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Please contemplate the reason that Google recently begged and pleaded that only developers download the *developer* release of Google Chrome for Mac and Linux, and begged people not to blog and whine and bitch about its shortcomings. (They were aware of its shortcomings. It's a work in progress.)

If you want to know more about filesystems, start here:
Filesystems @ Wikipedia (Hint: the blue words are links. Click on them to read and learn even more.)

If you want to know more about ZFS, start here:
ZFS

If you want to know more about designing and building filesystems, there is an excellent discussion here (this book should be required reeading for all software developers and systems administrators, regardless of what types of systems you tend):
The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System

If you want to know more about the chief failing of the human intellect (our own limitations) start here:
Incompetent People Really Have No Clue, Studies Find: They're blind to own failings, others' skills
Personally, (just between you and me, the internet, and alien archeologists a billion years from now) I interpret this finding to be scientific evidence supporting The Dilbert Principle: "People are stupid." That is to say, we are all stupid about most things, most of the time. The trick is to figure out when you don't know what you're talking about, at which point you stop talking, and start reading or asking questions.

Complex and revolutionary software systems, like good food, take time. ZFS has tremendous potential. It might not be finished yet, or Apple might take the lessons learned from ZFS and use them in a different way (HFSEFK - HFS Extremely Fraking Cool).

The unix attitude kills another neat technology. When are the unix types going to learn that everything in The Unix Philosophy has been completely rejected by the market place. It took Apple to bring Unix to the desktop and they did it by completely HIDING it - hint hint!

...is Principles of Network and System Administration by Mark Burgess. Very enjoyable read, good for IT info and also good for the "people" side of sysadmin. After having read the book from beginning to end, I now find myself frequently going back to read bits and pieces.

I'm a sysadmin by day, computer consultant by night.

I started this path because I kept getting stuck as "The Computer Guy." I set everyone up with email. I kept everything in the office running. I was the guy that knew what hardware to get next. I got a LAN up and running.

I became a known quantity and all kinds of people started coming to me to fix the stupid problems. My friend talked me into starting a business on the side after fixing her computer. If nothing else I'd get a tax writeoff and at the very best my goal was to get into IT professionally and double my income.

I burnt out. I got tired of doing the same stupid fixes for different (l)users. I got sick of working on someone's weird ass-hardware. I questioned why I ever wanted into the field in the first place. Then I got in with a company that wasn't stingy on getting standardized hardware and my job got easier (even possible). Things were great, I was excited and connected with my job, and then I ran into a lead programmer who dumped the impossible on my lap and expected immediate return. I burnt out again.

Most of the company respected what I did, a few powerful people didn't. I got out, landed with a company I feel more comfortable with, and brought all my strengths with me without the baggage of a programmer dumping me in the middle of a problem and expecting me to fix it while he looked over my shoulder.

My guru is a BoFH. I am not. It just doesn't work for me, I don't enjoy being grumpy all day (even though I secretly wish that I could be..) The people that respect what I do like me because I'm positive and helpful. When I'm not, I don't like myself. I'm most important, if I can't deal with the demands something outside me has to change, I can't live with the BoFH attitude.

On the other hand, you're not a carpet to be walked on. If you have liberal policies that are getting dumped on, well, you have no policies at all. Defend and enforce your policies - you may need to explain your rationale. I'm really liberal on my network, I'm dealing with about 20 users, but my blanket policies are stupid easy to defend. (ie "Surf porn at home - our schtick is we're fast and our customers need ever bit of bandwidth we can give them." If they don't buy that, there's a dozen more excuses in my bag. If I can't get through after that, I have to decide if it's a hill I want to die on.)

I completely agree with those who say, "Look at your work / life balance." Balance is everything. You don't have to do all your planning by the Scotty principle, but do pad your estimates and give yourself reasonable deadlines plus a bit. If you finish early, fill in that extra time you've given yourself with interesting projects. If you are enthusiastic and engaged in your work, your attitude spreads to your coworkers.

Go get Thomas Limoncelli's "Time Management for System Administrators." http://www.amazon.com/Management-System-Administrators-Thomas-Limoncelli/dp/0596007833/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244613832&sr=8-1 I found it infinitely worthwhile and read it every few months when I start to feel overwhelmed again.

A last side note, I don't have to do the consulting gig on the side any longer, but I choose to because I find it most rewarding now. I do a lot of simple stuff these days and it's pleasant to have people at the end of their rope so grateful to have a professional look at their system. Treating coworkers as regular customers has helped me not bog down in the abyss of cynicism.

And congratulate yourself. The very notion that you asked the question is a pretty good indication that you will find your own solution.

