Unutterably Silly So what are you doing RIGHT NOW?

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by LCF

Searching for a software no longer available for download, 'cause it's free and allows you to turn txt to tts. Arrrgh.

Archive.org is your friend.
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Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by devilsadvocate

NOTE: Lest I be accused of thread-hijacking, *right now* I'm having a killer conversation with Dennis so !

Topic drift is inevitable. Speaking as a moderator, I don't worry about it. I assume that like Little Bo Peep's lost sheep, "leave them alone, and they'll come home, wagging their tails behind them". If need be, I can goose things back on topic, but it's seldom necessary. What concerns me are the quality of the conversations, and some of the best arise from just such drift.

Besides, this is the Silliness topic in the Lounge. I'm trying to think of what might be off topic here, and not getting far.

Alkarama for human rights is a NGO similar to Human Rights Watch only focused specifically on the Middle East. Lots of stories of people imprisoned for years with not so much as a visit to a judge.

Here is a New York Times story on the pending execution of a guy who appears to be nothing more than a Lebanese version of John Edward. Granted America still has that little Guantanamo issue to clean up but could you imagine if, instead of a fine for fraud, we actually beheaded Miss Cleo? That's outside the bounds of "cultural differences" if you ask me.

Unfortunately, it's well within the bounds of cultural differences, and one of the issues you must deal with in a multi-cultural society.

There was a case not long ago in Texas of an Iraqi who murdered his daughter in an "honor killing", because she was too friendly with non-Muslim boys and he saw her as drifting away from Islam.

According to his interpretation of Islamic law, he was within his rights to do so. I've no idea of the mess that might result if he tried to claim that Islamic law came before US criminal law, and what the reaction of the Muslim community might be.

But it illustrates the the issues when cultures meet. How far do you go to accommodate someone who comes from a different culture? At what point must you draw a line, and say "The following behavior may be acceptable in your homeland, but is not here. If you wish to live here, you will refrain from doing it. If you don't refrain, you can be punished under our law."

It's an issue the US has struggled with throughout its history. Consider the uneasy relationship with Mexico. There are significant cultural differences between Mexico and the US that have led to all manner of problems. For that matter, look at Louisiana, which was a French colony before the US acquired it, and still retains large amounts of French influence. The state is organized into parishes, not counties, and the law derives from French law, not English common law. It's a very different place than the northeast where I live.

The last I knew, there were considered to be something like seven distinct regional cultures in the US, with differences that had broad effects. As an example, back in the early 50's, country singer Jerry Lee Lewis was a rising pop star and teen heartthrob along with folks like Buddy Holly. His pop star career came to a screeching halt when it got out that he'd married his 13 year old cousin. Where he came from, that was accepted behavior. He discovered the hard way the rest of the country thought differently.

The real problem is that the critical differences tend to happen on an unconscious, reflex level. You get lots of cases of not even knowing a line is there until you cross it and someone objects, perhaps violently.

I won't fill space with links; I just Googled "Saudi due process" and I got the impression these incidents aren't the only ones. I just have a really hard time believing due process as any rational person understands it is the rule and not the exception, enough so that I wouldn't want to visit the region in order to test the theory. The only people I know who had rarely left the compound as they were support personnel with the Air Force.

It's not a place I'd care to live, either, and I didn't claim their idea of "due process" was much like ours - only that there was a process.

Honoring due process is very difficult, and doesn't always happen anywhere. I was in occasional email contact with a chap down south over stuff related to SF. He was a youth counselor, working with boys for a living. He was dating a woman with a young teen son. She accused him of molesting her son. He was arrested and put in jail. While in jail, he was beaten badly enough to suffer permanent nerve damage. Mere accusations of pedophilia were enough to ruin his life. Was he guilty? Did he actually commit the molestation he was accused of? Who knows? He was in jail for two years before getting a conditional release, and the case has yet to actually come to trial. Whether or not "innocent until proven guilty" holds tends to depend on what you are accused of and where. Yet that concept is at the heart of our ideas of due process.

Meanwhile, there's a fundamental problem. As little as you may care for the current Saudi government and the patterns of their society, they are what passes for a moderate regime. They are in dispute with RIM because they're fighting domestic terrorism (and if your irony meter pegs off scale at that, well, it should.) Should they lose that fight, what would replace them doesn't bear thinking on.

