I don't want to get all gushy or anything, but I knew there was a reason that I liked you, Marcus.
(Written, gushingly, on an Android device.) And fuck you, Google. Get it fucking right, finally. Please. On Feb 7, 2013 9:26 PM, "Marcus G. Daniels" <mar...@snoutfarm.com> wrote: > Nick, > > If you use a proprietary system like a Mac running Mac OS X or a Windows > PC, and you aren't a person that has reason to know the semantics of > internal interfaces (a.k.a. APIs) there really is no recourse but to seek > support from the vendors involved, or online support groups. > > A second approach is Doug's guerrilla like tactics as with Google. Just > beat them until they give you the answer you want. Most users expect > things not to work, so there's only so far that can take you. There's only > so much outrage that can be generated. > > In your case, it sounds like the problem was the Layered Service Provider > interface that Microsoft provides and how it interacts with some other > product trying to intercept that traffic (see the table at > http://support.apple.com/kb/**TS4123 <http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4123>). > Sometimes the developers of one of these intermediate products will be > motivated to debug the problem, other times you'll need to appeal the the > app vendor (here Apple), or the operating system vendor (here Microsoft). > Do a little work with Google, and the support websites of the likely > vendors involved, and you'll find the answer almost every time. > > The third approach is to make it your responsibility. With Linux, there > is source code to the whole thing. Tens of millions of lines of code. It > can all be rationalized. While it is true that few people have the depth > and breadth to understand all of these things, the beauty of the free > software community is that you can almost always find that expert and > someone has likely had the same problem and analyzed it, and _to the > bottom_. Not just in terms of vague phenomenology as with so many Windows > or Mac problems, but the the particular line of code with a mistake. > > I just don't understand how people who use or write software for a living, > especially scientific software, would ever tolerate using a Mac or Windows > box. I won't tolerate being helpless to vendors who make it hard to > understand how their software interacts with other software. Well, let me > qualify that, I won't tolerate being helpless when it matters and I can get > my way. I don't mind using a Mac or Windows box for entertainment, for > example. And I'll use Microsoft Word or Powerpoint if collaborators want > to use that. Those things don't involve `real' problem solving -- at > worst solving problems with`presentation' issues can become an annoying > distraction. Any interesting program will have bugs, and any interesting > program runs in concern with a lot of other programs. If bugs exist in > `secret' components, we'll you're often completely powerless to do anything > about it. > > Could I tolerate some obstacles and `secret' components? That is, > tolerate intellectual property of software companies? I often could, but > I think it is better if I don't, and will also try to persuade more people > not to tolerate it either! > > (I mostly sit in front of Macs, but I do all my work on Linux machines > either over the network or in Linux systems in virtual machines.) > > Marcus > > ==============================**============================== > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > to unsubscribe > http://redfish.com/mailman/**listinfo/friam_redfish.com<http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> >
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