Something for the reading list. The Essential Sternberg:Essays on Intelligence, Psychology, and Education

Beer and Circus details this phenomenon quite well. The sports program is a fundraising avenue, recruitment tool, and publicity machine all rolled up into one. Trouble is, the quality of the education suffers for the sake of the almighty sports program. The portion of Beer & Circus detailing the veto power that Bobby Knight had over the university president at Indiana is especially telling of this fact of life at Division I schools.

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

I also don't think Disney has done a limited re-release in about 20 years.

A quick Amazon search shows that you might be wrong.

To be fair, there are more than I thought that are still available, but I clearly remember seeing commercials for some of those claiming that they'd be "locked away" in the Disney Vault "soon".

What is new in Windows 7 - the screenshots all look the same to me as Vista... apparently it's leaner and runs faster.Oh wait, look, Snow Leopard is the same.

I can't believe a reasonable viewer would come to your conclusion. The UI changes/improvements between Vista and Windows 7 are much larger than the UI changes between Leopard and Snow Leopard. They're comparable to the UI changes between typical OS X releases like Panther and Tiger.

Windows 7 has DirectX 11 you say? But Snow Leopard has QuicktimeX. Windows 7 has DirectX Compute? But Snow Leopard has OpenCL.

DirectX 11 (which DirectX Compute is a part of) will be a free API update for Windows Vista and will be included with Windows 7. QuickTime X is a non-free part of Snow Leopard and will not be available for Leopard or Tiger. I haven't heard any details about Apple's implementation of OpenCL being available for Leopard or Tiger. I'll bet a spindle of Taiyo Yudens that the major GPU vendors (NVIDIA, AMD, Intel) will make OpenCL drivers available for Vista (and maybe Leopard if Apple lets them).

Vista came out in 2007. Leopard came out in 2007. These new versions are both coming out very close to each other. Why, in your mind, is Snow Leopard comparable to a service pack whilst Windows 7 is not?

I said Snow Leopard was comparable to 2 Service Packs and some free Windows API updates. For example, Vista Service Pack 2 was released two weeks ago and Service Pack 3 will also be free (perhaps I should have said 3 Service Packs). DirectX 11 (and maybe 12) will be a free update for Vista. Updates for .NET Framework will be available for Vista.

I would agree that Leopard and Tiger were bigger updates than all the free updates that XP and Vista get. However, Snow Leopard is much smaller than a typical OS X upgrade and is much closer to the cumulative free Windows upgrades than the non-free Windows 7.

I do actually agree that Apple should just get everyone on Intel systems up to Snow Leopard by having an upgrade option ... oh, they do, it just includes iLife and iWork so that the other major Apple applications are also brought up to date.

Now we're straying off topic. I agree that Apple offers great upgrade bundles and family packs (subsidized by requiring a Mac) that no other software maker seems to match. However, I'd hardly call iLife and iWork "major." With the exception of GarageBand, the $79 iLife bundle is made up of applications that Windows users can pretty much duplicate for free with apps included with Windows (e.g. DVD Maker), free MS downloads (Live Essentials, Visual Web Developer Express), and/or free third party apps (e.g. Picasa). iWork is a nice $79 suite if that's what you're looking for, but so is Office for Mac Home & Student Edition for $108, or NeoOffice for free.

I thought the home market wouldn't care about things like this on average. How many people actually use Microsoft Office with their new OEM PC rather than use MS Works, or some crippled version of MS Office?

They really aren't any "crippled" versions of MS Office.

MS Office Home includes full versions of Exel, PowerPoint, Word and OneNote, with a three-seat license.

The Ultimate Steal includes everything for $60. For this will need an .edu address and proof of enrollment.

0.5 credit hours.

If your employer has a volume license with Microsoft, home use is likely to cost you no more than S&H on the disks.

But there is no getting around the fact that the MS Office product - retail boxed - sells very, very well: Software Best Sellers in Business and Office

The problem for the GIMP is that products like Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate & VideoStudio Pro X2 Bundle pack a lot of power into a less intimidating package.

It is not always clear to me that the geek has decided on his target audience before he begins work on a project like The GIMP. That touches on issues like feature sets, UI design, the help system, tutorials, online resources...

and, of course, avoiding such elementary mistakes as choosing a name for your project that is not instantly offensive to anyone other than a gnome.

I thought the home market wouldn't care about things like this on average. How many people actually use Microsoft Office with their new OEM PC rather than use MS Works, or some crippled version of MS Office?

They really aren't any "crippled" versions of MS Office.

