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Agreed, Windows 7 is fine and only has some minor issues I have heard tell of here regarding a hosts file issue and some things said about its firewall versus the older versions of Windows firewall and filtering design. In regards to rescuecom being noted, here however? After my research of them online, it appears that you really have to realize that RESCUECOM is a company in trouble and is desperate for publicity of any kind. Even the bad kind:

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=9&threadID=173106&start=0

and

http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&id=561974

and

http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0683.html

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2200654

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-11189-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2189403

and

http://www.wtvh.com/news/local/13511157.html

and

http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:FOl9N09jyNQJ:0-www.msnbc.msn.com.millennium.unicatt.it/id/22546106/+%22David+Milman%22+and+%22RESCUECOM%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=86&gl=us

Their owner David Milman rips off his own employees and has run afoul of the law in the wtvh.com link by ripping off customers as well. He tried to sue google and that was just for publicity to get his name in the papers to try to drum up more business.

Stay away from rescuecom.

Agreed, Windows 7 is fine and only has some minor issues I have heard tell of here regarding a hosts file issue and some things said about its firewall versus the older versions of Windows firewall and filtering design. In regards to rescuecom being noted, here however? After my research of them online, it appears that you really have to realize that RESCUECOM is a company in trouble and is desperate for publicity of any kind. Even the bad kind:

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=9&threadID=173106&start=0

and

http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&id=561974

and

http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0683.html

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2200654

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-11189-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2189403

and

http://www.wtvh.com/news/local/13511157.html

and

http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:FOl9N09jyNQJ:0-www.msnbc.msn.com.millennium.unicatt.it/id/22546106/+%22David+Milman%22+and+%22RESCUECOM%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=86&gl=us

Their owner David Milman rips off his own employees and has run afoul of the law in the wtvh.com link by ripping off customers as well. He tried to sue google and that was just for publicity to get his name in the papers to try to drum up more business.

Stay away from rescuecom.

Agreed, Windows 7 is fine and only has some minor issues I have heard tell of here regarding a hosts file issue and some things said about its firewall versus the older versions of Windows firewall and filtering design. In regards to rescuecom being noted, here however? After my research of them online, it appears that you really have to realize that RESCUECOM is a company in trouble and is desperate for publicity of any kind. Even the bad kind:

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=9&threadID=173106&start=0

and

http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&id=561974

and

http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0683.html

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2200654

and

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-11189-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=188328&messageID=2189403

and

http://www.wtvh.com/news/local/13511157.html

and

http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:FOl9N09jyNQJ:0-www.msnbc.msn.com.millennium.unicatt.it/id/22546106/+%22David+Milman%22+and+%22RESCUECOM%22&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=86&gl=us

Their owner David Milman rips off his own employees and has run afoul of the law in the wtvh.com link by ripping off customers as well. He tried to sue google and that was just for publicity to get his name in the papers to try to drum up more business.

Stay away from rescuecom.

> > > > > > > Scilon Troll: "Hey, it's no sillier than $mainstreamReligion"
> > > > > > Fundamentalist Religious Dupe #1: "No it's not, our $mainstreamReligion is holy, space aliens are weird."
> > > > > Fundamentalist Atheist Dupe #1: "You silly $mainstreamReligionist! Both your belief systems are bogus!"
> > > > Moderate Atheist Dupe #2: "Yeah, all religions are the same."
> > Trolly Atheist Dupe #3: "Yeah, we should tax 'em all!"
> Paranoid Religious Dupe #3: "No way, I'd rather just let the Scilons keep on doing what they're doing... Relijus Freedumb!!!"

And then the Scilon troll reports back to the mothership: "False equivalence has been established. Everyone's bickering about whose religion is weirder, and all the moderates have agreed that our beliefs are as legitimate a religion as everyone else. Now we can claim religious persecution when speaking to religious audiences, and that we're being attacked by fanatics when we speak to non-religious audiences. Mission Accomplished!"

This isn't about whether Jesus or Xenu or the Flying Spaghetti Monster is weirder. Or about the relative atrocities of Crusades, the RPF, or not serving meatballs with spaghetti.

