Wakk013 - Slashdot User

Comment Re:cant we already get free and support with cento (Score 2, Informative) 165

by Wakk013 on Friday March 20, 2009 @08:30PM (#27275859) Attached to: Oracle's Take On Red Hat Linux

There is a free version of Oracle available. Its not licensed in any way. However if you go over their max data limit, then you have to purchase a version of Oracle.
Also, RedHat and CentOS are the same product. They are the same source code: RedHat compiled by RedHat, and CentOS compiled by open source community. This allows RedHat to get more exposure and most of the bugs found in CentOS can be patched back into RedHat.

Comment Its going to be tough... (Score 1) 314

by Wakk013 on Thursday March 19, 2009 @08:08PM (#27263513) Attached to: How To Get High-Schoolers Involved In Real Science?

I think the biggest problems teachers of the current generation students have is that these students are constantly multitasking. They grew up in an environment where so much is constantly going on in their normal habitat (home, friends house's and so on) that attempting to teach in a normal classroom setting will drive them to utter boredom. These students need to be active on many levels, not just one particular focus. You'll lose them.

Having text ongoing while presenting videos with active listening to get them involved maybe your best bet.

Less Is Moore 342

Posted by timothy on Wednesday January 28, 2009 @03:02PM from the 3-slugs-from-a-.44 dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "For years, the computer industry has made steady progress by following Moore's law, derived from an observation made in 1965 by Gordon Moore that the amount of computing power available at a particular price doubles every 18 months. The Economist reports however that in the midst of a recession, many companies would now prefer that computers get cheaper rather than more powerful, or by applying the flip side of Moore's law, do the same for less. A good example of this is virtualisation: using software to divide up a single server computer so that it can do the work of several, and is cheaper to run. Another example of 'good enough' computing is supplying 'software as a service,' via the Web, as done by Salesforce.com, NetSuite and Google, sacrificing the bells and whistles that are offered by conventional software that hardly anyone uses anyway. Even Microsoft is jumping on the bandwagon: the next version of Windows is intended to do the same as the last version, Vista, but to run faster and use fewer resources. If so, it will be the first version of Windows that makes computers run faster than the previous version. That could be bad news for computer-makers, since users will be less inclined to upgrade — only proving that Moore's law has not been repealed, but that more people are taking the dividend it provides in cash, rather than processor cycles."

Comment Re:Violation of free speech (Score 1) 849

by Wakk013 on Thursday January 15, 2009 @12:16PM (#26466861) Attached to: South Carolina Seeking To Outlaw Profanity

Agreed, its illegal to pass this law. Even if it does pass, it will be dismissed at a latter time, lost of wasted money going out to pay off the people affected by it and so on.

IMHO, its a political maneuver trying to get votes.

Comment OK so shoot me (Score 1) 531

by Wakk013 on Monday December 01, 2008 @12:36PM (#25946165) Attached to: PC <em>Grand Theft Auto IV</em> Features SecuROM DRM

Buy the game, don't install from that. Download it from the hack sites that you think are clean from DRM.
Run the game.

You've now legally purchased the game without installing the draconian DRM crap. You also don't get any support from the company when it breaks (normal when you pirate). You've shown support to the developers who have worked their tails off to make the game, but you haven't exposed yourself to what you don't like.

Granted even using this tactic is considered illegal. *shrugs* The only real answer is don't buy the game to boycott their process.

The problem is the masses have already invested in the game without your boycott and anyone boycotting at this stage is wasting his/her breath. If enough people don't buy for PC, then you're basically forcing the developers to ignore the PC platform in the future because its not worth the cost.

Comment Quoting statistics without providing the studies (Score 1) 422

by Wakk013 on Tuesday November 18, 2008 @02:49PM (#25805695) Attached to: Independent Dev Reports Over 80% Piracy Rate On DRM-Free Game

Means that any of these quoted rates are worthless. If you can't back up the claims with hard facts and numbers, its all bogus crap spewed out to grab attention and distort the true relational facts.

Comment I'm one affected (Score 1) 301

by Wakk013 on Wednesday November 05, 2008 @01:18PM (#25645029) Attached to: EA Recommends Hilarious Work-Around For RA3 CD-Key

Haven't bothered to install the game yet, but I had read about this a few days ago.

Its funny that they've already got the game patched 3 times since release. I know I was in the beta testing, and they wouldn't fix things then, interesting that they do now.