MS Office Home includes full versions of Exel, PowerPoint, Word and OneNote, with a three-seat license.

The Ultimate Steal includes everything for $60. For this will need an .edu address and proof of enrollment.

0.5 credit hours.

If your employer has a volume license with Microsoft, home use is likely to cost you no more than S&H on the disks.

But there is no getting around the fact that the MS Office product - retail boxed - sells very, very well: Software Best Sellers in Business and Office

The problem for the GIMP is that products like Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate & VideoStudio Pro X2 Bundle pack a lot of power into a less intimidating package.

It is not always clear to me that the geek has decided on his target audience before he begins work on a project like The GIMP. That touches on issues like feature sets, UI design, the help system, tutorials, online resources...

and, of course, avoiding such elementary mistakes as choosing a name for your project that is not instantly offensive to anyone other than a gnome.

My issue with the graph is someone needs to take a class on "how to make a graph". 0% performance and $0 cpu.... why? Was there a $0 cpu? Did any of the cpus get a 0%?

Probably because the person who made that graph for The Tech Report wanted all the proportions to be honest.

Did you ever read the book How to Lie with Statistics? Or the book How to Lie with Charts? Or a nice, short blog post called Graphs That Lie?

When you chop out some of the "wasted space" in a graph, you distort the graph. Unless people are careful and check where your axes begin, and then mentally visualize where the axes go, they'll get a misleading idea of the data from the graph.

Suppose the bottom part of the graph was sliced off, at the 90% line, to make you happier. Imagine what it would look like. The AMD X2 6400+, sitting at the 100% line, would have very little white space under it; and the Intel i7-920, sitting a bit below the 200% line, would now appear to be ten times faster than the AMD X2 6400+. The numbers would be the same, but the visual impact would be that the Intel chip totally blows away the AMD chips.

The graph is good the way it is.

I'll meet you halfway, though: it wouldn't have hurt for them to have put in a second chart, zooming in on just the most crowded areas.

steveha

I was thinking something more along the lines of this. Seriously. A bigger screen would be in order, but other than that, I say throw out all the assumptions of needing networking, rechargeable batteries, modern displays, etc. and I bet you could mass produce something that will suffice to replace a textbook for around $50 or less. Want something nicer? Save up your allowance.

Perhaps it will have a nice web portal with reviews, in-depth descriptions, and decent screenshots?

In other words, what Windows users found in TuCows in 1993 and Download.com in 1996.

What MIchael Robertson was saying was absolutely essential to the mainstreaming of the Linux desktop in 2002 when he launched CNR.com. CNR (sofware)

The difference is that Robertson was a pragmatist with no interest in the geek's ideological wars over development models and licenses.

CNR would list - and sell - the proprietary - closed source - DVD player or game that would help make his product competitive.

No lectures. No hassle.

There are four long-standing problems for Linux in the home.

1 Linux arrived late to the party.

It really, really, needed to be there - and strongly positioned - before Windows 95.

2 Linux is either invisible - embedded in the cell phone or set top box - or it's the second cousin, twice removed.

The Blue Light special on Aisle 3.

3 The home is a demanding, sophisticated market.

Difficult to get a handle on.

Light years removed from the sterotype of the Windows "luser." Software Best Sellers in Home and Hobbies

4 Free is never as compelling as the geek likes to think.

That the home market is a solidly middle class market couldn't be made any plainer than this: Chief Architect Software

This is a market where ideological purity or political correctness counts for absolutely nothing.

That lesson can't be repeated more often.

You have to prove - again and again - that you offering a better product than the incumbent.

The geek will choke on this - but he has to get it down:

The OEM price of Windows is trival -
as close to free as makes no difference.

Windows is a solid, marketable, operating systems with a credible UI. It is not particularly difficult for a home user to secure - and the free tools available are more than adequate for the job.

It's all about the apps.

You have to brutally honest about what you have.

Don't try to sell The Gimp or OpenOffice as first-tier apps until they are first tier-apps.

Don't count the number of programs in your distro's repository.

Think about what is missing, what needs to be there to reach your target audience.

It can be something as basic as Print Shop.

Perhaps it will have a nice web portal with reviews, in-depth descriptions, and decent screenshots?

In other words, what Windows users found in TuCows in 1993 and Download.com in 1996.

What MIchael Robertson was saying was absolutely essential to the mainstreaming of the Linux desktop in 2002 when he launched CNR.com. CNR (sofware)

The difference is that Robertson was a pragmatist with no interest in the geek's ideological wars over development models and licenses.

CNR would list - and sell - the proprietary - closed source - DVD player or game that would help make his product competitive.