It's about one specific organization, and its track record of using litigation as a tool to silence dissent. Sonny Bono, Scientologist and Senator, not only supported the Mickey Mouse Protection Act which extended copyright terms to 75 years plus the life of the creator, he got the damn bill named after itself. When the DMCA was passed in 1998, guess was among the first first lawsuit under its provisions just a few months later? Hint: It's the same organization that attacked Slashdot itself in 2001 and Google in 2002.

It's not about space aliens, UFOs shaped like DC-8s, or volcanoes. It's about one organization's multi-decade track record of attacks on the Internet. That - and nothing else - is why it's News For Nerds, and Stuff That Matters.

Of course, by the time I've typed this, we'll have already gone through 100 posts of "No, your religion is weirder!" "No, all religions are silly", and Scilon trolls sitting back and smiling gleefully as they watch yet another message board thread fall for the distraction tactic, and this post all pointless.

(Yep, the Cult has already compared it to the Spanish Inquisition. For something nobody's supposed to expect, I'm not at all surprised the cult spokesperson has already started to draw comparisons to the Spanish Inquisition, especially in a historically-Catholic country, and right on time, two attempts to distract us by advocating taxation of the Catholic Church shows up here...)

But it felt good to rant for a bit.

While its true that the UAC stuff is way over done, there is a way to calm it down. The following page shows how to turn off UAC for certain apps that you always use, that way when it does pop-up you may not auto-click "ok".

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/window-on-windows/?p=635

That's your opinion and just because you have one doesn't make it the correct choice.

In fact, I do remember how the web was before CMS came around. I remember people handing me MS Word documents saved as 150KB+ HTML files. Or having to clean up sections of the corporate site where someone cut-and-pasted from MS Word into the site.

Heck, people made a living off writing software just to clean up the mess. Eliminate clutter in Microsoft Word generated HTML files with the Office 2000 HTML Filter

And to Sopssa, He fails to realize that Drupal can be hardened and has the benefit of several years of testing and user feedback unlike a custom system.

I clearly remember the days before CMS and it looked like this.

<html xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40" > <head > <meta name=Title content="This is normal unformatted text" > <meta name=Keywords content="" > <meta http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=utf-8" > <meta name=ProgId content=Word.Document > <meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 10" > <meta name=Originator content="Microsoft Word 10" > <link rel=File-List href="WordtoHTML_files/filelist.xml" > <title >This is normal unformatted text </title > <!--[if gte mso 9] > <xml > <o:DocumentProperties > <o:Author >Elizabeth Pyatt </o:Author > <o:Template >Normal </o:Template > <o:LastAuthor >Elizabeth Pyatt </o:LastAuthor > <o:Revision >1 </o:Revision > <o:TotalTime >1 </o:TotalTime > <o:Created >2003-10-22T19:05:00Z </o:Created > <o:LastSaved >2003-10-22T19:06:00Z </o:LastSaved > <o:Pages >1 </o:Pages > <o:Company >ETS </o:Company > <o:Lines >1 </o:Lines > <o:Paragraphs >1 </o:Paragraphs > <o:Version >10.2418 </o:Version > </o:DocumentProperties > </xml > <![endif]-- > <!--[if gte mso 9] > <xml > <w:WordDocument > <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery >0 </w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery > <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery >0 </w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery > <w:UseMarginsForDrawingGridOrigin/ > <w:Compatibility > <w:SpaceForUL/ > <w:BalanceSingleByteDoubleByteWidth/ > <w:DoNotLeaveBackslashAlone/ > <w:ULTrailSpace/ > <w:DoNotExpandShiftReturn/ > <w:AdjustLineHeightInTable/ > </w:Compatibility > </w:WordDocument > </xml > <![endif]-- > <style > <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Times New Roman"; panose-1:0 2 2 6 3 5 4 5 2 3; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:50331648 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Arial; panose-1:0 2 11 6 4 2 2 2 2 2; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:50331648 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Palatino; panose-1:0 2 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:50331648 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Palatino;} h3 {mso-style-next:Normal; margin-top:12.0pt; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:3.0pt; margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; page-break-after:avoid; mso-outline-level:3; font-size:13.0pt; font-family:Helvetica;} p.MsoBodyText, li.M

Sorry, I should have called it a "special SATA data+power" port. After a google search, I found a picture here of the connector on the enclosure for the Xbox 360 drive. It looks more durable than a standard SATA connection so I would say that it is more comparable with eSATA(which does not include power). Also, a standard SATA drive will have both the SATA power and data connectors in the same formation, but they are still technically 2 connectors.

