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Debugging skills are for coding. This would be "troubleshooting"

Perhaps you should consult a dictonary before answering the trolls:

Debugging skills are for coding. This would be "troubleshooting" :

debug ( P ) Pronunciation Key (d-bg)
tr.v. debugged, debugging, debugs
To remove a hidden electronic device, such as a microphone, from: debug a conference room.
To make (a hidden microphone, for example) ineffective.
To search for and eliminate malfunctioning elements or errors in: debug a spacecraft before launch; debug a computer program.
To remove insects from, as with a pesticide.

Most tech-savvy people would use either of the terms, leaning 'troubleshooting' towards hardware and 'debugging' towards software. The term 'debugging' isn't coding-specific.

Usage Note: Traditionally the pronouns he, him, and his have been used as generic or gender-neutral singular pronouns, as in A novelist should write about what he knows best and No one seems to take any pride in his work anymore. Since the early 20th century, however, this usage has come under increasing criticism for reflecting and perpetuating gender stereotyping. Defenders of the traditional usage have argued that the masculine pronouns he, his, and him can be used generically to refer to men and women. This analysis of the generic use of he is linguistically doubtful. If he were truly a gender-neutral form, we would expect that it could be used to refer to the members of any group containing both men and women. But in fact the English masculine form is an odd choice when it refers to a female member of such a group. There is something plainly disconcerting about sentences such as Each of the stars of As Good As It Gets [i.e., Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt] won an Academy Award for his performance. In this case, the use of his forces the reader to envision a single male who stands as the representative member of the group, a picture that is at odds with the image that comes to mind when we picture the stars of As Good As It Gets. Thus he is not really a gender-neutral pronoun; rather, it refers to a male who is to be taken as the representative member of the group referred to by its antecedent. The traditional usage, then, is not simply a grammatical convention; it also suggests a particular pattern of thought. It is clear that many people now routinely construct their remarks to avoid generic he, usually using one of two strategies: changing to the plural, so they is used (which is often the easiest solution) or using compound and coordinate forms such as he/she or he or she (which can be cumbersome in sustained use). In some cases, the generic pronoun can simply be dropped or changed to an article with no change in meaning. The sentence A writer who draws on personal experience for material should not be surprised if reviewers seize on that fact is complete as it stands and requires no pronoun before the word material. The sentence Every student handed in his assignment is just as clear when written Every student handed in the assignment. Not surprisingly, the opinion of the Usage Panel in such matters is mixed. While 37 percent actually prefer the generic his in the sentence A taxpayer who fails to disclose the source of ___ income can be prosecuted under the new law, 46 percent prefer a coordinate form like his or her; 7 percent felt that no pronoun was needed in the sentence; 2 percent preferred an article, usually the; and another 2 percent overturned tradition by advocating the use of generic her, a strategy that brings the politics of language to the reader's notice. Thus a clear majority of the Panel prefers something other than his. The writer who chooses to use generic he and its inflected forms in the face of the strong trend away from that usage may be viewed as deliberately calling attention to traditional gender roles or may simply appear to be insensitive. See Usage Note at each. See Usage Note at every. See Usage Note at neither. See Usage Note at one. See Usage Note at she. See Usage Note at they.

Insipid? Damn, Dude, I thought that picture was pretty disturbing.

I'm not sure it would make any different to you, but look here. It says,

Usage Problem. Used to refer to a person whose gender is unspecified or unknown: "He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence" (William Blake).

I agree the rule should be changed, but to deny it was the rule for hundreds of years is stupid.

apt but incorrect...

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

It's my favourite movie...technically they didn't innovate or invent as to innovate is "To begin or introduce (something new) for or as if for the first time." Dictionary.com

They didn't do it for the first time, others have done it before (the museum domain. for instance)

Perhaps they are innovating new ways of breaking the internet?

There is no such word as beit.

Even if there was, it would only be one syllable.

As to Jefferson, there were some dictionaries available at the time. There's something *you* have that Jefferson did not, though: the ability to reference dozens of dictionaries and other language references with the minimal effort of a few mouse clicks.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=criticise &db=*

FYI, it's GoogOL not googLE, and it does not equal a googolplex, either. A googolplex is 10 to the power of googol, or a 1 followed by 10 to the 100 zeroes.