It would be nice if we could simply ignore and have nothing to do with them, but we can't. Given the likely alternatives, the current regime probably defines as "the lesser of two evils".

A distro "ought to be" whatever you make it. I thought that was the whole point. I feel that *buntu has contracted a case of Windows-itis in the quest to be all things to all people but I don't think of Shuttleworth as the Anti-Christ as a result of that pursuit, just as I didn't harbor an irrational hatred of Bill Gates back when it was fashionable to do so. I do think it raises an interesting question of who "properly" represents Linux however.

Oh, I concur. It's why there are something over a thousand distros. Whatever you feel it ought to be, you can probably find a distro that meets your desires.

I think Ubuntu is trying to be comparable to Windows in one major respect. When you install Windows, it does its best to examine your hardware, figure out what it's running on, set itself up, and Just Work. It does that quite well, because at this point, there are probably Windows drivers for almost any hardware you're likely to use, and they are probably included in the Windows distribution.

Ubuntu tries to do likewise, and does the best job of it I've seen in a Linux distro. They do their best to reduce or eliminate entirely interaction with the user in the install process, and reduce what the user needs to know to get a running Linux system in the first place.

I run Ubuntu here on the desktop, triple booting with Win2K and WinXP, because I wanted the simple solution. I'm a tech, and could deal with other distros (and have), but I didn't want to make the investment of time some distros require. I didn't want a build-it-myself Erector set, I wanted a pre-assembled kit.

FWIW, I run ArchLinux, which is a first-gen distro (i.e. not based on something else) and most decidedly not for beginners; sudo works just fine and when I review a distro for my site, the first thing I do is install sudo and add my user to the sudoers list. Somehow I still manage to have complete control of my system. Maybe those guys are trying to make up for something...I would consider myself a power-user and If I have to log in as root for anything after the install is done, either I'm doing something wrong or the distro isn't ready for prime-time, usually (but not always ) the latter.

Ubuntu uses sudo (and gksudo) and adds the userid you select when installing to the sudoers file. As a convenience, I added a root password so I could log in as root, but seldom find it necessary.

I completely agree with the car analogy (in fact that's a well-worn tool; see the "Required Reading" tab at my site if you haven't already)..one doesn't necessarily need a knowledge of the inner workings of the OS/motor, though it helps to make better use of the machine/car when you have that knowledge. Responsibility is another matter; you also don't have to understand programming/the laws of physics to know you're going to mess up your install/run into something if you don't pay attention while using the machine/driving. Sadly, this lack of responsibility continues to be a problem both in the real and metaphorical sense. I believe that with any technological advance comes responsibility even if you're not literally risking physical harm, and relieving a user of his/her need to think in such a situation sets a dangerous precedent; in neither instance should it just be a matter of operating the controls.

Agreed. I just roll my eyes to the heavens and get a long suffering look when I encounter Linux zealots who think every Linux user should be a mechanic, or want to become one. It won't happen. If you want your distro to be a techie toy, only used by mechanics who like to build their own cars, fine. If you want your distro to have broader acceptance, you need to reduce what the user needs to know to get it up and running in the first place, and make if easier to maintain once they have. You can't have it both ways.

Not necessarily; just as Ubuntu, which uses sudo and (initially) discourages root logins, cellphones have a wide userbase, many of whom want everything to "just work". Also, just as in Ubuntu, there is a way to enable root access for the enterprising in the rare case the need arises. The difference is, all phones running Android have direct root access locked down by default, so there isn't a "right" phone for that. In addition there's a liability issue: I can all but guarantee the local Verizon store has no interest in reviving bricked phones 10 times a day.

Which is exactly why I'm not perturbed by Android rocking down root by default. For the vast majority of folks, an Android phone does as desired out of the box. The cases where you must get root to accomplish something will be a tiny fraction of the total. And good luck on the local Verizon store knowing how to revive a bricked phone.
______
Dennis

[happy_terd]

I feel like taking off my clothes and dancing a jig.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by happy_terd

I feel like taking off my clothes and dancing a jig.

Post it on You-Tube.

[kindlekitten]

Originally Posted by happy_terd

that is EXACTLY how and why I end up with so many broken fences! the grass is ALWAYS greener on the other side regardless if it is dirt.

Originally Posted by dsvick

Horses are such pigs I like the watch the ones at the barn when there are more than a couple in the arena they all spend the time going in and out of any open stalls looking for food And god forbid you walk in there with a carrot - it's be like a mugging.

and destructive ones too!!!