Three things you could have done. First, you can install the Office 2007 compatibility pack all the back till Office XP running on Windows 2000 SP4.
Second:
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/msoffice/?p=135

Using the Compatibility Checker

Before you send a document that was created with an Office 2007 program to someone who’s using a previous version of Office, you can run the Compatibility Checker, which is built into Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007. It will identify any features or formatting you’ve used that won’t be recognized by older versions of Office.

A list of the incompatible content will be displayed, and you’ll be advised that such content may not be fully editable in the previous version. The Compatibility Checker runs automatically when you save a file in the old format.

Three: You could have used the free Office 2007 Word Viewer.

Studies by researchers from Computing Research Association (CRA), Duke, Georgetown University, Harvard, RAND Corporation, Rochester Institute of Technology, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Stanford, UC Davis, UPenn Wharton School, and Urban Institute, have reported that we have continually been producing far more US citizen STEM (science, tech, engineering, math) workers than we've been employing in these fields.

Examination of employment data and projections from BLS when compared with NCES (US Dept. of Education) records of degrees earned by US citizens confirms these findings.

"As late as 1987, 60K graduates were competing for about 25K open positions, according to Janet Ruhl, author of _The Programmers Survival Guide_" --- Margie Wylie _CNET_ "The skills shortage that isn't: When the rising tide floats employees' boats, employers proclaim disaster" http://news.com.com/2010-1077-281060.html http://www.kermitrose.com/econ1998.html#19980204

In testimony to the House Science and Technology Committee, Harold Salzman reported that we've been producing as many as 3 times the numbers of STEM workers as we've been employing in these fields. http://democrats.science.house.gov/Media/File/Commdocs/hearings/2007/tech/06nov/salzman_testimony.pdf http://www.kermitrose.com/econ200711.html#Runnerup2007

There are plenty of real world case studies that prove your personal experience to not be the general case for Java:

http://www.sun.com/customers/index.xml?soln=31a8487e-0f60-11da-99bc-080020a9ed93&page=1&sort=date&asc=false

This case study is particularly relevant:

http://www.sun.com/customers/servers/transact_tools.xml

This page is rather out of date, but shows that Java was performing well even in 2003:

http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=8142

Java has become the number one most prominent language in business with good reason. It's flexible, and can cater to pretty much anything you throw at it if you understand the tools and technologies available, and which ones are suited to your particular problem. Garbage collection really just comes down to having an understanding of the way the garbage collector works and being able to develop with that in mind. See here for an example discussion of just that from back in 2003:

http://java.sys-con.com/node/37613

here's a slightly more recent (but still relatively dated in technology terms) article:

http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-6108296.html

The problem Java and .NET seem to face is people approaching the language, from say a C++ background and not understanding what's different about it and how it works to be able to implement a solution in it to an equivalent level of their C++ application. This does not mean experienced Java/.NET programmers cannot do just that though- they can, and do. Again, it's really a question of competence in a particular skillset rather than inherent flaws in a particular technology.

what about Buffalo? Buffalo helped fund dd-wrt and encourages (or at least used to encourage) the use.of dd-wrt.

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/wireless/?p=161

I read the linked article, and don't see anything exciting. How is this any different from the shared libraries that have been used in the Unix world for 23 years? "Private assemblies" can be achieved with rpath or a simple manipulation of LD_LOAD_PATH (see Mozilla). And what does the asymmetric cryptography buy you over simply using the appropriate soname?

You can also try disabling any unnecessary background tasks and reniceing up FF. Responsiveness is a priority on the desktop.