I... don't... know...

as in googol?

"Beg the question" is a shortening of "beggaring the question"--ie. answering a question with the question itself. "Why don't parallel lines cross? Because lines that never cross are parallel!"

If you look at the definition for beggar, you'll see one of the definition "One who assumes in argument what he does not prove." (Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, (C) 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.) In fact, this meaning of beggar has survived as a submeaning of 'beg.' This link on dictionary.reference.com supports my point. Look at definitions 3a and 3b.

So, the parent poster to your post is quite correct. His statement was not a hypothesis, but rather closer to fact, based on accepted usage.

Granted, standard American usage seems to treat "beg the question" as a synonym for "raise the question", but that's a rather incorrect usage, IMHO.

"Property" in the sense of "intellectual property" and "theft" in the sense of "copyright violation" are pretty well known in the US and other predominantly English speaking countries. It's entered common usage.

As far is theft is concerned, it's not a usage that's in the dictionary. And yes, common usage will come before dictionary definitions, but I only ever hear theft being used to mean copyright infringement by people making an anti-piracy argument. I can't say I've heard it generally being used as an umbrella term of both theft of physical objects and copyright infringement.

If you're going to use the here's the same article... karma-whore bit, at least learn how to spell "article".

Objectivism?

Please consider it to be hyperbole.

Hey, no problem, Dude. I had written it off as physically impossible bullshit, but whatever you say.

From Dictionary.com:
v. tr. Informal
To qualify with a warning or clarification: The spokesperson caveated the statement with a reminder that certain facts were still unknown.

1. Exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service: "Monopoly frequently... arises from government support or from collusive agreements among individuals" (Milton Friedman).
2. Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party.
   
3. A company or group having exclusive control over a commercial activity.
4. A commodity or service so controlled.
   
5. Exclusive possession or control: arrogantly claims to have a monopoly on the truth.
6. Something that is exclusively possessed or controlled: showed that scientific achievement is not a male monopoly.

First, "democracy" and "republic" are technical terms here. A democracy gives the population and enormous share in saying things. [...] The best example is the death penalty [for the record: I am against it]. The reason why Europe doesn't have the death penalty while some U.S. states do is not because the Europeans are morally superior, but because they are not allowed any say on the matter

Germany, France, and Britain are, of course, democracies.

The reason why they don't have the death penalty is because it violates their constitutions and European human rights conventions. Referendums and politicial decisions in the US are also routinely thrown out because they violate the US Constitution. In fact, I guarantee you that sooner or later, US courts will declare the death penalty unconstitutional in the US as well.

Because U.S. politicians are elected as people, if you don't like the guy, he is gone in six years max. Most European politicians are elected via their party; if you want to get rid of them, you have vote for a completely different party. [...] Pity the Europeans: When they watch their news at night, they know that they will probably be seing those same faces for the rest of their lives, and there is not a damn thing they can do against it.

The "choice" that US voters get is meaningless because it doesn't actually affect the policies that get enacted. Presidentail votes are about whether Clinton got a blowjob from an intern and whether Bush's drinking problem has stopped, not policy issues.

Europeans actually have had far more meaningful political choices. Over the last couple of decades, Germany, France, and the Netherlands have gotten powerful parties standing for positions on the environment, immigration, and education, that were previously unrepresented in Europe and still are nearly completely ignored by any US party with any power. There is still far more thoughtful political participation by citizens in those countries than in the US because their choices still matter.

The population in the U.S. could have a far greater influence on policy than possible in Europe -- if they wanted to, and so they could get a lot changed.

Theoretically, that may or may not be true. In practice, the US population has much less say in the policies of the nation than Europeans.

Sadly, Americans don't go to elections that often, and so we end up where we are today.

That isn't apathy, it's the simple realization that, given the way the US political system operates in practice, they don't have meaningful choices. Clinton, Dole, Gore, Bush, they are basically all roughly interchangeable. And look at the choice we get in California: Davis, Bustamante, Schwarzenegger. None of them has a coherent vision or proposals, and even if they did, they'd be foolish to articulate them before the election. There is no point in voting in most US elections.

