Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 6th Mar 2012 23:27 UTC
As you may have seen, David's been taking care of OSNews for a few days because I'm quite busy with work. Still, there's one thing I'd like to talk about: the desktop mode in Windows 8. I wish I could've added this to the first impressions article, but I only arrived at this conclusion yesterday: desktop mode in Windows 8 is Microsoft's equivalent of Mac OS X's Classic mode.
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RE: Mac OS X's Classic mode
by modmans2ndcoming on Wed 7th Mar 2012 01:42
in reply to "Mac OS X's Classic mode"
Member since:2005-11-09
And the reason for that was Apple implemented it in such a way as to provide an incentive for development and/or porting to OS X APIs.
MS is doing something similar. All the bitching about the desktop not being integrated well is to push users to demand a better windows 8 experience from their applications and to push developers to use the new WinRT system APIs.
RE[2]: Mac OS X's Classic mode
by orestes on Wed 7th Mar 2012 02:03
in reply to "RE: Mac OS X's Classic mode"
Member since:2005-07-06
RE: Mac OS X's Classic mode
by andih on Wed 7th Mar 2012 22:42
in reply to "Mac OS X's Classic mode"
Member since:2010-03-27
Must agree with you, how is win7 fantastic? I think it suck in almost every way..
filesystem used
ram usage
configurability
looks and functionality (although much better than xp and vista)
scalability (well not made to be a versatile server.. but still sucks bigtime here)
security
registry (.conf files, yes please)
cost
Built in DRM etc
how installing programs is managed.. (becomes better with new appstore I guess and hope)
++
RE[2]: Mac OS X's Classic mode
by WereCatf on Thu 8th Mar 2012 06:56
in reply to "RE: Mac OS X's Classic mode"
Member since:2006-02-15
filesystem used
While there are a few filesystems I'd like to be able to use I have to ask you one question here: how does Microsoft's choice of filesystem affect you? Are there some things you cannot do with it but you can do with e.g. ext4? Have you found a performance-regression that no one else is aware of?
Or are you just lambasting it for the sake of lambasting it, without any actual real-world scenario behind it to justify such?
ram usage
Do clarify, what is wrong with Win7's RAM usage?
registry (.conf files, yes please)
Tell that to application developers. There is nothing stopping them from using .conf - files.
Also, are you similarly against e.g. gconf2 which is in practice the same thing as Windows registry?
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Google added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 21:41 UTC
Glass is getting some love at Google I/O as well. New applications have been released - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Elle, Tumblr, and CNN. Perhaps more interesting: the newly announced Google Glass Developer Kit will allow offline applications and direct hardware access - great for hacking and expanding Glass' potential. This kit will really allow hackers to put Glass through its paces.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 17:04 UTC
"But Beck and Merrill decided that simply banning toxic players wasn't an acceptable solution for their game. Riot Games began experimenting with more constructive modes of player management through a formal player behavior initiative that actually conducts controlled experiments on its player base to see what helps reduce bad behavior. The results of that initiative have been shared at a lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on panels at the Penny Arcade Expo East and the Game Developers Conference." Absolutely fascinating stuff. I'm a League of Legends player, and to be honest, the community isn't nearly as bad as some make it out to be. I'm happy Riot games has the guts to employ science to address the issue.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 13:17 UTC
"Android and iOS, the number one and number two ranked smartphone operating systems worldwide, combined for 92.3% of all smartphone shipments during the first quarter of 2013 as Windows Phone crept past BlackBerry for 3rd place. According to the International Data Corporation Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, Android smartphone vendors and Apple shipped a total of 199.5 million units worldwide during 1Q13, up 59.1% from the 125.4 million units shipped during 1Q12." Windows Phone doubles from a few to twice few, iOS loser market share as its growth is slower than that of the overall market. BlackBerry continues slide into irrelevance.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 12:06 UTC
"According to the latest research from our Wireless Smartphone Strategies service, global Android smartphone profits reached US$5 billion in total during the first quarter of 2013. Samsung dominated and captured an impressive 95 percent share of all Android smartphone profits." Wow.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/15/13 23:03 UTC
"During its Keynote today, Google announced new features coming to its flagship search function - you know, that thing we all started using Google for. VP Amit Singhal spent some time discussing what Google's search functionality will eventually morph into. Google's strategy is summarized by three words: answer, converse, and anticipate. Singhal explained that many of the pieces of these upcoming changes can already be seen in products that Google has recently introduced - namely, Google Knowledge Graph and Google Now, with perhaps a splash of Google Glass, too." I hold on to my hat every time Google changes Search. It's such a vital product in my daily life.More News »
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Member since:
2006-01-23
If I don't recall it wrong, Mac OS X's Classic mode, was more like an virtual machine of Mac OS 9 inside Mac OS X.
When you loaded a MacOS 8 o 9 app on OS X you will had to wait for a while for the classic mode to run.