It is known that I am not a Microsoft fan. I use a Mac, and used Linux for more than 10 years, and I currently administrate some Linux servers. But there are some things that Microsoft does that, while not great inventions, are relevant. For instance, for years Encarta was the best multimedia encyclopedia available. Also, Excel is a great tool (I knew Lotus 1-2-3 and Quattro, also great tools, but Excel survived).
In any case, in a Summer School on Natural Language Processing Microsoft Language Development Group went to talk about Microsoft speech technologies. You know, Windows 7 will have text-to-speech and speech recognition technology (unfortunately only for English, but a good start). Theoretically, the girl was there to explain the technology. Or at least to teach something about that. But I just got seller talk.
In one hour talk, 80% of the time was explaining how to choose a good person to read text (so its voice can be analyzed, segmented, etc). I know this person is crucial for the system. It should have a clean voice, and all that. But this is not the interesting portion for a set of computer science and linguistics students.
There wasn't only one slide that explain anything. Let me tell another one: Microsoft tests this product in two ways. In the second way the user votes from 0 to 5, using an application. But votes on what? :-/
In any case, in a Summer School on Natural Language Processing Microsoft Language Development Group went to talk about Microsoft speech technologies. You know, Windows 7 will have text-to-speech and speech recognition technology (unfortunately only for English, but a good start). Theoretically, the girl was there to explain the technology. Or at least to teach something about that. But I just got seller talk.
In one hour talk, 80% of the time was explaining how to choose a good person to read text (so its voice can be analyzed, segmented, etc). I know this person is crucial for the system. It should have a clean voice, and all that. But this is not the interesting portion for a set of computer science and linguistics students.
There wasn't only one slide that explain anything. Let me tell another one: Microsoft tests this product in two ways. In the second way the user votes from 0 to 5, using an application. But votes on what? :-/
It was pleasant to play with Moblin in the first days. Mainly because it was a new environment, with some nice graphics, and a new perspective on operating system. But there are a lot of problems, and decisions, that I can't understand:
- why is the default browser working so bad it if is based on a well known browser engine? (Gecko). Imagine that current moblin is not able to login in gmail.
- the integrated messenger is an interesting idea. But why in hell to support just gmail and jabber? libpurple supports a lot of protocols, and it would be great if all were supported by moblin.
- there was a new beta release, but the version I had installed does not have updates. If you want to keep users interested, do not force them to reinstall things every time. Why not just to show that the updates mechanism is great (I know it is not)?
I found this Brilliant Button Maker page and had some fun preparing some simple badges. In case they can be useful for someone, I am posting them here. Be free to use. I would just approciate a comment linking to where you are using it. Cheers.
Some more details on my experiments with moblin:
- the second boot took more than one minute. Just a few pair of seconds to get the background image, about one minute to get the system working.
- when trying to upgrade flash player plugin, used the tool to install new packages. This tool shown the package, shown the option to install it, downloaded it, tried to install, detected a bad signature, asked if I wanted to continue, I said I did, and it did nothing. Did this about five times, always the same result. Opened a terminal, used yum, installed it without problems.
Yesterday I decided to remove Arch Linux from my netbook (Acer Apire One). Main reason: Arch was giving problems with the intel graphics processor (yeah, we need to lose the habit to call it graphics card, now that everything is built-in in the motherboard).
I was tempted to install an ubuntu linux. I asked a couple of friends what version to install, and they suggested an ubuntu remix... that should be soon based on moblin. That made me ask for moblin details, and I finished up downloading it and installing it.
Installation was quite simple. I think the installation is based on Fedora installation wizard, GTK based. It starts quickly, and detects correctly graphical details. I found the partitioning interface quite sloppy. It is the old interface, that I think could be bettered.
After installation the reboot was quick, but not as fast as the original Acer Aspire One Linpus. Probably because it was the first reboot. Unfortunately I did not have the time for a second reboot, yet.
The user interface is not based on the standard windows structure. There are windows, of course. But the main interface is based on a sliding panel, somehow compared to PDA devices. I think this interface is a fresh air in Linux interfaces.
I did not have much more time. I noticed it full integration with twitter and last.fm, but I think these are just two examples, and other plugins will appear. I loved the pastbin (I think this was the name) idea, a place to paste any kind of information (like a notebook) to find later.
I'll probably post again about this, but for now, let me complain about the lack of a button to turn off the computer (or suspend). At least, I did not find it. I had to use the powerbutton...
