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From an user's perspective, it may not change much, but for developers it's another thing. Apple did not bundle Sun's JVM with OS X, they developed its own version, just like Microsoft did, and would continue to do if they didn't ruin the whole thing. What's more, at one point Apple officially supported Java as a language suitable for developing OS X applications. Not anymore. Developers using Java now have to wait for Oracle to come up with a version of its own, which may or not suck more than Apple's own.

With Apple's security track record, non-bundling Flash and Java doesn't automatically make them invulnerable, they only have potentially fewer holes, but not many. And I say "potentially", because Flash had been autoupdating itself for a while and the JVM is updated via Apple Software Update, so in one case the infection window lasts at most a whole week, and in the second case, it's a matter of Apple to change its policies.

And finally, did you know the review guidelines for Apple's new App Store reject (among others) Java apps?

Who knows, in the end, it may not mean much, after all Microsoft used to bundle both Flash and their own JVM, and Windows hasn't become a less open platform that it was before, but Apple's control tendencies cannot be understated in things like this. In principle it's a good thing for Mac users that developers make good use of OS X features when developing applications, but in the long term you may be precluding them from using 3rd party tools which would make things easier for them, and we already saw a glimpse of such future with the abandoned iPhone app guidelines.

But as soon as there's big financial interest involved, and considering censorship and the license terms Apple enforces on the iPhone App store - ugh. And there's rumors that apple might be removing Flash and Java support for OS X...

Nah, they're simply not bundling them with Lion, so if you want any of those two, you're on your own. It's not the brightest idea Apple ever had as, unlike the iPhone, you need Flash on desktop computers, and Oracle does not yet have a Java runtime for OS X, which it's in their best interest to get resolved soon, considering the number of Java developers working with Macs. In the end, it's just another step towards Apple absolute control over their own products.

[disclaimer]

Yeah, except that Opera is probably too late to hop onto the bandwagon - FireFox probably has the majority of the devs, and unless Opera have been pretty clever about their implementation, there's probably too much effort involved in supporting both browsers for a plugin writer (disclaimer: I haven't looked at either browser's plugin/extension implementation, all I know is firefox uses javascript/XUL).

Opera's approach to extensions is similar to the one used by Chrome, so it's unlikely a Firefox extension developer will support both approaches, although that may vary based on such extension reliance on XUL.

I heard a rumor about the new OSX version, Lion. It will by default behave like iOS so you can only have 1 application running at a time. It's a massive stupification of the OS. How stupid do you need to be to not be able to deal with having more than 1 application open? If you've never used a computer before, or you're under 10 years old, well, then there's an excuse. Steve Jobs has some good ideas about making things easier, but this?

That's not a rumor, but nonsense. And I think I don't have to explain why, do I?

What Lion will have, and probably fueled such rumour, it's the ability to auto save and auto resume documents and applications state, which it's a fantastic feature I'd like to see under other operating systems, even though many applications are already coded to do that on their own.

As long as the store doesn't become the only officially sanctioned way to install software, and the store includes automatic updates for the installed apps, bring it on. Like if I could give a damn about it, really

First alpha is up, together with some extensions for users to play with.

My favorite quote comes to mind...

"You don't need anything more, opera has everything built in"

Which now is more true than ever

Sure thing, Deo

Couldn't catch the offer any earlier, since I did not check my feeds until late night, plus the site that got hold of the deal published the news only one hour before my feed checking.

But don't worry, there will be another opportunity in 2020

sounds good, are there any DRM attached or is it one key for multiple computers?

You have one key that grants you 5 activations, which can be used in multiple computers if you want. I assume this limit can be reset if you contact PopCap.

Seems like I were too late, no anniversary mention on the site you linked to, Lashiec

Same .. and my son was all excited when he saw Bejeweled here .

Yeah, IIRC the offer was available 'til 10 PM PST, so you guys were a bit late

Name and branding. That's all. All the patches Go-oo integrates are being merged into LibreOffice, so it's kind of a spiritual successor, with much stronger backing this time, or so I hope.

To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Bejeweled, PopCap is offering Bejeweled 2 completely free just today. Getting it is fairly straightforward, despite the occasional site hiccups surely caused by the overwhelming demand, so grab it fast before it's too late.

The guys at Mozilla Labs launched yesterday the Game On competition, geared at kickstarting development of web games based on open technologies, including the nascent WebGL^w. As you may know, Flash is the cornerstone of nearly every game available on the net today, with more complex games like Quake Live opting for proprietary plugins not compatible with all browsers, and others like Minecraft preferring to use the ubiquitous Java plugin.