No lectures. No hassle.

There are four long-standing problems for Linux in the home.

1 Linux arrived late to the party.

It really, really, needed to be there - and strongly positioned - before Windows 95.

2 Linux is either invisible - embedded in the cell phone or set top box - or it's the second cousin, twice removed.

The Blue Light special on Aisle 3.

3 The home is a demanding, sophisticated market.

Difficult to get a handle on.

Light years removed from the sterotype of the Windows "luser." Software Best Sellers in Home and Hobbies

4 Free is never as compelling as the geek likes to think.

That the home market is a solidly middle class market couldn't be made any plainer than this: Chief Architect Software

This is a market where ideological purity or political correctness counts for absolutely nothing.

That lesson can't be repeated more often.

You have to prove - again and again - that you offering a better product than the incumbent.

The geek will choke on this - but he has to get it down:

The OEM price of Windows is trival -
as close to free as makes no difference.

Windows is a solid, marketable, operating systems with a credible UI. It is not particularly difficult for a home user to secure - and the free tools available are more than adequate for the job.

It's all about the apps.

You have to brutally honest about what you have.

Don't try to sell The Gimp or OpenOffice as first-tier apps until they are first tier-apps.

Don't count the number of programs in your distro's repository.

Think about what is missing, what needs to be there to reach your target audience.

It can be something as basic as Print Shop.

Snow Leopard costs $29 to upgrade ($129 new). Windows 7 Home Premium: $260 (rumoured).

Wow, troll for making a valid point that this upgrade price is going to look seriously good in comparison to the price of Windows 7?

I still fail to see where the troll is, seriously.

I'm guessing it's where you compare Snow Leopard's $29 upgrade-from-Leopard price to your uncited, rumoured $260 price for Windows 7 Home Premium. You don't need to rediculously inflate the price of a Windows upgrade or compare a relatively small OS X update to a comparably large Windows update.

Upgrade prices for "home" versions of Windows are typically around $100. Also, Windows upgrade pricing eligibility applies to the two previous versions of Windows. In this case, Windows XP (released 2002) users are eligible for Windows 7 upgrade pricing. OS X Tiger (released 2005) users are not eligible for Snow Leopard's $29 upgrade price.

Also, the $29 upgrade from Leopard to Snow Leopard is more comparable to 2 free Windows Service Packs and some free API updates (e.g. DirectX, .NET Framework). The upgrade from Vista to Windows 7 is more comparable to a typical $129 upgrade between OS X point releases (Snow Leopard is much less than a typical point release). The upgrade from XP to Windows 7 (same upgrade price) is considerably bigger than a typcial OS X point release.

You sir, don't know what you are talking about.

http://www.amazon.com/Mining-Sky-Untold-Asteroids-Planets/dp/0201328194

What Would Alfie Cohn Do?

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0618001816/ref=ase_fastcompanycom/102-5164850-9600113?v=glance&s=books

These anecdotes seem to fly in the face of research on the subject. What is being unsaid about this "experiment"?

Why Stanislaw Lem doesn't get more attention on this News for Nerds site I just don't understand... But for everyone here I'd recommend strongly the Cyberiad

As someone who took twenty minutes to write up a review on The Futurological Congress, I may point out that it's very easy to write a review and submit it. You could do that for Cyberiad if you'd like. I agree that it is also a great book.

Maybe it's just a general adversion [sic] to works in translation.

One thing that's confused me about Lem's books is the wordplay he does and how the hell anyone can translate that from Polish to English so flawlessly that the alliteration and prefix/suffix work moves from one language to another. Perhaps these two languages are more closely related than I know but I am always impressed with the translations.

Why would anyone be averse to books in another language if a decent translation exists? I feel that I am very eager to find these books and read them as I don't get out of the country a lot and love hearing different cultures reflected in works like Hesse and Tolstoy and Bulgakov ... why, prior to this book I read 2666 by Roberto Bolano (Peruvian born Mexican resident who died in 2003) and reviewed it but it was rejected. Probably because it's not nerdy enough.

I suspect that as special effects get better and better that Lem will be exposed to many more people through movies of his stories. Hopefully people return to the original works to enjoy them.

Why Stanislaw Lem doesn't get more attention on this News for Nerds site I just don't understand. Maybe it's just a general adversion to works in translation. But look beyond works like Solaris which is a clever book, though not so great, and of the film adaptations one was dull and the other cheesy. But for everyone here I'd recommend strongly the Cyberiad , about capable engineers roaming the galaxy when technology allows them to realize whatever crazy schemes they want. The chapter where they design a computer capable of generating poetry, and its first production is a splendid love poem in the language of tensor algebra will have the mathematically minded folks here falling off their chairs laughing.

http://www.amazon.com/Daikatana-Pc/dp/B00001ZT47

I hope I'm not the only one honestly disturbed that rape games have customers. Funny, as I'm a big fan of GTA4.