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/opensource/?p=140

...you can learn WHY you don't want that piece of crap on your pc anyway...

The single wheel on the U3-X is made up of many tiny motor-controlled wheels, packed inside the bigger wheel, allowing the device to swerve in any direction.

A wheel made of up of smaller wheels is one of the classic bad ideas of robotics. Back in the 1980s, when robot motion planning software barely worked, many mobile robots were "holonomic" or "omni-drive": they could move in any direction without turning first. One of the popular geometries was three big wheels on axes 120 degrees apart (that robot is in a display case in the lobby of the computer science building at Stanford), with each big wheel composed of little wheels around the rim. This mechanism can execute any rotation or translation.

The problem is that the little wheels only work on hard, flat terrain. Shag rugs are a problem. Grass, dirt, and mud, no way.

Just put a card in the spokes. Yea, it's nerdy, but so is the car.

http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/bto/20090918/NISSAN_EV6.jpg

why not take it further and make the whole thing out of cardboard

http://i.techrepublic.com.com/gallery/57197-500-375.jpg

"a casual windows user will get upset pretty fast with the default interface of OOo and will drop it"

For the life of me, I don't ever see that 'problem'. I have sat msOffice users down in front of Open Office and they can't tell the difference.

"The main problem of FOSS is that there's no real "Software Management" structure that tell developers how to comunicate with the users"

What are you on about. When was it ever that the average 'Windows User' got to communicate with the developers. Contrast that with the FOSS equivalent where you contact the developers on the various forums. And in most cases get the problem dealt with - directly by the developers.

"Comercial documentation is never made by the developers: Always are done by a team of users and testers .. That's why they centralize everything in a manual (physical or electronic). FOSS don't"

'Comercial documentation' is a long running joke in the industry ..
--

PHB: "You'll have to have all the documentation written by next week so we can ship it when the software is done."

Tina :"How can I write instructions for something that doesn't exist yet?"

PHB: "You'll have to make logical guesses."

Tina: "If you press any key your computer will lock up. If you call our Tech. Support, we'll blame Microsoft."

The whole concept of tabs, in the first place, was that of a tabbed folder, like a 3-ring binder with those little plastic tabs so you can find your place. That was the visual "metaphor" that was being followed. By visually detaching the tabs from the pages they control, the metaphor is broken, and the eye does not follow as naturally from the page to the tab, or vice versa.

Please remember that there are reasons for both ways and that you are debating which is less wrong. Not which is right. The tabs attaching to the toolbar is supposed to show that the buttons effect that particular tab which is also a very important thing to represent in the gui. Ideally, the tabs should be on the very top of the window like Opera and now Chrome.

Or alternatively you can use abstract PC for the tab connecting to both effect so no one is happy. :)

You mean something like SMART ? More information on it is available here also....

"Don't be Evil"

I wish people would stop propagating such silly misinformation. It read more like "Don't Panic" and it was never a motto, just a note poorly scribbled on a towel that was used as a replacement air filter for the first Google Server.

http://www.pendrivelinux.com/

Or, for Windows XP:

http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-22_11-5928902.html

Give the higher ups a simple answer too: SQL Server 2000 Mainstream Support has ended.

No one said Linux is "bulletproof". Don't try to change the topic.

TFA is saying that the closed-source software costs more when operating costs are included in the total price tag. How much does industry pay for malware protection, virus protection, trojan protection, downtime from infection, and loss of productivity as a result of closed-source software? Those costs are relevant to businesses and should be considered.

What the hell does 'closed-source' software have to do with malware and all things you listed? Those depend more on popularity than FOSS or not. For example, check FireFox 'infected' with spyware http://i.d.com.com/i/dl/media/dlimage/14/92/50/149250_large.jpeg

Debian servers attacked http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1000000189,39118062,00.htm

"This is a very unfortunate incident to report about. Some Debian servers were found to have been compromised in the last 24 hours," the posting read.

Attackers compromised four servers, including those responsible for maintaining the project's bug tracking system, mailing lists, Web, Common Versioning System (CVS), security downloads and others.