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But recent advancements in HTML standards, plus the furious race to develop much faster JavaScript engines, have made possible for game creators to finally leave plugins behind and code games to run directly in any browser that supports the latest standards, an excellent example being Biolab Disaster. With almost all browsers now capable of running these games, and Mozilla encouraging further development, true web games will begin to be the rule, rather than the exception.

Further information is available at the site linked above. Naturally, all games must run on Firefox 4 (which this competition also helps promoting), but apart from that, the rules are pretty relaxed, as expected from Mozilla. The deadline is on January, 11th 2011, though some people have been working on a concept for some weeks now, and I hope they share something with us ;)
via Asa Dotzler and Mozilla Links

64 GB should be more than enough, really, but your space requirements may vary based on your usage patterns. If you like to have several big games installed, or use several operating systems (either virtualized or not), I hope your wallet is as fat as the SSD you may need in such case. Otherwise, get a big mechanical drive for secondary storage as f0dder suggests (or a NAS), and move your personal files there. You can even set up folder junctions pointing to the secondary drive if you run out of space (hi, humongous "steamapps" folder).

How come moving "My Documents" to another drive is messy for you, Deo?

Mechanical hard drives have at most a 64 MB cache, and IIRC it's used as a buffer for data or drive commands, while the "cache" in hybrid SSDs is used to allow quicker access to the most used data stored in the mechanical platters.

True that. I missed Markus last minute clarification, so I thought the 600,000 € were accumulated through Minecraft entire existence. Still, it's perplexing how many licenses were sold in so little time, considering the game has been available since May of last year. The game has been referenced in the media more than it's usually been for the past week, but that's because of Markus intent on starting his company as well as his visit to Valve headquarters in Washington.

I mean, the fan videos showcasing the game are pouring out as usual :D

Looks like PayPal should not be your payment service of choice if you intend to do some serious business, or you suspect your little pet project might hit the big time.

Markus Persson, game developer, is the latest example of a worrying trend. After achieving huge success with the unconventional Minecraft, with more than 500,000 registered users, and 100,000 licenses sold for the "premium" version, and the accompanying buzz in major gaming sites, Markus decided to pursue the idea of setting up its own videogame company, to offset much of the burden of supporting Minecraft, so he could focus on continue to develop Minecraft, as well as having the means to back a completely different gaming project.

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Problem is, the vast majority of the money intended to fund the new company is now blocked by PayPal. And we're not talking about hundreds or even thousands of dollars, but a staggering 600,000 €. What's more, if PayPal detects something suspicious during their reviewing process, PayPal keeps all the money, and Markus will have to start again from almost zero.
via Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Joke or not, you can't help but laugh a bit when you listen to guitar and bass lines played by human voices.

My main tool is WinRAR because it is the only archiver that goes beyond simple file compression (creating different archives per file or folder, and deleting the source files after compression are invaluable features). I also use 7-Zip when working with .7z and .zip archives, because it handles .7z better than WinRAR and its ZIP compression ratio is slightly better.

I keep Universal Extractor around to handle the most obscure formats and peeking into software installers.

Locate and Click Robot

[not]

Keep in mind that you should not use blurring for really sensitive information - while it's not possible to revert the effects of a blur, and attacker can brute-force-blur and get the information he wants.

Pretty interesting. Time to leave blurring behind, then.

How come I managed to miss this plugin until now?

Thanks to lanux for bringing it to my attention, and for the Steam alias, and to phitsc for all his hard work

* Lashiec pokes mouser to update DcUpdater plugin list

Does it matter who did it first? I always thought it mattered more who did it best?

Yes and no to both questions. What's the most important consideration depends on what we're discussing, and the context under which the matter is being discussed.

In this case, it doesn't matter who did it first, since so far having tabs on top or under the address bar it's for all practical purposes a personal preference, as there is no actual drawback when using the browser for having the tab bar on one place or another. For the same reason, it doesn't matter who did it best, because technically there's isn't a *best* way to put tabs on top.

There are a bunch of reasons (summary) for Firefox to now have tabs on top, due to other UI changes, which makes more convenient for the browser to have tabs on top.

Besides, I was joking :)

No, that's Opera you're talking about (sorry, couldn't help it :D)

It's pretty telling when the founder of one of the pioneers of news aggregation says the model doesn't work at all. Perhaps that's why FARK has an editorial team that promotes links to the frontpage, while the rest remain in the back.

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Of course, the statement has to be taken with a grain of salt, as he's talking about comments, which are personal opinions on a matter, not a combined effort of a group of people in order to reach a single answer. Plus, this is FARK we're talking about.