Two issues come to mind:

1. The harm of rape simulation

While there's evidence that violence and rape instincts live in ever man (and higher ape, for that matter), instinctively I believe there's difference between simulated rape and violent video games.

Violent video games are rather cathartic, and serve that need pretty well. Going around a fake city in a tank and blowing up every douchey car is just wholesome fun. But what does rape simulation appease? It's not sex, that's what porn is for.

2. Free speech

Normally I'm a blind attack-dog in favor of free speech. But here, no, I can't be. If free speech means anything more than "just let everyone talk," it has to have a purpose behind it -- such as letting different ideas being heard, or letting the truth be heard, then there has to be a some sorts of speech it encourages, and others it's agnostic to. I can't think of any case for free speech helped by defending a rape simulator.

Well said.
What we all need to read is this good book that teaches us in a precise, emotionless way of dealing with platenary defenses.

And if their consumer level stuff doesn't work your OS is "free as in worthless" and they'll be taking it back for a Windows machine. Sorry, No Sale.

Look at it from WalMart's point of view:

Your minimum wage clerk knows even less about tech than Joe.

The ARM netbook at $99 looks like just another overpriced toy - another gadget - and in a deep recession the toy doesn't sell very well.

It's going to be really, really, tough to make money on these things even - or perhaps especially - in deep discount retail.

Now imagine that you need to keep Linux printers and other peripherals on your shelves. They take up quite a lot of space. But they move very slowly.

This is not a good thing.

It's telling when the geek claims that the home user really only needs three apps - though which three apps is never quite clear.

But it makes for something less than a ringing endorsement of the 25,000 apps in his distro's repository.

The Windows user seems more alert to the possibilities. Bestsellers in Home and Hobbies

It is distant echo now.

But I remember what I was told when I first began shopping for a computer:

Don't begin with the hardware. Don't begin with the OS. Just think about you want to do with the machine. What you can do with the machine.

I have not read the article (par for the course here) but I think there is probably some confusion among the commenters regarding the difference between multi-threading programs and parallel algorithms. Database servers, asynchronous I/O, background tasks and web servers are all examples of multi-threaded applications, where each thread can run independently of every other thread with locks protecting access to shared objects. This is different from (and probably simpler than) parallel programs. Map-reduce is a great example of a parallel distributed algorithm, but it is only one parallel computing model: Multiple Instruction / Multiple Data (MIMD). Single Instruction / Multiple Data (SIMD) algorithms implemented on super-computers like Cray (more of a vector machine, but it's close enough to SIMD) and MasPar systems require different and far more complex algorithms. In addition, purpose-built supercomputers may have additional restrictions on their memory accesses, such as whether multiple CPUs can concurrently read or write from memory.

Of course, the Cray and Maspar systems are purpose-built machines, and, much like special-build processors have fallen in performance to general purpose CPUs, Cray and Maspar systems have fallen into disuse and virtual obscurity; therefore, one might argue that SIMD-type systems and their associated algorithms should be discounted. But, there is a large class of problems -- particularly sorting algorithms -- well suited to SIMD algorithms, so perhaps we shouldn't be so quick to dismiss them.

There is a book called An Introduction to Parallel Algorithms by Joseph JaJa (http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Parallel-Algorithms-Joseph-JaJa/dp/0201548569) that shows some of the complexities of developing truly parallel algorithms.

(Disclaimer: I own a copy of that book but otherwise have no financial interests in it.)

The fact that it seems so simple at first is where the problem starts. You had no trouble in your program. One program. That's a great start. Now do something non-trivial. Say, make something that simulates digital circuits-- and gates, or gates, not gates. Let them be wired up together. Accept an arbitrarily complex setup of digital logic gates. Have it simulate the outputs propagating to the inputs. And make it so that it expands across an arbitrary number of threads, and make it expand across an arbitrary number of processes, both on the same computer and on other computers on the same network.

There are some languages and approaches you could choose for such a project that will help you avoid the kinds of pitfalls that await you, and provide most or all of the infrastructure that you'd have to write yourself in other languages.

If you're interested in learning more about parallel programming, why it's hard, and what can go wrong, and how to make it easy, I suggest you read a book about Erlang. Then read a book about Scala.

