[Shameless Plug] A New Book

serious and heartfelt congrats, Tim.

Tim Wescott wrote:

i like this guy's transparency.

r b-j

robert bristow-johnson wrote:


Well, the subject line did say "shameless".

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

Tim Wescott wrote:


You know, I was going to immediately reply (before even reading the
message) saying "why would you say that it's a shameless plug?" ...
Then, when I read that final part, I could only agree with the
subject  ;-)

Carlos
--

Tim Wescott wrote:

but that doesn't show in Google Groups.  i dunno, but i guess it's an
undocumented feature that if you enclose text in [brackets] in the
Subject: header, Google Groups doesn't show it in their front page for
the newsgroup.

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.dsp

r b-j

robert bristow-johnson wrote:


Yes it does, at least in comp.arch.embedded.

larwe wrote:

The immediate replies to Tims post were all from google, and they
all elided the "[shameless]" portion.  Just one more of the
failings of the google interface.  Have they no shame?

--
"If you want to post a followup via groups.google.com, don't use
 the broken "Reply" link at the bottom of the article.  Click on
 "show options" at the top of the article, then click on the
 "Reply" at the bottom of the article headers." - Keith Thompson
More details at: <http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/>
Also see <http://www.safalra.com/special/googlegroupsreply/>

CBFalconer wrote:


Oh, the humanity!

CBFalconer wrote:


They're too busy taking over the world ... May all gods help
them do that!!  I'm so depressed, living in a world owned by
Microsoft!!!

;-)

Carlos
--

I commensurate with you, Carlos. BUT..., you CAN do something
about it:

  http://www.linux.org
  http://fedora.redhat.com/
  http://www.centos.org/

Do you think you need MS's office suite? No, you don't:

  http://www.openoffice.org/

NOTHING on my system is purchased and I am using first-rate applications:

  database (postgresql)
  editor (xemacs)
  version control (subversion),
  typesetting (TeX/LaTeX)
  video/music (realplayer 10)

etc., etc.

You can even have your cake and eat it too (if you have a CD
of an MS OS):

  http://www.vmware.com/

in which you can install and operate MS-Windows inside your
unix box. Absolutely amazing, and vmserver is FREE (I think...).

I installed FC4 about 2 or 3 months ago and I am elated! Yes, it
took a lot of fooling with, but I now have the system of my dreams!
I absolute love FC4!
--
%  Randy Yates                  % "Maybe one day I'll feel her cold embrace,
%% Fuquay-Varina, NC            %                    and kiss her interface,
%%% 919-577-9882                %            til then, I'll leave her alone."
http://home.earthlink.net/~yatescr

Randy Yates wrote:


I haven't gone over to Linux yet, but that 320 page book was written
entirely in OpenOffice -- and while some of the symbolic math was
checked in MathCad (which costs a few $$) all of the numeric processing
was done in SciLab for free, and the code examples were developed and
tested using Gnu tools under Cygwin.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

Way to go, Tim! You're on your way to open-source freedom!

Here are some things I like about FC4 vs. MS:

  1. It's free. MS is asking $300 for the "reinstallable"
  version of XP. That's just too damn much, IMO. And with
  FC4, nobody's tracking your usage.

  2. It's stable and well-structured. I can easily go for weeks
  without rebooting, even after installing something major.

  3. It's mult-user and multi-tasking. Yeah, sure MS *says*
  the same for XP, but it doesn't really measure up. There
  are very few times something hangs so severly that I must
  reboot. I keep my wife logged in all the time and can instantly
  switch back and forth between her desktop and mine.

  4. Viruses? What viruses?

I really hope more folks see that there are viable alternatives
to MS, especially in this day and age.
--
%  Randy Yates                  % "Watching all the days go by...    
%% Fuquay-Varina, NC            %  Who are you and who am I?"
%%% 919-577-9882                % 'Mission (A World Record)',
http://home.earthlink.net/~yatescr

Tim Wescott wrote:


Huh... Bringing the thread back on-topic, eh?  Nice!!!!  :-)
(I mean, really, when you think about it:  NICE!!)

Well, you now need to switch to Firefox for web browsing and to
Thunderbord for e-mail and news...

Then, you'll soon notice that you can switch to Linux (BTW,
Randy, Fedora Core 5 is out -- has been for some two or three
weeks now -- haven't tried it yet ... soon) and will barely
notice the difference -- well, you *will* notice the difference
when you realize how long it's been since you haven't been
forced to reboot or to reinstall due to viruses, etc.  You'll
also notice it when you receive junk e-mail from antivirus
making companies and realize that you don't even need to read
it!!  :-)

Carlos
--

Carlos Moreno wrote:


You need to look at the headers of my posts.  Granted, Mozilla isn't
Firefox, but for the purpose I think it's equivalent.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

Tim Wescott wrote:

Mozilla >>> Firefox
;)

In some ways it is superior:
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.electronics.design/browse_frm/thread/e5b6fe9f46aeceeb/f3db415a35d7ce80?q=plug- *+Seamonkey+*-DOM-*
The suite has had a DOM Inspector for years--natively.
Firefox only got it as an extension recently.

Unless something has changed very recently,
those who use Firefox+Thunderbird will have a larger memory footprint
than those who use the suite.
(As the code for the individual apps is optimized,
this should shrink and likely disappear.)

Having the HTML editor, Mozilla Composer (nee Netscape Composer),
open with a click from within my browser  is kinda nice too.
If you use Firefox, you have to obtain & install Nvu individually.

Tim Wescott wrote:


Shame, shame, shame on me!!  :-)

Actually, there is some evil in the headers of your posts:


Up until the opening parenthesis, everything was going so well...
Those headers clearly need some work  ;-)

Carlos
--

Holy cow.  People write _books_ using word-processors?  That
seems a bit like digging a canal with a trowel.  

OOo is fine for a letter or fax, but I switch to LaTeX for
anything that

  1) is over a page long

  2) has a table of contents, index, or auto-numbering of
     table, figures, equations, etc.

  2) has any equations in it

  3) needs to look like it was professionally typeset

I've never seen anything that can equal TeX's hyphenation and
line-breaking, and (AFAICT) OOo doesn't even do ligatures at
all.  At least OOo gets points for doing an acceptible job of
kerning.
  

Bravo!

--
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  I feel... JUGULAR...
                                  at              
                               visi.com            

Grant Edwards wrote:

I wanted to write it in LaTeX, but the editor I signed with made it
clear that I would be _very_ unpopular with their production people if I
did.

You can write book-length stuff in OOo (obviously), but you have to pay
attention.  Frankly, being able to see the equations and figures in the
text as I'm writing helps my miniature brain grasp what the reader is
going to see which in turn helps me do a better job presenting the material.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google?  See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

Tim Wescott wrote:

   ...


You young whippersnappers! I used to write production instruction
manuals in NROFF and make them look good on a nine-pin printer. :-)

Jerry
--
Engineering is the art of making what you want from things you can get.
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