Boondoggle.

If you actually knew what the word monopoly means, you'd know that it was actually used correctly.

From dictionary.com:

# Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party.

So, in fact, they used the word correctly.

I'll probably get modded down for comments that aren't pro-Linux. But this needs to be said. And what you don't realize is that many government workers are trained to use the Windows operating system and the software for it. The cost to switch everything over to Linux is pretty high compared to the cost of upgrading the existing systems. From dictionary.com: Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party. In fact, them referring to the Massachusetts decision as a monopoly is quite correct. Many companies provide software for Windows. Remember, when you're switching operating systems, you're not only switching the operating system, but switching the software you use for your tasks. All they're asking is to evaluate the costs in each situation and not exclude other solutions (including Mac OS X, *BSD, Linux, Windows, BeOS, etc..) from the process. That's only fair. If Linux turns out to have the lowest cost to provide a certain service, this group would have no problem with it. The problem here isn't the CCAGW. The problem here is the Linux zealots who think that Linux is ALWAYS the best solution and that Microsoft is ALWAYS the problem.

I'll leave you to ponder this for a while....

On the topic at hand: Linux is a monopoly"???

A bit of research (Although, they're running linux, so it may be a conspiracy) :

monopoly:
1. Exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service: "Monopoly frequently... arises from government support or from collusive agreements among individuals" (Milton Friedman).
2. Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party.
3. a. A company or group having exclusive control over a commercial activity.
3. b. A commodity or service so controlled.
3. c. Exclusive possession or control: arrogantly claims to have a monopoly on the truth.
3. d. Something that is exclusively possessed or controlled: showed that scientific achievement is not a male monopoly.

1. Maybe if SCO get's their way...
2. Maybe if Microsoft have their way...
3. Err, see above...

While I don't use Linux at present (although I have experimented with it on both x86 and PPC hardware) I favour OS X. Of Windows, OS X, and Linux, the three OS's are different in so many ways due to creation and control factors of all aspects of the product. A very small amount of research will highlight these differences, and who does exert control of development and code. When I read something like this and imagine the time and effort (and maybe cash, who knows) put into and this comes out, it really makes me wonder does sanity prevail: does the majority rule, or are all the idiots just on the same side?

Hanlon's Razor "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."

It's only funny because it's true.

Hanlon's Razor "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."

It's only funny because it's true.

Bullsh*t: neandertal

A real pedant would demand it be spelled and pronounced Homo neanderthalensis.

Kay not to contradict you for the fun of it, cause i don't like being called a geek neiter, but here's some definitions to help your understanding of the slang english language: Geek definition

1. b. A person who is single-minded or accomplished in scientific or technical pursuits but is felt to be socially inept.

Have a nice day

Did you mean Bankruptcy?

...you have to see it for yourself.

From Reference.com:

Entry: matrix
Function: noun
Definition: origin
Synonyms: cast, forge, form, grid, model, mold, origin, pattern, source, womb
Concept: origin/source
Source: Roget's Interactive Thesaurus, First Edition (v 1.0.0).

its the same as a Chequebook is in ENGLISH - please note, this is different that what passses for English inmany American dictionaries

English is an old, language built up from many tongues based around Saxon roots with some latin, french and celtic thrown in for good measure.

The US spellings are gradually stripping away the "frenchness" from the language in an attempt to further anglicise the tongue. I for one am proud of the mongrel language we have and think that attempts to "purify it" are akin to language fascism and will ultimately lead to a rigid linguistic structure with no room for growth and change. French is such a tongue and in my opinion their aversion to english-isms in their language is slowly converting a beautiful language into a dead one.

The internet is a great place to see the varieties of use of english and observe its development and constantly evolving vocabulary.

As such i have no direct objections to "American Spellings" merely the fact that in many american dictionaries i have seen (though not all) the original spellings are not even mentionned. eg Color = COLOUR, Flavor = FLAVOUR and of course Check = CHEQUE.

Now, beat that for off topic...

You mean "up" was not a transitive verb. As of October 2003, the American Heritage(tm) and WordNet(tm) dictionaries both define "to up" to mean "to raise."

