richlowe - Slashdot User

Comment Re:Lots of code? (Score 5, Insightful)

by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 11, 2008 @07:03PM (#23371690) Attached to: VIA Releases 16K-Line FOSS Framebuffer Driver

(1) I think you vastly underestimate the complexity of modern framebuffer management. I know our game engine has several thousand lines of code just to manage page flipping in all the various combinations (different hardware, SLI cards, etc), and that is even with DirectX drivers doing most of the heavy lifting.

(2) Why are the first few comments so negative? First you criticize all the graphics vendors becuase they won't open up their code, then when VIA goes and *does* open up their code, the first reactions are so critical? What the hell? Just take it for what it is: a gesture of openness and an opportunity for the community to pick up VIA's code and maybe make some interesting things out of it?

Submission + - EFF Attacks Online Gaming Patent (eff.org)

Submitted by

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property

on Monday February 04, 2008 @05:47PM

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes: "The EFF is attacking more bogus patents. This time they're going after the 'method and system of playing games on a network' which covers tournament ladders, online rankings and advertisements. The patent in question has already been asserted against a number of small companies who know that licensing it is cheaper than litigating. Ars Technica's coverage mentions that Netrek looks like a good source of prior art."

Yahoo May Re-Consider Google Alliance, Rebuff Microsoft 273

Posted by Zonk on Sunday February 03, 2008 @11:33PM from the now-the-rubberband-is-on-the-other-claw dept.

anastasd writes "Reuters is reporting that Yahoo might consider a business alliance with Google as a way to top a $44.6 billion takeover proposal by Microsoft. 'Yahoo management is considering revisiting talks it held with Google several months ago on an alliance as an alternative to Microsoft's bid, that source said. At $31 a share, Yahoo believes the bid undervalues the company, two sources said. A second source close to Yahoo said it had received a procession of preliminary contacts by media, technology, telephone and financial companies. But the source said they were unaware whether any alternative bid was in the offing.'"

Has the Desktop Linux Bubble Burst? 677

Posted by CmdrTaco on Friday December 22, 2006 @11:00AM from the crushed-by-osx dept.

El Lobo writes "For the Linux desktop, 2002 was an important year. Since then, we have continuously been fed point releases which added bits of functionality and speed improvements, but no major revision has yet seen the light of day. What's going on? A big problem with GNOME is that it lacks any form of a vision, a goal, for the next big revision. GNOME 3.0 is just that- a name. All GNOME 3.0 has are some random ideas by random people in random places. KDE developers are indeed planning big things for KDE4 — but that is what they are stuck at. Show me where the results are.KDE's biggest problem is a lack of manpower and financial backing by big companies. In the meantime, the competition has not exactly been standing still. Apple has continuously been improving its Mac OS X operating system. Microsoft has not been resting on its laurels either. Windows Vista is already available. Many anti-MS fanboys complain that Vista is nothing more than XP with a new coat, but anyone with an open mind realizes this is absolutely not the case."

Homeland Security Director Defends Real ID 376

Posted by Zonk on Thursday December 14, 2006 @07:22PM from the fighting-the-fight dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff is defending the upcoming rollout of the national ID card as vital for the nation's security. Chertoff reminded reporters of the importance of the initiative after this week's uncovering of an ID-forging ring. The Real ID Act of May 2005 dictates the uses and requirements for the documentation, which by 2008 may be required for everything from travel to banking. Just the same, the HSD has yet to dictate how exactly the cards will work. " From the article: "The Homeland Security chief, who is nearing his two-year mark with the agency, was likely trying to quell rampant skepticism about the IDs voiced by some privacy advocates, immigrants and other groups. Some have said they fear that the IDs are a stepping stone to a veritable police state, complete with ready surveillance of individuals. Some have argued that the idea of creating more tamperproof IDs is only a marginally better way to screen out those intent on committing terrorist acts because ID cards don't even begin to tackle a core crime prevention challenge: determining a person's unspoken intentions. "

Comment Re:Ok, so let's take the author at his word... (Score 1) 467

by richlowe on Sunday August 13, 2000 @01:41PM (#858843) Attached to: Linux Should Be Shunned

All the distro's I've seen provide both pgp/gpg signatures and md5 checksums for their binary packages. a lot of authors also sign/checksum there source and binary packages. if somone was so worried about downloading packages with backdoors, they should download from the official site and only use source tarballs.

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