*sigh*

New EMI Boss Says 'Downloads May Be Good' 173

Posted by Zonk on Thursday April 03, 2008 @02:53PM from the burn-the-heretic dept.

warrior_s writes "Douglas Merrill was just installed as CIO of EMI (one of the big four that forms the RIAA). The ex-Googler recently stated it is a 'poor business model to sue your customers. I don't think that's a sustainable strategy.' Quoted by the Guardian, he was referring to Warner Music, EMI, Vivendi Universal and Sony BMG's current practice of trying to use legal systems around the world to force their customers into buying products rather than using the free P2P networks and independent music sites and services. 'Previously, the music industry has rubbished studies that claim file sharing can have a positive effect on music sales. "I think people will pay," Merrill said. "There is evidence that people we think are not buying music are buying music. They're just not buying it in formats we can measure."'"

Census Bureau To Scrap Handhelds — Cost $3 Billion 264

Posted by kdawson on Thursday April 03, 2008 @12:49PM from the one-two-three-many dept.

GovTechGuy writes "The Census Bureau will tell a House panel today that it will drop plans to use handheld computers to help count Americans for the 2010 census, increasing the cost for the decennial census by as much as $3 billion, according to testimony the Commerce Department secretary plans to give this afternoon."

Administration Claimed Immunity To 4th Amendment 703

Posted by kdawson on Thursday April 03, 2008 @08:32AM from the unreasonable-searches-and-seizures dept.

mrogers writes "The EFF has uncovered a troubling footnote in a newly declassified Bush Administration memo, which asserts that 'our Office recently [in 2001] concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations.' This could mean that the Administration believes the NSA's warrantless wiretapping and data mining programs are not governed by the Constitution, which would cast Administration claims that the programs did not violate the Fourth Amendment in a whole new light — after all, you can't violate a law that doesn't apply. The claimed immunity would also cover other DoD agencies, such as CIFA, which carry out offline surveillance of political groups within the United States."

Microsoft Told to Pay Tax on License Fee 282

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday April 03, 2008 @12:20AM from the we-do-whatever-is-cheaper dept.

MissingRainbow writes "To avoid paying taxes in India, Microsoft wanted a court to believe that it is selling its product and that there are no royalty payments involved. Their own EULA worked against them in this particular case however as it states, "the product is licensed, not sold". The court ruled against them."

Tsunami Spotted on the Surface of the Sun 164

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday April 02, 2008 @10:16PM from the mother-of-all-disaster-movies dept.

BigBadBus writes "The BBC is reporting that NASA's twin spacecraft designed to obtain stereo images of the Sun have recorded a Solar Tsunami. The feature includes a fascinating movie of the images captured."

P2P Scammers' Lawyers Attack Open Source Team 157

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday February 26, 2008 @09:06AM from the worst-are-full-of-passionate-intensity dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Late last year a company affiliated with the French RIAA hijacked the Shareaza.com domain name from the original, open source project's owner. They are passing off their own for-pay software, which violates the GPL, as the real thing. Now, having stolen the Shareaza project's identity, the scammers are threatening legal action to shut down the real open source team."

Antidepressants Work No Better Than a Placebo 674

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday February 26, 2008 @08:02AM from the sugar-pills-are-cheaper dept.

Matthew Whalley writes "Researchers got hold of published and unpublished data from drug companies regarding the effectiveness of the most common antidepressant drugs. Previously, when meta-analyses have been conducted on only the published data, the drugs were shown to have a clinically significant effect. However, when the unpublished data is taken into account the difference between the effects of drug and placebo becomes clinically meaningless — just a 1 or 2 point difference on a 30-point depression rating scale — except for the most severely depressed patients. Doctors do not recommend that patients come off antidepressant drugs without support, but this study is likely to lead to a rethink regarding how the drugs are licensed and prescribed."

Building a Green PC 190

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday February 26, 2008 @06:56AM from the in-time-for-st.-patrick's dept.

Kermit writes "Ars Technica has put together a green DIY system building guide. The idea is to build a PC offering decent energy efficiency as well as solid performance. The 'Green Gaming Box' draws about 125W at full load (not including a monitor); the minimalist 'Extreme Green Box' uses a mini-ITX case and a VIA CPU-motherboard combo for about 30W at typical load. If you want to mix and match components, or modify your current system so that it uses less energy, there are plenty of options for swapping out individual components."

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