RedHat/Fedora itself being attacked http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/150212/hackers_crack_into_red_hat.html

The last two examples are almost the equivalent of Windows Update being attacked and distributing malware, which hasn't happened (yet).

How can you claim that 'closed-source software' is the cause of all the ills you mentioned?

I hope these notebooks come with three or four spare motherboards. Judging by their previous track record, that is what it takes to keep their notebooks running beyond the warranty.

http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=101&threadID=243038&start=0
http://www.techspot.com/vb/all/windows/t-71394-Acer-5101-keyboard-usb-and-touchpad-are-dead.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/51337-35-keyboard-mouse-work-vista-login-screen
Google it, tons more...

Seems Acer preferred playing their customers along until the warranty ran out, then charged them for a new motherboard (that didn't fix the problem in most cases) rather then admit they had a pattern failure.

I don't care WHAT kind of product they have, from a purely moralistic point of view, I'll take my business elsewhere.

Here you go.. Any questions?

If he can't read it then he can't read it. Of course he might report the procedure incomplete because of file encryption and the judge might look at it with skepticism.

However, I have seen several replies about obfuscating the files in some way and your suggesting encryption. The problem is that having the files in the computer in and of itself isn't against the law or against what the lawsuit is about. what is at question is whether or not the files were being offered to anyone else and whether or not anyone else got them (distribution and copying outside of fair use). Your not really going to be able to share files that are encrypted unless you decrypt them or the partition they are on first. No one looking for Britney Spears latest hits will be looking for .doc or .ffm or .whatever files, they will be looking for a known file type by extention so they can use it.

Now here is where the problem with these overly complex schemes come up. If your using true crypt to hide a sharing folder/partition, there will be markers in the file sharing software pointing to the directory and flags will be raised when everything is encrypted and the forensics software can't access it. If you download to a specific folder and then move it to another or change the file extension, there is/could be a good chance that a deleted file will remain in either meta data on the file system or it's actual content would remain as the file is rewritten from memory. I would hope that people know by now that a deleted file isn't actually deleted and secure erasing becomes more difficult with large drives and Logical Block addressing where the firmware on the drive controller interprets the file positions and acts as a middleman to the operating system (some of which has been addressed with native 48bit addressing in the IDE controllers). Most modern multiuser file system will also load a file into memory from the dive and instead of appending the existing information,>/a> it actually rewrite the file to another location and mark the old file as deleted.

But to make obfuscating the files more complex, when you down load something to your encrypted location, the file doesn't directly go there. it goes to a temporary location to be reassembled first then copied over to the correct location. This could leave remnants of the files on the disk directly and/or possibly in the swap file that could be seen later with the correct tools. There for a while, people were able to pull credit card information entered into web browsers for online shopping from swap files on computers even after a couple of reboots. Also, the code for the true crypt could be stored in the swap file too and with the right tools, access and used to decode your super secrete partitions.

Here is a brief article describing some of the places you should look to cover your ass with if your that concerned. Keep in mind that many applications keep their own cache which can expose information on it's own outside of the ones mentioned. Most P2P software will have a cache of torrents being served, it may also keep a history of them that can come back to bite you. Normally people won't have the means to be this thorough but the judge required a forensic examination buy the experts of the RIAA's choice which pretty much assures you that they will go that far considering the other lengths they have went to.

MS has been such a problem by making unrefusable offers, that it's part of common culture. Making fun of it was probably a factor in a former political cartoon itself getting an offer it couldn't refuse and ending up under the control of MS' own competitor to Salon. A Gates-style "buy out" is a concept of its own.

... Their owners sell them because there's a chance their company will fail and they'll go under...

That's exactly the point repeated throughout this topic by many people. But you left off the reason: the small company will likely go under because it has been targeted by Megacorp, for a small business Microsoft is the kiss of death. Besides, advocating use of MS products at this late date is to knowingly advocate bleeding money from US workers. How many have to be fired to pay for the "upgrades", which in turn pay for the "buyouts"?