The thing is, it looks easy at first, and it really is easy at first. Then you launch your application into production, and stuff goes real funny and it's nigh unto impossible to troubleshoot what's wrong. In the lab, it's always easy. With multithreaded/multiprocess/multi-node systems, you've got to work very very hard to make them mess up in the lab the same way they will in the real world. So it seems like not a big deal at first until you launch the stuff and have to support it running every day in crazy unpredictable conditions.

The fact that it seems so simple at first is where the problem starts. You had no trouble in your program. One program. That's a great start. Now do something non-trivial. Say, make something that simulates digital circuits-- and gates, or gates, not gates. Let them be wired up together. Accept an arbitrarily complex setup of digital logic gates. Have it simulate the outputs propagating to the inputs. And make it so that it expands across an arbitrary number of threads, and make it expand across an arbitrary number of processes, both on the same computer and on other computers on the same network.

There are some languages and approaches you could choose for such a project that will help you avoid the kinds of pitfalls that await you, and provide most or all of the infrastructure that you'd have to write yourself in other languages.

If you're interested in learning more about parallel programming, why it's hard, and what can go wrong, and how to make it easy, I suggest you read a book about Erlang. Then read a book about Scala.

The thing is, it looks easy at first, and it really is easy at first. Then you launch your application into production, and stuff goes real funny and it's nigh unto impossible to troubleshoot what's wrong. In the lab, it's always easy. With multithreaded/multiprocess/multi-node systems, you've got to work very very hard to make them mess up in the lab the same way they will in the real world. So it seems like not a big deal at first until you launch the stuff and have to support it running every day in crazy unpredictable conditions.

For those who haven't read it, this book is a GREAT read: A quarter Century of Unix by Peter H Salus Highly recommended, and once you've read it you'll suddenly understand why a lot of stuff is the way it is. Hat's off to the Best. Operating System. Ever.

the ineptitude of their management can be seen in the 108 hour week. anything over a 12 hour day is wasted, and you NEED 1 day off a week minimum to recharge the batteries, otherwise you just find ways to waste time on the job.

i've been there, i'm working 50 - 60 hour weeks and i achieve more now than i did in 90 hour weeks.

Indeed. Peopleware describes this situation, where developers are considered equivalent to burger flippers in this kind of situation. If there is no creative output to be made, then yes, working more time helps get more output(ie. more time flipping burgers, more burger output).

However, programming requires having a clear mind, otherwise your defect rate increases, thus increasing the total amount of effort that must be expended to complete in time.

Usually, at that point, poor managers will add additional staff, which only slows the project even more("Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later," see The Mythical Man-Month, as new staff needs to be brought up to speed on the new codebase, which takes time away from the currently exhausted developers.

The solutions in that case are to push back the shipping date, cut on features or cut on quality and cause their developers to burn out. Looks like we know which route they took.

Full disclosure: The links above are affiliate links.

the ineptitude of their management can be seen in the 108 hour week. anything over a 12 hour day is wasted, and you NEED 1 day off a week minimum to recharge the batteries, otherwise you just find ways to waste time on the job.

i've been there, i'm working 50 - 60 hour weeks and i achieve more now than i did in 90 hour weeks.

Indeed. Peopleware describes this situation, where developers are considered equivalent to burger flippers in this kind of situation. If there is no creative output to be made, then yes, working more time helps get more output(ie. more time flipping burgers, more burger output).

However, programming requires having a clear mind, otherwise your defect rate increases, thus increasing the total amount of effort that must be expended to complete in time.

Usually, at that point, poor managers will add additional staff, which only slows the project even more("Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later," see The Mythical Man-Month, as new staff needs to be brought up to speed on the new codebase, which takes time away from the currently exhausted developers.

The solutions in that case are to push back the shipping date, cut on features or cut on quality and cause their developers to burn out. Looks like we know which route they took.

Full disclosure: The links above are affiliate links.

Some colleges require you to live on campus for the first year. During that time, you'll have to "suck it up" and live with the networking restrictions. Or switch to a computer and OS they don't support, like MacOS 9 or CPM or RT-11 or whatever to ensure you have the privacy you need. Or just don't use the computer (or the phone) for anything you don't want anyone to know about. If the school requires you to run an OS that they support, then you have your answer. For more ideas along this vein, read Cory Doctorow's Little Brother:

http://www.amazon.com/Little-Brother-Cory-Doctorow/dp/0765319853

Some colleges are really worried about the infringing material on their networks and applying some rather heavy handed response. Yours seems to focusing on prevention rather than assuming the students are adults and capable of making their own choices and dealing with the consequences. There's a fine line between "policing" and "fascism". Your college crossed it, IMO. If they require the dorm resident advisors to search your room periodically for "contraband", then I think you have to find another college or a good lawyer to fight it.

