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The fastest growing industry in the US right now, even during this time of slow economic growth, is probably the patent troll protection racket industry. Lawsuits surrounding software patents have more than tripled since 1999.... What does this sound like? Yes, it’s a textbook case of a protection racket. It is organized crime, plain and simple. It is an abuse of the legal system, an abuse of the patent system, and a moral affront. Civilized people don’t pay up. They band together, and fight, and eliminate the problem.
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Everybody knows a computer is a machine made of metal and plastic, with microchip cores turning streams of electrons into digital reality. A century from now, though, computers could look quite different. They might be made from neurons and chemical baths, from bacterial colonies and pure light, unrecognizable to our old-fashioned 21st century eyes. Far-fetched? A little bit. But a computer is just a tool for manipulating information. That's not a task wedded to some particular material form. After all, the first computers were people, and many people alive today knew a time when fingernail-sized transistors, each representing a single bit of information, were a great improvement on unreliable vacuum tubes. That slime in the back of your refrigerator may be calculating Pi.
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Terrence Dorsey wrote: That slime in the back of your refrigerator may be calculating Pi.
maybe it's the remnants of Apple Pie calculations.
as if the facebook, twitter and message boards weren't enough - blogged
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Pfft. Some little girl's "cooking creation" is probably counting googolplex.
Meh.
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iPad is three years old now, and many tech blogs are writing stories to reflect what has changed. More than 100 million of them have been sold, alongside other popular tablets like the Kindle Fire and Nexus 7. But originally the reception was quite sceptical. Many made the argument that the tablet was "just a big iPod Touch or iPhone"... The funny thing about this argument is that — while the skepticism was misplaced — the core point was true: The iPad is just a big iPhone. Or to put it the other way, the iPhone is just a pocket-sized iPad. The big news here is that the telephony part of a smartphone is not going to matter for much longer.
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It's true. Mickey Mouse is a Sith Lord. Disney is closing LucasArts[^].
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And so it begins... The brick-by-brick dismantling and assimilation of an empire by an even bigger, more evil empire...
The United States invariably does the right thing, after having exhausted every other alternative. -Winston Churchill
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. -Oscar Wilde
Wow, even the French showed a little more spine than that before they got their sh*t pushed in.[^] -Colin Mullikin
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Since "Sith" describes a group, rather than an individual, shouldn't that be "The Sith are winning"?
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined."
- Homer
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Except when I'm referring to Mickey Mouse as the Sith, rather than the organisation.
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In that case, it should probably be "The Sith Lord is ..."; if you were referring to a single Jedi, you wouldn't use "The Jedi is ...", would you?
Mind you, I suppose I should be grateful your title wasn't, "Winning, the Sith is."
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined."
- Homer
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Richard Deeming wrote: Winning, the Sith is.
Bollox, Thought of that I should have.
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Sorta OT: Do you like Star Wars? I watched some of the movies, never really got into them, but I love Angry Birds Star Wars. It is quite fun.
I think I have an addiction to Angry Birds, but I can stop anytime. I already have several times today!
Gryphons Are Awesome! Gryphons Are Awesome!
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Despite my avatar, I only like some Star Wars. I liked episodes 4 and 5. The Yoda reference came years ago when someone referred to me as the Geordie Jedi, and it stuck as a sort of in joke. I forget who said it.
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Pete O'Hanlon wrote: I forget who said it
Don't worry, nobody expects you to remember something that happened 800 years ago.
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CodeProject.TV is the video training arm of CodeProject and a technical training marketplace that enables trainers, authors and educators to share their knowledge through bite-sized, high-quality videos. Start watching today. Notice anything new on CodeProject? (Hint: it's just to the left of your user ID.) Stay tuned for the official announcement.
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What I consider to be the three most powerful features of JSON are little-known. The main reason for this is probably that they are pretty much undocumented, and therefore not widely used. This article will explain these features. It will show that JSON in itself, without any of the complicated hacks in JavaScript, is in fact a powerful, extensible and dynamic programming language, and not just a dumb, closed data format containing the least common denominator of all C-based programming languages. Since most developers have a limited view of what JSON is, I will call JSON with these three features JSON++. The List, the Symbol and the Extension tag... plus two bonus future features.
