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Am I the only person who read that as "Microsoft Bugs Rare"?

No, Bill Gates would read it the same way.

A mite offtopic, but food for thought anyway: [cantrip.org]

.... *wondering why MS keeps adding useless functionality to SP's rather than fixing the millions of existing bugs in their GUI interface that sits on top of a piss poor OS* ....

"Gates: It turns out Luddites don't know how to use software properly, so you should look into that. -- The reason we come up with new versions is not to fix bugs. It's absolutely not. It's the stupidest reason to buy a new version I ever heard. When we do a new version we put in lots of new things that people are asking for. And so, in no sense, is stability a reason to move to a new version. It's never a reason."
REF: FOCUS Magazine (nr.43) Excerpt Here

Being a Unix admin just requires a higher level of understanding what's going on in your computer, so, Unix admins are usually smarter than their Windows colleagues. Exceptions may occur.

In a way, I agree that teenagers need time to socialize, but I disagree that school is the time or place for it. Public schooling is 7 hours of being talked at, with 3 minutes passing period. Theres no time to talk and interact with your friends like you want to, and there should be. A serious look at how teaching is needed. Lecturing is not equal to learning. I think we could get away with less school hours, and give more time to children for their own social interactions, like playing street football with the kid down the street that doesn't go to school with you for some reason.

I used to think that homeschooling was only for religious wierdos, and by and large, it still is. But now I think of it more as an act of rebellion against the instutional education system. Public schools really dislike this stuff happening right under their noses. Gatto has more to say on the failings and realities of public education; if you liked the article google for more on gatto. Whether you dislike homeschooling or not is not the question; the number of dissaffected students graduating with no hope of self-actualization demands the question, "What are we going to do to fix it?" Or perhaps, this was a semi elaborate trolling.

Many parents homeschool for regligious reasons, but no state requires homeschoolers to join a church or profess the Christian faith. (And you don't pass or fail the SAT, either.) Secular homeschoolers will easily find plenty of other people who aren't just putting their kids through religious indoctrination. For the last ten years the most growth among homeschoolers has been non-religious families.

The best reason to homeschool your kids: to be closer as a family. Too many parents don't know their kids, don't know what their kids are doing, and leave almost every aspect of their child's education and growth to total strangers. Nothing can replace spending time with your kids every day. Numerous studies, not to mention common sense, show that kids who spend time with their parents and are part of a family do better in life.

The socialization issue is really a non-issue; people with don't like homeschooling for one reason or another always trot that out. Spend some time in a public school and say with a straight face that most of those kids show healthy socialization. Do you really want your kids to spend 12 years in an artificial, opressive, regimented, and cruel environment that--at best--prepares them to do what they are told, to blindly accept arbitrary authority, and to jump whenever a bell rings?

Some homeschooled kids are spelling bee geeks. Some are jocks. Some are social butterflies. To me they mostly seem like well-adjusted versions of schooled kids, minus the toxic amounts of peer pressure and grade anxiety the schooled kids carry around. And I don't have to wait for the 10th grade skills test to find out what my kids know or don't know.

The "professional teacher" argument is another red herring favored by teachers and "education professionals." Kids know how to learn on their own. Almost everyone learns the single hardest skill they will ever learn--speaking their own language--with no professional help at all. Believe in your child, and yourself. If you don't know how to teach your child something you can easily find someone who can. Many homeschooled kids we know attend some classes at private schools or community college, to learn things like languages or music that are best taught by an expert.

I have three homeschooled kids and my wife and I are involved in various city and state groups of homeschoolers. Social activities dominate the calendar: skating, teen dances and activities, camping, museum trips, 4-H, soccer and other sports, various clubs and study groups, etc. etc. Lots of kids have part-time jobs. Most will go to college: homeschooling conventions and curriculum fairs attract recruiters from Ivy-league schools now, and homeschoolers have higher college admission rates than public school kids.

Don't accept random opinions from slashdotters to decide something so important. Find a local group of like-minded (secular or religious) homeschoolers and attend some activities. Read about it: John Holt's two excellent books How Children Fail and How Children Learn will open your eyes.

Microsoft never made the statement that "this product is bug free, and has no security concerns whatsoever"

Well, not quite, anyway

There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed.

I have my own compendium of significant omissions at http://cantrip.org/coding-standard.html.

Microsoft Code Has No Bugs

It might hamper your ability to properly indoctrinate.

You can find a lot of his stuff here, and I would recommend starting with The Six-Lesson Schoolteacher.

"There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed."
-- Bill Gates, 1995 interview in Focus Magazine (Germany)

The rest of the article is just as damning.

Like he did with the Internet, Gates just ignored bugs for as long as possible. Once they finally became a threat, he suddenly cares. I fully expect him to act against bugs with the same concern for interoperation, user support, and openness that he has with all Microsoft products which use the internet.

Anyway, people only complain about bugs to show how cool they are, not because bugs cause any real problems.

So this Dilbertism is just promotng the bonding of people with their fellow (wo)man who experiences crash after crash of their computer as well.

<vent>Microsoft is really doing society a favor by making flawed products - they promote shared experiences so that more people can relate to one another!</vent>

Be careful, you might reveal public schooling's secret. People point to homeschooling as a perfect ground for indoctrination, but they never think what public schools are used for. Most public schools and their teachers are so far to the left its amazing we're not further down the socialist ladder than we already are.