Hey Glow!! Nice to see you up and about - sort of Is this just morning sickness? Should not have too much more of that then right?

Originally Posted by glowhappy

nausea: morning, late morning, noon, late afternoon, twilight, evening, late night. It's pretty much most of the day. headaches and fatigue...all the fun things that come with pregnancy! I think I have about 8 more weeks of this until the second trimester starts...yay.

awww sweetie! sounds just like my son... morning noon and night. and to top it off I had gotten pregnant on the pill, kept having my period and kept getting negative pregnancy tests back. one Doc told me I had an intestinal parasite! the Army was NOT prepared for pregnant soldiers!

Originally Posted by happy_terd

I feel like taking off my clothes and dancing a jig.

and this is news?

[happy_terd]

Home I drive...55.

[phenomshel]

Got the new phone. WebOS is...different. Not better, not worse than the BlackBerry OS...but different. Once I got through the learning curve though, I really do like this phone. I paid the $1.99 for Popelli Reader, and so far it's handled everything I've thrown at it, which has been txt, html, lit, and pdb. I would have paid twice that for an app that would do that on BlackBerry.
So far the only thing that's missing is the capability to add music to a playlist on the phone itself. You have to do it through a third party app. or a beta of an improved music player app. I can live without it - but I'm sure Chris will have a blast enabling Developer Mode to be able to install nonofficial apps, LOL. I *think* (I haven't tried verifying this yet) that I can also make a playlist in m3u format (using winamp on my desktop) and throw it in the phone and it'll work, as long as the file names of the songs in the phone match those on the m3u files. Bonus, also....the included hands-free earphones don't hurt my ears!
Oh, and I forgot to mention it's a hell of a lot easier to type on this!! I might remember to enjoy texting again.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by phenomshel

Got the new phone. WebOS is...different. Not better, not worse than the BlackBerry OS...but different. Once I got through the learning curve though, I really do like this phone. I paid the $1.99 for Popelli Reader, and so far it's handled everything I've thrown at it, which has been txt, html, lit, and pdb. I would have paid twice that for an app that would do that on BlackBerry.

Would you consider installing pReader as well, and writing up a comparative review for MR?
______
Dennis

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by phenomshel

... I paid the $1.99 for Popelli Reader, and so far it's handled everything I've thrown at it, which has been txt, html, lit, and pdb. I would have paid twice that for an app that would do that on BlackBerry. ....

You mean like four whole bucks? Less than a cup of coffee at one of those places or a burrito just about anywhere?

[phenomshel]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Would you consider installing pReader as well, and writing up a comparative review for MR?
______
Dennis

Sure, I can do that.

Originally Posted by kennyc

You mean like four whole bucks? Less than a cup of coffee at one of those places or a burrito just about anywhere?

LOL... Okay, Mr. Smartypants, I would have paid a LOT more than $1.99 for a BlackBerry app that did that. Probably even more than 4 bucks.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by phenomshel

Sure, I can do that.



LOL... Okay, Mr. Smartypants, I would have paid a LOT more than $1.99 for a BlackBerry app that did that. Probably even more than 4 bucks.

[recluse]

I have a question, Shel.

Does it have a phone app?

And I wouldn't add anything suggested on this Forum.
Unless you like having someone listening in on your life, 24/7.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by phenomshel

Sure, I can do that.

Thank you. They seem to cover similar territory, and it would be good to have a first hand account of their relative strengths and weaknesses.

pReader, for example, claims to handle Mobi and ePub formats, and I'm curious as to how well it does so.
______
Dennis

[phenomshel]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Thank you. They seem to cover similar territory, and it would be good to have a first hand account of their relative strengths and weaknesses.

pReader, for example, claims to handle Mobi and ePub formats, and I'm curious as to how well it does so.
______
Dennis

They both handle unDRM epub and mobi, but pReader says it handles DRM mobi as well. I don't think I have a DRM'd mobi file... LOL.

[phenomshel]

Originally Posted by recluse

I have a question, Shel.

Does it have a phone app?

And I wouldn't add anything suggested on this Forum.
Unless you like having someone listening in on your life, 24/7.

Let's put it this way, Recluse. I don't dread checking my voice mail anymore. The dialpad on this is a ton better than on the Storm 2.