My favorite was Bubba by OsaSoft - here is a writeup with images - and apparently Mr. Gates didn't like being made fun of. You can even download it and run it on all versions of windows (written in VB v.3) linux in wine :D it is quite humorous.

http://www.bricsys.com/en_INTL/bricscad/features.jsp

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/

http://www.touchcad.com/tc3features.html

http://www.touchcad.com/tc3news351.html

See 3/4 of the way down on this for OpenGL rendering
http://www.touchcad.com/tc3news35.html

Possibly dated review:

http://software.techrepublic.com.com/abstract.aspx?docid=599221

This one:

ProgeCAD, is kinda interesting. It has a layer management system that is different from but kinda similar to ACAD. I tried it last year, but then it timed out on me. It's free for academic use, otherwise, starts about $250 depending on the version, IIRC. It's one of those that seems to be an ACAD knock-off, but kinda updated or less crufted than ACAD 2007/2008 maybe due to a cleaner, newer codebase (as opposed to, say, accumulating decades of in-fighting over code functions, (my ACAD course instructor in 07 said ACAD))

http://www.progecad.co.uk/Downloads/

Also, consider ViaCAD

http://www.punchcad.com/products/viacad2d3d.htm

Their prices are pretty good, and if you're not needing the overkill of ACAD and not working with clients who DEMAND ACAD, and who live with DXF/ACIS formats that contain the info, then why get addicted to a product that costs a fortune to use legitimately. You have rake in some serious dough to justify paying $4k+ on software which can take years to get proficient with. ViaCAD is GREAT for me for lofting/surfacing & solids-making.

Right now, the ship design industry (maybe, based on the economy now, compared to last year) is short on designers/drafters who are GOOD at CAD. If you're designing real or model boats for sale as kits (or ships & boats to be built) check out the combination of delftship and Punch ViaCAD...

Also, see boatdesign.net

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/design-software/

and...

http://www.polycad.co.uk/links.htm

GOOD LUCK!

I was going to ask you for a reference to this story but thought I'd give Google a try first:

A short summary: http://www.boingboing.net/2007/02/20/teen-couple-who-phot.html
The summary also contains a link to a more authoritive source: http://news.com.com/Police+blotter+Teens+prosecuted+for+racy+photos/2100-1030_3-6157857.html
And a link to the legal opinion, to see for yourself: http://politechbot.com/docs/child.porn.laws.apply.to.minors.020807.html

I'm amazed this actually seems to be a TRUE story. Not even the Mythbusters could have proven that myth, yet it's true!

I for one have a problem with our government documents and processes being hosted by a private company. At least Microsoft just sells software.

What is the difference between buying Microsoft Office to store documents on your PC, and buying a Google Appliance to store documents on your PC (or file server)?

At least MS just sells software, but at most they have a track record of forcibly pushing out upgrades to software that make backwards compatibility a pain and expensive, where Google does not.
MS also has a history of holding data hostage where Google does not.

I'd rather trust my data to a Google appliance server in my house, than trust it to MS office.

Signal-To-Noise

If only there were a few million people out there willing to filter through this stuff and decide what was good and what wasn't.

Yeah, you're right, blogging will never take off.

There are half as many Root Hubs as their are devices. Well one Root Hub says it supports 6 devices. Now I thought that 1 hub was limited to 500mA. But I may have a conflict somewhere too. I have a lot of devices and my machine is 5 years old. But low and behold you are right after reading what you say, every device should be 500mA on a computer since they are self powered. The ones that aren't self power I was guessing have to share 500mA. I guess the point being that it will negotiate 500mA with a half charged battery and charge up but not with one that is almost dead but can still manage to place a call for a short time. It also cannot take a charge and negotiate a bluetooth connection at the same time. I don't know if that is a USB conflict or the way it is designed. The battery charger made by Motorola will charge the phone when it is stone dead so I still don't see why USB wouldn't do the same thing if Motorola wasn't using a resistor and a short across their cable as someone else here mentioned. It might not be anything malicious since the whole Razr GUI is weird. Then again they might want to sell more chargers.

