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Splash screens == sloth

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Re: Splash screens == sloth

#241

Post by pavel_lishin »

why-el wrote: post #192
pavel_lishin wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some times I reopen a window of preview let's say just to close the whole program. I do not understand what you are saying. Can you elaborate?

Here is a scenario, and my mac is a month old, so maybe I am borrowing heavily from Ubuntu and MS experiences. When I am reading two pdfs, and then close one, it makes sense for the preview menu to stay on because I am reading the second pdf, but when I close the second, what reason is there for preview menu to stay up? Edit: As to my original comment, when I switch to another app, preview stays open, but up to now I…

There's lots of reasons for the menu to stay open; the simplest example is clicking File, then Open, to open a new file.

As far as the menu disappearing when you close both documents, that's confusing and directly contradicts what you typed earlier. I can open Preview.app, and it'll just show me the menu. I can close it by alt-tabbing to it and hitting Cmd-Q - no windows required.

Re: Splash screens == sloth

#242

Post by motoford »

talmand wrote: post #236
jiggy2011 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, although from what I remember the flash development tools seemed to provide much functionality that seemed to be aimed specifically at creating things like this. IIRC there was something that was basically a "flash intro wizard" however this may well have just been added due to demand from developers for such features.

I don't recall such a wizard in Flash itself, although I wouldn't be surprised. That kind of thing seems something that a third-party would create and there are a large number of them out there. The main thing to remember was that the Flash intro, at one time, was an accepted practice. It was an easy way for a company to introduce itself, much like a commercial. It wasn't until it was overused that people started to…

I disagree that it was an accepted practice. I don't know of any technical person who didn't hate them from the very first time they saw one. Remember this was back during dial-up days and you had to wait forever for that crap to load. I can't tell you how many sites I left before ever seeing their content because when I saw flash loading I just switch back to my search engine and find the next link. Heck, I still do that.

edit: I forgot to mention my even bigger gripe about the flash intros, and that was because I was basically being forced to sit through a commercial before I could interact with the company. It went (and goes) against the very basics of web use.

Re: Splash screens == sloth

#243

Post by jmah »

pak wrote: post #205
jiggy2011 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surely Windows updates are applied via some sort of transactional system that can be rolled back and re-attempted if the process fails for whatever reason? Having a power cut during a Windows update shouldn't result in a completely trashed system.

Surprisingly, NTFS does allow for transactions [1] and this feature is implemented since Vista, while as far as I know, HFS+ on Macs has no comparable feature. Therefore what you say may in fact be true. I'm curious if cutting the power on a Mac while it's moving files into place will break a software update, or if the whole package receipt mechanism prevents that from occurring. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tran…

On HFS+ on OS X, most file writing is done atomically, by writing to a temp file and atomically switching the (conceptual) data pointer of the target file, aka FSExchangeObjects. It's common to end up with some of these temp files in ~/Library/Preferences, ending in .plist.asdfx, when the process was interrupted (so the original remains untouched).

This can be done for directories too - make a new one, write changed files and hard link unchanged ones, then FSExchangeObjects. Obviously this scales linearly with the number of files in the directory, so it's not perfect. I'm not sure if / how any of this is used for system updates, though.

Re: Splash screens == sloth

#244

Post by Hemospectrum »

irahul wrote: post #156
JS_startup wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I once wrote a clone of Microsoft Word for a company looking to move away from Office dependency - I think you're really understating the complexity of something like Word when you call it a glorified textbox or say it should load as quickly as MSPaint because they both use the ribbon UI.

>I once wrote a clone of Microsoft Word for a company Out of curiosity, when was it? Wasn't openoffice.org an option?

The chief complaint I have with HN's lack of reply notifications is that interesting questions like this one will go unanswered forever.

Re: Splash screens == sloth

#245

Post by talmand »

motoford wrote: post #242
talmand wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't recall such a wizard in Flash itself, although I wouldn't be surprised. That kind of thing seems something that a third-party would create and there are a large number of them out there. The main thing to remember was that the Flash intro, at one time, was an accepted practice. It was an easy way for a company to introduce itself, much like a commercial. It wasn't until it was overused that people started to…

I disagree that it was an accepted practice. I don't know of any technical person who didn't hate them from the very first time they saw one. Remember this was back during dial-up days and you had to wait forever for that crap to load. I can't tell you how many sites I left before ever seeing their content because when I saw flash loading I just switch back to my search engine and find the next link. Heck, I still do…

I would say the people defining an accepted practice are the people paying the bills. If the company wanted it, the technical person made it so they would get paid. I would admit it was probably the technical people who finally convinced the majority to abandon them. Plus the fact that over time they could see that the idea was failing them, much like you point out. But until that moment it was accepted practice among major websites. The fact you remember them so vividly in your dislike of them almost proves my point.

But alas, I agree, they were a total waste of time. As I said, the people who pay the bills don't always listen to the people that they should listen to.

Re: Splash screens == sloth

#246

Post by eru »

lusr wrote: post #239
eru wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saves on electricity, and noise. Though suspend to RAM does that, too.

Assuming this hardware monitor is reasonably accurate, my hyperthreaded quad core i7 chows 145W when I'm really busy, which with my 80+ Corsair HX750W means I'm not eating more than 2 100W lightbulbs. I seldom play games any more so rarely use more than that. And that's when I'm doing serious number crunching. Since I'm only working at home about 4-5 hours/day during the week and maybe 2-3 that on weekend days, I rea…

Yes. I don't want to claim that rebooting still makes sense. But old habits die hard.
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