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Legacy code is everywhere. Every bit of software we use, whether in an app on a phone, in the cloud, or installed on our PC is legacy code. Every bit of that code is being managed by a team of people who need to do something with it: improve it, maintain it, age it out. The process of evolving code over time is much more challenging than it appears on the face of it. Much like urban planning, it is easy to declare there should be mass transit, a new bridge, or a new exit, but figuring out how to design and engineer a solution free of disruptions or worse is extremely challenging. While one might think software is not concrete and steel, it has a structural integrity well beyond the obvious. The most courageous efforts of software professionals involve moving systems forward.
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To be successful as a Game Developer first and foremost you have to be passionate about what you do, whether it is programming, art, design, writing, or something else. You need to be passionate about games and your chosen field. In addition I believe my love of learning has been a huge asset in my career development and growth. I am not afraid to dive into new technologies, or get my hands dirty in a code base I do not understand. I believe doing this helped me get into the industry, and continuing to do so makes me valuable. From playing SNES to coding Gears of War.
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Adobe's Flash Player was once the best way to add animation, video and interactivity to your websites. That's all changed in the last few years.... But reports of Flash's death have been exaggerated. While it's no longer the catch-all behemoth it once was, it continues to be a useful tool that's used throughout industry for specific tasks, especially gaming. And nor has it been abadoned by Adobe, which has been hard at work over the last few years on the next generation of Flash Professional, codenamed Hellcat. Still doing Flash development? Tell us what you're working on.
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Ready to write your first Windows Store app? Or have you already been writing Windows Store apps using HTML/JavaScript, C# or Visual Basic, and you’re curious about the C++ story? With Visual C++ component extensions (C++/CX), you can take your existing skills to new heights by combining C++ code with the rich set of controls and libraries provided by the Windows Runtime (WinRT). And if you’re using Direct3D, you can really make your apps stand out in the Windows Store. Write Windows Store apps quickly using modern C++ idioms.
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Adafruit Industries just posted the first episode in a new educational series aimed at teaching kids about electronics. The episode is entitled “A is for Ampere” and teaches the basic theory behind electrical current. The subject seems like a common one for A-to-Z themed electrical tutorials.... After demonstrating a mains circuit breaker tripping the episode goes on to discuss electron flow and how current is measured. Ohm schooling.
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As of this Tuesday, Rock Band DLC support will be done, and so too will end this generation of music games. There is always the possibility Harmonix or Activision could resurrect their dormant music franchises somewhere down the road, but it seems readily apparent that that won't happen for some time, if at all.... Given all these nostalgic feelings I'm having, what say we go back through the last five-or-so years and pick out some of the highlights (and a few of the lowlights) of Rock Band's brief, but memorable existence? Alex looks back at the brief, but memorable life of the Rock Band franchise.
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You’re in a virtual world hunting the ultimate easter egg. You’re standing in the back of an empty 80's pizza joint, staring at an old arcade machine with an immobile quarter sitting on top of it. The game: Pac-Man. You sit down and crack your knuckles. Your goal: the perfect score. I’m not going to tell you what happens next. Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One can tell you. What I will tell you is a story — no, a legend — of one of the world’s oldest video games. And how my wife didn’t believe I could code it in a day. He tried to write his own Pac Man, and discovered some the clever firsts the game pulled off.
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Above all, however, Kay is known for the Dynabook — his decades-old vision of a portable suite of hardware, software, programming tools and services which would add up to the ultimate creative environment for kids of all ages. Every modern portable computer reflects elements of the Dynabook concept — the One Laptop Per Child project’s XO above all others — and yet none of them have fully realized the concept which Kay was writing about in the early 1970s. Actually, Kay says that some gadgets with superficial Dynabook-like qualities, such as the iPad, have not only failed to realize the Dynabook dream, but have in some senses betrayed it. Technology is anything that wasn’t around when you were born.
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Kay is a true legend, someone we'd all be living in a different and poorer world without.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage."
Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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