When you charge the phone up it automatically turns the ringer on to loud if you had it on vibrate. You can't turn that feature off. I does lots of things automatically that you may not want it to do and there is no way to turn most of them off like with any other cell phone. At least with Windows I have managed to turn stuff off I don't want. I just got the Razr V3a because it was cheaper than buying a battery for my LG at the time and it had bluetooth.

http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-5055986.html

The most vivid example of this philosophy, to me, was Negroponteâ(TM)s comparison of the XO and netbooks. XOs cost about $225 apiece. Netbooks, which are produced by companies like Acer and Lenovo, among others, run about $300 to $450 but offer more memory and graphics power and larger screens. So, one could ask, wonâ(TM)t the normal, cost-curve-squashing evolution of computers obviate what OLPC is trying to do, and more efficiently than a non-profit? Negroponte replies that OLPC is not trying to compete with commercial computer makers but instead asking, "What are the things the normal commercial market wonâ(TM)t be pushing?"

What won't the "normal, cost-curve-squashing evolution of computers" include? Well, I don't see a huge rush by Acer, Dell, Lenovo, and others to include cranks, solar panels, and other alternative charging options to their units. I don't think the "normal commercial market" has decided to go that direction yet. Also, I doubt highly that these same companies will ever make their equipment repairable by children as this would cut into their profit margins too much if they had to stop making computer equipment with proprietary and hard-to-replace components.

The underlying, subconscious goal (in other words, whether they realize it or not) of the OLPC project is to prove that reliable, hardy products don't have to cost a fortune. It's the mentality of the business world today to produce cheap crap that is then sold at a premium in order to finance yacht parties and private jets for the upper echelon of their employee-base. the OLPC is just one of the few outfits out there trying their best to disprove that particular business model.

Oh I remember... Symantec and Sun are both on the list of "Tech Giants that Might Not Survive 2009." http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/hiner/?p=910

I wish the new president would bring successful executives into government, not losers.

Ahem. You are wrong. http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/bto/20090125/amd-opteron-3g-pricing-small-2.jpg

Here's a screenshot of Pandora. Note the third button down: http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/bto/20080710/iPhone-menu_270x502.jpg

(For those too lazy to click: "Buy from iTunes")

http://apcmag.com/seagate_settles_class_action_cash_back_over_misleading_hard_drive_capacities.htm

All manufacturers clearly state the units they are using NOW, however none of them lists BOTH sizes and none of them clearly state what the relationship this might be to the sizes listed in popular operating systems.

Windows until Vista and 7 happily displayed size/some-base-2-number as Gigabytes, which always meant the disk you bought that was "100GB" actually turned out to be "98GB" or so. Hard disk manufacturers are absolutely guilty of manipulating their product marketing such that you buy one size disk and get it home to reveal it's lower than expected.

Imagine if you clicked Properties on a folder and found it was "100GB" in Windows. You might go out and buy a 100GB disk to back it up. Obviously this would never have worked and you'd be a few files short of backing it up totally. Who would have known, if not an engineer or technician or software developer or worked in professional IT support?

USB 3.0 is going to suffer the same thing because of the 8b10 encoding (which means that the bandwidth is actually 4/5ths of the speed it says on the box, even before packet header overhead; http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-1056753.html)

I've seen some articles on, for instance, the Seagate website which explain that the value is the "fastest speed at which the drive can send data across the cable (or bus) from the drive buffer" which is not an outright lie, but does move into the realms of blurring and misinformation;

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?locale=en-US&name=External_Drive_Troubleshooter_-_Performance_Issues_-_My_drive_is_slow&vgnextoid=33434a3cdde5c010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD

I thought the lab had a verbal component, but apparently not. In any case, good idea.

It isn't verbal, just not written. I don't know the exact details because I haven't taken it myself but I work with a CCIE. There is a troubleshooting lab that you must take which accompanies the written portion. This used to be setup such that you would setup the lab equipment for your personal test on day 1. Overnight they would screw it up and then the 2nd day you had to fix it. Now it is just one day and you don't set it up from the ground up (cabling, etc.) You have access to Cisco docs to do the lab but you are limited to 9 hours to do the lab portion. If you are spending all your time looking up some piece of info you won't come close to completing it and some of the tasks are cumulative. Read this for more info. They changed the format back in 2001. I don't see how anyone could really cheat on this part since you have to know how to configure the devices but maybe this interview is supposed to aid with minimizing the cheaters on the written portion. If you are cheating there though then I'd think you would have to cheat on the lab and if you don't need to cheat on the lab that you wouldn't have to on the written but I assume Cisco is seeing some trends that indicate cheating in some way.