Take physical notes with pen, paper, and notebook--it uses a different part of your brain than typing. I still can't actively listen to a lecture and type note. I have to take them by hand. A client told me about Lightscribe, a pen computer which he uses for meetings and downloads what he wrote to his computer later:

http://www.amazon.com/Livescribe-2GB-Pulse-Smartpen-APA-00002/dp/B001AAN4PW

Some colleges require you to live on campus for the first year. During that time, you'll have to "suck it up" and live with the networking restrictions. Or switch to a computer and OS they don't support, like MacOS 9 or CPM or RT-11 or whatever to ensure you have the privacy you need. Or just don't use the computer (or the phone) for anything you don't want anyone to know about. If the school requires you to run an OS that they support, then you have your answer. For more ideas along this vein, read Cory Doctorow's Little Brother:

http://www.amazon.com/Little-Brother-Cory-Doctorow/dp/0765319853

Some colleges are really worried about the infringing material on their networks and applying some rather heavy handed response. Yours seems to focusing on prevention rather than assuming the students are adults and capable of making their own choices and dealing with the consequences. There's a fine line between "policing" and "fascism". Your college crossed it, IMO. If they require the dorm resident advisors to search your room periodically for "contraband", then I think you have to find another college or a good lawyer to fight it.

Take physical notes with pen, paper, and notebook--it uses a different part of your brain than typing. I still can't actively listen to a lecture and type note. I have to take them by hand. A client told me about Lightscribe, a pen computer which he uses for meetings and downloads what he wrote to his computer later:

http://www.amazon.com/Livescribe-2GB-Pulse-Smartpen-APA-00002/dp/B001AAN4PW

This game is truly an amazing concept, and I don't minimize the difficulty of having such a large set of objects that interact with the game world in a meaningful fashion - indeed, I'd like to see something like this in a PS3 game.

However, I think these 20-Q games are also amazing: they are a small ball, running off IIRC an AAA battery or two, that plays a pretty good game of 20 questions. I've thought of some pretty weird things and it has gotten it right amazingly often (OK, I'll be fair: if I'm thinking "Airwolf" and it guesses "helicopter" I'll give it a pass). All that on a device that you can pick up in stores for $10.

The author of the article should study a Noble prize-winning work "Administrative Behavior".

There is nothing secret about human cognition. The fact that software engineering relies on human resources and not on binary logic is in no way a limitation. Many modern algorithms rely on heavily on probability and work with uncertainty. Herbert A. Simon built a solid framework for understanding human decision making process. This framework is just as solid as mathematical formulas behind computer science.

Hey we're really hurting on the economy, let's ban the idiots that dare run a successful business and bring needed tax revenue in!

The economic argument is a boneheaded tactical blunder.

It is the argument the tobacco company makes. The pornographer.

There is no business practice so corrupt and debased that hasn't been defended the same way.

The economic argument fails on the facts.

The Wii is the best selling console platform.

The Wii could all its M rated titles - and it would remain the best selling console platform. The most popular items in Wii. Updated hourly.

The ultra violent action game doesn't hold that strong a position even in the PC market. The most popular items in PC Games. Updated hourly.

Hey we're really hurting on the economy, let's ban the idiots that dare run a successful business and bring needed tax revenue in!

The economic argument is a boneheaded tactical blunder.

It is the argument the tobacco company makes. The pornographer.

There is no business practice so corrupt and debased that hasn't been defended the same way.

The economic argument fails on the facts.

The Wii is the best selling console platform.

The Wii could all its M rated titles - and it would remain the best selling console platform. The most popular items in Wii. Updated hourly.

The ultra violent action game doesn't hold that strong a position even in the PC market. The most popular items in PC Games. Updated hourly.

It is quite amazing to me that we have evolved the ability to react to things moving far faster than any remote situation that we would ever run into in nature. With modern nutrition the best of the best barely brake 20 mph for short distances, and fast predators are not that much faster.

I've always admired Gene Wolfe's defense of calvary in his science-fiction tetralogy The Book of the New Sun . In his vision of the far future, warring armies fight on horseback, but with beasts genetically engineered to be faster and tougher. The idea is that living creatures, that can heal, reproduce, and feed themselves by grazing on widely available grasses might be more reliable than machinery which needs fuel and spare parts.

I have felt your pain. I just got my used copy of Distributed Services with OpenAFS: for Enterprise and Education and it looks pretty awesome so far.