While blindly upgrading seems to be how most IT people respond, Bill Gates seems to disagree with that assesment about that being his customers' only choice. He acknowledges that there can be buggy products, but that bugs won't be fixed without bug-reports filed. If what he says about consumer behaivor is true, his business decisions seem fairly reasonable to me.

Many users of Microsoft products seem to take the approach of upgrade to the latest (and "greatest") whenever possible. Usefulness of features is irrelevant, it's quantity that counts! Odds are, significant bugs will be fixed by the next verision. That makes it a worthy gamble for my upgrade dollar! (Especially if I warez it.)

It is an interesting question that I won't address as to whether Microsoft causes or responds to this phenomenon in consumers of its products. Do users of Open Source products regularly file bug reports and only upgrade to fix these relevant bugs or to add previously desired features? (Hell no, if it's free, then gimme gimme!)

What I am saying, in light of every Bill Gates interview I have ever read, is that maybe Outlook 98 with service pack 1 can be considered the "latest version" of Outlook 98 for Macintosh. Perhaps Outlook 2000 (or was it 2001?) for the Mac is considered distinct in this circumstance.

There are many interviews of Bill Gates available where he discusses bugs in MS products. Check out Bill's Homepage and read some of his thoughts. In various entries you can find him addressing the subject in his own words. Or try, e.g. a less sympathetic source if you need to stoke your Anti-Gates dogma while he tells you that you have other choices than "to pay cash money and upgrade" to their current flagship product.

Like any good capitalist, his corporation is guided by the actions of the marketplace. Perhaps the last version of their product is too "big" and bloated to fit your needs, you are turned off by all of its nasty bugs... when most of the paying consumers respond by grabbing their ankles and asking for more features, more...

Okay, so I took the "shaft" metaphor too far. I blame my lack of sleep for lack of judgement. But I did stay pretty close to your points. Hopefully your eyes were opened. In exchange, I'll close mine.
goodnight

The nature of bugs (especially MS bugs) is that not everyone experiences the same bugs. Just because you haven't seen it doesn't mean others haven't. I've seen documents that crash Word on some computers and not on others, even with the same version of Word. And if it wasn't an SQL Server bug, why would changing from one version of SQL Server to another affect it? Microsoft acknowledged the bug existed but said it didn't appear at "other customer sites" (all other sites? the majority of them?), downplaying its significance. As Bill Gates said, "There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed."

Linux and Windows that is. A lot of the astronauts have win95 laptops, but
Linux Journal has an article about two programs developed and run for the ISS on Linux.

Check Linux-Equipped Astronauts Project for more info and a way to help.

I'm sure this will interest someone

This article is all about using Linux on the ISS.

A link from that page goes to LEAP - The linux equiped astronaut project. Essentially aiming to save the poor astronauts from Windows, by porting all the useful applications. (The OS has since changed to Solaris, but there's still no reason not to push an open OS)

From the Yahoo article: "... Gates told Time magazine in November: ``The only thing we know for sure would be bad for consumers is ... anything that made it so that when people buy Windows they don't know what's in it.'' "
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the problem with proprietary software that people don't know what's in it?! If the Windows source was open, people could begin to fix a few of the bugs that have been around since the earliest versions of Windows, or better yet, improve WINE to the point that we don't have to use Windows at all.
- Chris

I read an intreview with Gates himself in a magazine a little while ago.
The interviewer started to ask why there were so many bugs in the new version of Office.
Quoth Mr. Gates: No! There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed.

You can read the rest here

Makes me sick.
But, when did any figurehead EVER not lie in the face of the truth?

PPoE

Ah, but MS would never admit to quote bug fixes end quote. Fixing bugs doesn't sell software. See: Microsoft code has no bugs

He then proceeds to attack the industry for "abusing" its customers. This is also nonsense. The computer industry has been improving its product faster than any other industry in the history of the universe. So technologically, this is certainly not true.

Second, according to the Bad Software Web site:

• "By the end of 1995, computers and software ranked #8 in the Top 10 list for complaints to the Better Business Bureau, outdoing used car dealers. As sales increased, complaints increased. In 1996, computer-related complaints rose to #7 on the list."
• "The software industry has been one of the worst for leaving callers on hold. A small study by Service Management International indicated that software companies leave callers on hold longer than any other industry studied, worse than government agencies, computer hardware companies, airlines, banks, utility companies, and others."

He claims that the system was copied from the Prussian compulsory education system from the early 19th century. He further claims that a specific design goal of that system was the systematic elimination of 1) individuality, 2) curiosity, 3) independance, and many other characteristics that most people would consider desireable qualities. The goal that this was supposed to achieve was a manageable populace.

Perhaps this is why the powers that be strive to identify the flaw in the children or the children's parents, rather than the flaw in the system. That is, they have no desire to "fix" the system since they don't see the system as broken. It is performing the desired function. This notion certainly casts a different light on the behavior of administrators who allow bullying of "non-conforming" students. The bullies are just one means by which "the nail that stands above the rest" might be "hammered down."

I am somewhat reluctant to invoke Gatto's name in this discussion. Most of the references to Gatto seem to come from conspiracy nuts. And, I haven't checked ANY of his assertions for historical accuracy. But I have to ask myself, "What if he's right?". So just in case he is right and assuming that the slashdotters will check the facts before making up their minds, and with the forgoeing disclaimer, if anyone is interested in reading more, here's an interesting article . And he's published a book: "Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling" which is available from Amazon.com.

Good luck to us all.

See for yourself.

- Nathan Myers

See for yourself.

- Nathan Myers