is driven by the urge to unfold another dimension.

It's right that while LGPL works for C code to make its header files non viral, C++ header files may contain non trivial template code that turns them into source files, license wise. They have to contain an explicit permission to be used without an viral effect.

For example the Gnu's libstdc++ header files are under GPL with the following addition:

// Under Section 7 of GPL version 3, you are granted additional // permissions described in the GCC Runtime Library Exception, version // 3.1, as published by the Free Software Foundation.

which refers to: http://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/libstdc++/manual/license.html

The purpose of this Exception is to allow compilation of non-GPL (including proprietary) programs to use, in this way, the header files and runtime libraries covered by this Exception.

I think of it as LGPL for C++ code, but it doesn't have its own name.

Considering what was said at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4loZGYqaZ7I the only reason why the PS3 hasn't been breached earlier is just because nobody tried. The only difference to other consoles, that according to the keynote have superior security, is OtherOS. Hence OtherOS is the reason for the fact that there was no piracy on the PS3.

AFAIK it wasn't even meant to hold hackers from poking the PS3, but to get an tax relief in some area of the world. So the lack of piracy was just a side effect of OtherOS. A side effect that earned them billions, I guess.

Disclaimer: I'm not a security expert by any means.

Every time I watch a recorded talk on security I spot the same aim they set them self: Allow two parties to communicate securely, where secure means that a 3rd party can't tap or alter data. This fundamental idea to make this work is that there is a secret that the 3rd party doesn't know. These talks also always assume that the attacker doesn't have physical access to one of the parties.

And that seems to be the fundamental flaw with DRM in physical devices: One does have physical access to them.

My opinion is that Qt Quick is an evolutionary development of these two trends:

1. 1. Make GUI layout accessible to artists (i.e. no build environment has to be set up)

2. 2. It's too hard to edit XML by hand

The 1. topic has been covered (not in Qt though) by using XML files to define the widget arrangement (layout) and widget properties (lables, colors etc.). Tools like Glade are meant to be used by designers to load these XML files and work on the GUI. But after a while you are know what you're doing and its faster edit the text files directly.

XML files can be edited by hand, but they are not designed for this. And XML files are _very_ verbose. For a while now the trend is away from XML to less flexible/powerful but human friendly and less verbose formats, like json and yaml.

For projects that are done by a single developers it doesn't make a big difference. But for teams, where the C++ developer(s) can concentrate on the flow of data and robustness while a designer can use these building blocks( provided by the C++ coder) to create a nice user experience, it's a real asset.

I have a hunch that this idea was in the minds of the Qt devs long before Trolltech got bought by Nokia.

This conclusion matches the observation of the kwin developers who are brave enough to use GLSL for desktop effects
http://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2010/09/driver-dilemma-in-kde-workspaces-4-5/

Without citations to back it up, the response of some open source devs was, IIRC: The KWin guys don't understand open source. They are meant to get in touch with the driver developers and help getting the bugs resolved, preferable send patches. The clutter developers i.e. sent patches to solve driver problems.

IIRC, the mentioned contribution from clutter devs to the graphics drivers were made by Red Hat employees, which heavily backs the gnome development. Red Hat has lots of money and eve more important expertise in house to tackle such problems. The KWin guys don't have these resources.

Open source gives the means to find, analyze and fix bugs, but its not mandatory. Saying so would mean that one has to know the code bases of every open source library used by his or her application. Thats ridiculous.

The firefox devs sure don't plan to get into linux graphics driver development and thats fine.

The real problem is that the driver teams don't have enough resources (money and developers) to get the job done. I'd be happy to vote with my feet and only buy graphics hardware with good open source drivers to encourage to hardware vendors to hire linux kernel developers. But right now I have to stick with nvidia since their drivers, though not open source and certainly have their own bugs, are the only sufficient choice for OpenGL (and OpenCL) on linux.