I was tempted to install an ubuntu linux. I asked a couple of friends what version to install, and they suggested an ubuntu remix... that should be soon based on moblin. That made me ask for moblin details, and I finished up downloading it and installing it.
Installation was quite simple. I think the installation is based on Fedora installation wizard, GTK based. It starts quickly, and detects correctly graphical details. I found the partitioning interface quite sloppy. It is the old interface, that I think could be bettered.
After installation the reboot was quick, but not as fast as the original Acer Aspire One Linpus. Probably because it was the first reboot. Unfortunately I did not have the time for a second reboot, yet.
The user interface is not based on the standard windows structure. There are windows, of course. But the main interface is based on a sliding panel, somehow compared to PDA devices. I think this interface is a fresh air in Linux interfaces.I did not have much more time. I noticed it full integration with twitter and last.fm, but I think these are just two examples, and other plugins will appear. I loved the pastbin (I think this was the name) idea, a place to paste any kind of information (like a notebook) to find later.
I'll probably post again about this, but for now, let me complain about the lack of a button to turn off the computer (or suspend). At least, I did not find it. I had to use the powerbutton...
Today was Asterix day. Yes, yet another French movie, but a really different genre than the previous four. I am an Asterix book fan. This was the first movie with Asterix that I've seen, and I was not very amused. The best character in the movie is Ideafix (Getafix for those that need to translate French). But the movie is funny.
I loved the Schumacher or Zinédine Zidane appearances. I noticed two or three other characters that might be known, but I did not recognize them. Finally, Vanessa Hessler is beautiful in this movie. I really enjoyed seeing her.
Finally, voting 7 in 10 at IMDB.
I loved the Schumacher or Zinédine Zidane appearances. I noticed two or three other characters that might be known, but I did not recognize them. Finally, Vanessa Hessler is beautiful in this movie. I really enjoyed seeing her.
Finally, voting 7 in 10 at IMDB.
Today it was the last. The fourth movie for TAXI, named T4XI. Same team, same kind of jokes, new taxi, less speed, more stupidity. Why all movie sequences get everytime worse?
It is quite hard to rate the movie. Yes, it has funny parts. But the funny parts are completely irrelevant to the movie. For instance, the best portion is in the beginning, right before the movie starts. Everything else are the old damn stupid cops jokes.
Voting 2 in 10.
It is quite hard to rate the movie. Yes, it has funny parts. But the funny parts are completely irrelevant to the movie. For instance, the best portion is in the beginning, right before the movie starts. Everything else are the old damn stupid cops jokes.
Voting 2 in 10.
The third movie from the Taxi tetralogy is quite bad. It has the same cast as the previous two. It has some funny action (specially in the beginning, right before the movie start officially). The rest of the movie is kind of basic.
The taxi modifications were unbelievable for the second movie. For this one, there are yet more unbelievable transformations.
Another thing that annoys me is the use of suction to suck out information from a computer. This is a movie from 2003!!! Why the use of such a stupid idea?? I know the movie is a comedy. But I am almost sure that wasn't to be funny... Oh well.
This one will have a vote from me on 4 on 10. Hope the next one will be a little better.
The taxi modifications were unbelievable for the second movie. For this one, there are yet more unbelievable transformations.
Another thing that annoys me is the use of suction to suck out information from a computer. This is a movie from 2003!!! Why the use of such a stupid idea?? I know the movie is a comedy. But I am almost sure that wasn't to be funny... Oh well.
This one will have a vote from me on 4 on 10. Hope the next one will be a little better.
As promised, today was Taxi 2 movie. And I would say it is more funny than the first one. OK, probably less veridic. But funny as well. A good reason to the movie be still good is to have the same cast (at least, most of it).
Then, there is a blond girl without panties doing karate. I know, I know, nothing inadequate was shown. But it is interesting/funny anyway.
I rated this movie as 9/10.
Then, there is a blond girl without panties doing karate. I know, I know, nothing inadequate was shown. But it is interesting/funny anyway.
I rated this movie as 9/10.
Today I choosed another movie to see. I found the Taxi quadrilogy. Today it was the first. It seemed quite familiar, but I didn't have a post about it on the blog. So, it should be some kind of déjà-vu. But at the end, I really noticed that I saw the movie previously. Well, it is good enough to be reseen. Taxi is a funny movie, and the bad thing, is that they speak french. Yeah, I know. There were subtitles. But normally I can follow English movies good enough. French isn't that easy... oh well.
Votes 8 in 10 in IMDB. Really soon, now, the second movie.
Votes 8 in 10 in IMDB. Really soon, now, the second movie.