FTFA:

She [Anne H. Milley, director of technology product marketing at SAS] adds, "We have customers who build engines for aircraft. I am happy they are not using freeware when I get on a jet."

Good thing Boeing's not using fere software for aircraft simulation tools, space station labs, sub hunters, or moon rockets ;-)

New word announcement: "fere" - used to denote the application of open source (free) software in critical roles, striking fear in the uninformed masses.

Examples:
"The new software we're using to control our killbots is the latest fereware clone of the commercial Killdows Humans release."
"NASA is requesting support from the fere community for software that can accurately convert between metric and SAE units."

She [Anne H. Milley, director of technology product marketing at SAS] adds, "We have customers who build engines for aircraft. I am happy they are not using freeware when I get on a jet."

Good thing Boeing's not using fere software for aircraft simulation tools, space station labs, sub hunters, or moon rockets ;-)

Explain to me how the Aero GUI becomes a load on the GPU when you are running Crysis full screen and with F/X cranked up to the max --- which is, after all, the reason why you lay out the big bucks for a high performance gaming system.

How Do I ... tweak Vista indexing options for better performance [Dec 15, 2008]
The Great Vista/Mac Showdown: Goodbye, WinRot [Feb 21, 2007]

If they're only going to use your product for free, how is it hurting business to piss them off? As you stated, they're not going to buy it anyway.

[citation] Bill Gates business model for pirated Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office to reinforce monopoly and combat linux in China

Following the advice here http://techrepublic.com.com/5208-6230-0.html?forumID=3&threadID=201099&messageID=2231826 fixed the windows update hanging for me at my company.

I preferred the hack Bubba. Reportedly put together in 1 day by some non-MS VB programmer. Versus a dev team at MSFT for a full dev cycle. Bob is long gone, but Bubba lives on. Apparently even working on Vista. And APPL had there 3D experiment back in the 90's as well. I spaced on the code-name for the public beta but maybe Tabasco. Although that was a internal printer project as well. And there was "Ark Interface" as well.

Not at all. You see - exploits are only developed by analyzing patches. What you have here is a very advanced malware developer. For they had gazed on the patch and, instead of seeing the vulnerabilities being patched, they saw the one that was not. It's all very Zen.

Actually - it's not the first time Microsoft's patch cycle has been gamed.

I cannot get a static IP on my home wireless while getting DHCP everywhere else

The easiest solution would be to setup your home dhcpd to give you a static address based on the mac address of that card. This is trivally easy to do on most linux based dhcpd. A quick google search turned up this link. But if that doesnt work I'm sure you can find another or check out the man page.

While it's not an obvious source of comedy, internationally-recognized patent law is actually a rather funny thing. Just ask Danish engineer and inventor Karl Kroyer, whose method of raising sunken vessels from the ocean floor failed to obtain a patent because of a comic strip.

The German patent office denied Kroyer's claim based on the patent law concept of "prior art," which essentially means you can't patent an idea that someone has publicly described in the past, even if that idea wasn't patented.

Geek Trivia

It doesn't make those attacks futile. You can detect them, sure, but if you're getting bogus information from your DNS server, that's still a denial of service (because you can't get the real address of the site).

The same DOS issue applies to DNSSEC. It is not magic and cannot overcome determined interference... it can only prevent you from using falsified data as if it were genuine.

Plus all that an adversary would need to do is watch the DNS requests as they come in to find out where people are going.

Again no different with DNSSEC, since it does not encrypt anything... it only signs/verifies. Here is a nice overview with diagram.

Neither technology was intended to provide anonymity for the 'who' of the connection, but SSL does hide the 'what' of our data. And though SSL was not meant for anonymity, it is the basis for anonymity in onion routing schemes like Tor, I2P and others.