It's a textbook of explanations wrapped around a whole bunch of script(1) captures of them setting up ntp,dns,k5,ldap,openafs,samba, etc on Debian with Windows, Mac, Ubuntu clients. You can find the table of contents and an excerpt at the book's site: http://www.springer.com/computer/programming/book/978-3-540-36633-1

hth and Good Luck!

adric

"Just buy a Nokia N8x0. I am willing to bet you can pick up an n800 for well under $200. "

You're comparing apples with oranges? The Nokia N8x0 has a 4.1" screen. It's in a different class than a web tablet with a 12" LCD. The Nokia's competition is the similarly priced Apple Touch.

The Fujitsu T4010 is a better competitor. 12" LCD, 1.6ghz, ram upgradeable to 2gb, 60+ gb hard drive, touchscreen, 4 lbs, boots XP in 30 seconds. It's a few years old so you should be able to find one for $300.

Right now on Amazon you can get a PSP-3000 and 16GB Memory Stick for $6.60 less than the PSP Go. By the time the thing actually goes on sale, that gap could widen to something more considerable. The screen is smaller, the UMD drive is gone, the only real features you're getting are smallness (is that a feature or a bug when it comes to the PSP?) and Bluetooth. According to their presentation they're not planning anything exclusive to it software-wise. It's probably a good purchase if and only if you want to use your PSP as your primary music player (the old one was kinda huge for that, and didn't have Bluetooth control/output). Otherwise, no...

Right now on Amazon you can get a PSP-3000 and 16GB Memory Stick for $6.60 less than the PSP Go. By the time the thing actually goes on sale, that gap could widen to something more considerable. The screen is smaller, the UMD drive is gone, the only real features you're getting are smallness (is that a feature or a bug when it comes to the PSP?) and Bluetooth. According to their presentation they're not planning anything exclusive to it software-wise. It's probably a good purchase if and only if you want to use your PSP as your primary music player (the old one was kinda huge for that, and didn't have Bluetooth control/output). Otherwise, no...

http://www.amazon.com/RABBIT-VCR/dp/B001F87TWI :-P

Everyone in the house can watch you play Ultima V on your C64 or you can play old school VHS pr0n in EVERY ROOM!

So the argument seems sound although the example is wrong.

It is a very interesting point. Depending on what you mean by "the argument", it's not sound. Popular culture is way behind the science on this.

Check out Pinker's "The Language Instinct": http://www.amazon.com/Language-Instinct-Steven-Pinker/dp/0060976519. Whether or not you accept his whole thesis, it's undeniable that the "Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis" is dead and has been for 75 years.

I find this long-lived and pervasive myth totally fascinating... It's a nexus of so many cultural issues; like BEV, native-only laws, exoticism, Esperanto, and the very notion of "improving" human language.

Although it's not my domain, I know Pinker's (and Chomsky's) work and I don't disagree. Sorry if I was not clear enough but what I meant was actually the contrary that you seem to have understood. That is, if in Spanish there are many names for shrimps, it's because there are lots of different shrimps in Spanish waters and Spanish people eat a lot of shrimps. Likewise for the Walloon example. And, of course, I was referring just to vocabulary, not to grammar and such.

As for the programming languages argument that I think was sound I mean that it's best if a programming language is designed to reflect better the environment that it's supposed to handle. That's the reason why I don't mind changing or even learning another language if it's more suited for the task at hand.

And sorry about the anonymous post. I just switched browsers so I'm still clumsy.

So the argument seems sound although the example is wrong.

It is a very interesting point. Depending on what you mean by "the argument", it's not sound. Popular culture is way behind the science on this.

Check out Pinker's "The Language Instinct": http://www.amazon.com/Language-Instinct-Steven-Pinker/dp/0060976519. Whether or not you accept his whole thesis, it's undeniable that the "Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis" is dead and has been for 75 years.

I find this long-lived and pervasive myth totally fascinating... It's a nexus of so many cultural issues; like BEV, native-only laws, exoticism, Esperanto, and the very notion of "improving" human language.

Although it's not my domain, I know Pinker's (and Chomsky's) work and I don't disagree. Sorry if I was not clear enough but what I meant was actually the contrary that you seem to have understood. That is, if in Spanish there are many names for shrimps, it's because there are lots of different shrimps in Spanish waters and Spanish people eat a lot of shrimps. Likewise for the Walloon example. And, of course I was referring just to vocabulary, not to grammar and such.

As for the programming languages argument that I think was sound I mean that it's best if a programming language is designed to reflect better the environment that it's supposed to handle. That's the reason why I don't mind changing or even learning another language if it's more suited for the task at hand.