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05/03/2001 Archived Entry: "The week that was"

Been a while since we talked computers, hasn't it? I know, normally you do a weekly wrapup on a Friday. But I do things how I feel like doing them. So, here's an irreverant look at the week's events in the wonderful industry we all love to hate.

Apple releases a new iBook. Somehow I'd read into the rumors that this would be a tie-dye iBook, similar to the tie-dye iMac (currently running second behind the Blue Dalmation iMac in the race to be the tackiest, most hideous computer on the market). Well, I was right in that Apple released a new iBook on Tuesday. But it wasn't something inspired by an LSD flashback. The new iBook is a knockoff of the Titanium PowerBook: small, thin, brushed metal appearance (unlike the PowerBook, it's plastic to save costs). Much more tasteful than what I had expected, and much more tasteful than the original iBook.

But I still don't want one.

SGI releases XFS for Linux. It's been a long time coming, but Linux now has a second journaling filesystem. XFS is extremely highly regarded, so its release bodes well for Linux's future. Expect this to ignite a round of debates about which journaling filesystem to use. It'll only get more complicated with time, though--IBM's JFS is on the horizon, and further out, there's the home-grown ext3 filesystem. And of course, newcomer ReiserFS is good enough that a lot of people are already using it, with good success. In fact, the computer that hosts this site uses ReiserFS. That became part of the kernel early in the 2.4 series.

I suspect this was worth the wait. SGI makes good stuff. Really good stuff. And this will pose a very nice problem to have. Soon, we'll have at least three outstanding filesystems. Undoubtedly, there'll be some tasks some of them are faster for than others. Once some data is out there, we'll really be able to tune our Linux boxes for performance.

The Evil Empire. Now let's talk about someone else who doesn't make really good stuff. Remember how Microsoft talked about how Media Player 8 was dependent on Windows XP and Media Player 7 would be the end of free versions of Media Player? (Same old tricks; they did this with Schedule+ and with Outlook 98 as well... And we trust them when they say Internet Explorer will always be free. Tell me another one, Bill.) But I digress. Someone evidently took that as a challenge, as a w4r3z version of Media Player 8 for older versions of Windows started floating around this week. Needless to say, Microsoft's not happy. It's crippled and reportedly doesn't really offer any functionality Media Player 7 doesn't. But I read an interesting tidbit amongst all this fallout: Media Player codecs are backward compatible to Media Player 6.4. So WMP7 and WMP8 codes work with 6.4, which is much more lightweight (faster loading, less memory and CPU consumption) than newer versions. Bottom line: Stick with 6.4.

Just in case you needed another reason not to buy Windows XP.

DejaNews is back! Google finally opened up the old DejaNews archives they took offline after purchasing the defunct Usenet archiving service last year. They replaced the search engine with one of their own, which they claim is more effective. Based on my own experience, I believe that's true. I remember searching on my name in DejaNews and not finding much. Searching with Google's implementation turns up messages I don't even remember writing, such as a pearl of wisdom I shared way back in May 1996: The Commodore MPS-1230 printer was a relabeled Citizen 230. Why I ever knew that, why I managed to retain that knowledge through 1996, and what good that information was, I have no idea. But that message definitely is my writing style, so I must have written it.

If you're looking for obscure information like that, or solutions to really weird and hairy problems, there's never been any better tool than DejaNews. It's also a decent way to track down people, if you happen to know they're active on Usenet.

Tomorrow. I'd break into song, because U2's "Tomorrow," off their difficult-to-grasp 1981 album October, would be appropriate now, but I can't totally remember the words and I'm too lazy to go look 'em up. But I do hope you'll be back tomorrow. I don't have the time to write it right now, but that's fine because I don't have the proper perspective yet either. Last night, my very good friend Brad introduced me to his friend Luke. I'd like you to meet him.

More like this: Apple Windows XP Linux DejaNews Roundup

Posted by Dustin D. Cook, A+ @ 05/03/2001 08:17 AM CST

My biggest gripe with XP is its spyware tendencies, plus I don't like how each MS release gets more and more imperialistic. By forcing me to keep his add-ons loaded all the time, Gates is effectively using my CPU cycles and available memory to fight his war to drive competitors out of business. Gates needs to fund his own war against Real and against QuickTime.

Posted by Dave F. @ 05/03/2001 11:29 AM CST

I, personally, get more and more disenfranchised with M$ each time I boot up my Win98SE PC. There are many programs for Windows, compared to Linux, but that also makes more programs that work screwy with the OS, and more things for Bill and his buddies to control. I use the MSN passport system that is a much criticized part of the .NET strategy, but the only thing I use it for is chat and such. I would not even consider lettign those bloodsuckers from Redmond have that tight of access to my info. I can remember it nicely myself, and it is also more secure. I will have no problem moving to Linux 100% as soon as humanly possible.

Posted by Dwight @ 05/03/2001 01:44 PM CST

I need to bite the bullet and build a full-time Linux system. I've got my e-mail exit strategy: set up a mailserver on Linux running IMAP, connect to it from my MS clients, then move all the messages to the IMAP server. Then I can connect to it and read the messages from any client I want. I'll probably lose the dates of the mail, but getting out is more important to me.

The things that matter most to me are web browsing, word processing, and e-mail, all of which I can do adequately from Linux now that I'm not writing books. And I can even play FreeCiv, which I think is a bettter Civilization than CivII. Not to mention there's a Linux version of Railroad Tycoon II available.

Posted by Dave F. @ 05/03/2001 02:05 PM CST

I have Civ II and cannot seem to understand it myself, mind you it is not the kind of game I play much. I also don't play many games at all.

Posted by Dwight @ 05/03/2001 11:54 PM CST

The two games I play semi-regularly are Civ and the Railroad Tycoon series. Civ's not the easiest game to learn but once you do it's terribly addictive. Being power-hungry helps too.

Of course... I've played two games of Railroad Tycoon II this year. I don't think I've played Civ since November.

Posted by Dave F. @ 05/04/2001 12:14 AM CST