It seems a bit disingenuous to say you've never found an honest headhunter, when you yourself are not honest.

Hey man...I got the joke. I think you are funny.

ROFL...This crowd can be just so eager to pounce on somebody for being *wrong* so they can be *right*.

If humor walked up behind them and stuck it's foot in their...nevermind.

Oh and Sherlock...

You may want to read a dictionary again. And again, until it sinks in.

And in case you still don't get it:

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=loose
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=lose

Read and learn.

And in case you still don't get it:

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=loose
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=lose

Read and learn.

Nitpicking?

Sorry... :)

That would be "flame bait" and "cowl"

Did you think "illegal" meant only "criminal"? Last time I checked, the word "illegal" meant only "prohibited by law," not "prohibited by the parts of law that define crimes." Copyright infringement is "prohibited by law" though it is not a crime.

A piddlingly small percentage of the even more pathetic percentage of sites that chose to try .Not ... er, I mean 2003 Server, we previously using Linux. The meat of the story (such as it is) is that so few sites are even bothering to try 2003 Server.

And I wouldn't be surprised if the story behind the switches from Linux to .Not are mostly cases where a company had their site done by a hosting service (who, sensibly, used Linux) that had grown enough that some twit manager decided they should bring their web presence "in house". Their internal IS people only know Windows, so their obvious choice was 2003 Server (it being perhaps the least bad of the Microsoft stable of shite).

<sigh>

Like it not, the definitions of words change. Take piracy, for example.

" The unauthorized use or reproduction of copyrighted or patented material: software piracy."

Arguing semantics because you can't come up with a real argument against the other person's point is a pretty good sign you've lost the argument.

Avast, burglar! Stop stealing and pirating that software. Arrr. :-p

It's a worthy post that deserves a complimentary post. According to Jesus Christ, the truth will set us free! Subjectively...

GNU software is voluntary. Labeling GNU and FSF as being a communism is a lie, as the history has shown us that all alleged communists use military dictatorship with force and intimidation to implement political views and governance.

Have we forgetten about a government vested in the people? Have we forgotten that the people are self-governing with unalienable rites and are consented for their voluntary and willfull grant of revokable privilege for governance or excise from a foreign artificial entinty or State? Today, most states use duress and coercion upon all in attempt to bequest unalienable right to travel, force to pay a third income tax, force to register children, force to accept their general welfare, force all to be held responsible for the decisions of a false and unlawful representative in an unlawful congress, and force to use fiat money of which provides no liability of any office or otherwise in a court of law (fiat money is infinite and against establishing commercial liability of unlawful people and unlawful artificial entities).

To the best of my present knowledge and witness, the employees at the artificial entity known as GNU don't force any to use their software. They have proved that all knowledge is free to all (and perhaps construed to be of a more public domain).

Don't bother downloading it, its totally arse.

Please see the definition of friggin' (frigging).

I truly hope that it wasnt a downright battle of friggin' wits.

Ex-Ef-See-Eee or is is Ex-Feese

If it's the latter does that mean if you have lots of computers running XFce your running X-fces?

BTW Nice logo.

HAL: "I honestly think you ought to calm down; take a stress pill and think things over."

Jessica Lynch has been trensferred to section 8 of the US Army medical facility at a base in the state of Ohio for "mental regeneration".

Comrades of the PFY have reported that she constantly craved for Arab cocks and that all their efforts to satisfy her with their black Negro-rods led nowhere.

"She just kept screaming for some Abu to fuck her white slut crotch," Malik Brown Jr., her former squad leader, reported to the newspaper (Voice Of Indifference) of her home-base.

I am sure the whole Slashdot community wishes our national heroine the best; she truly is an American idle.

I think you mean "mirror," you inarticulate chowderhead.

ROTFL... Strangely enough though, see dictionary.com's first definition for 'parse':

To break (a sentence) down into its component parts of speech with an explanation of the form, function, and syntactical relationship of each part.

"Average is a synonym for arithmetic mean -- which is the value obtained by dividing the sum of a set of quantities by the number of quantities in the set"

...you slacker, I think you want definition #2.

Dictionary.com definition. Singular = visa; plural = visas. M-W.com doesn't even have visum as a defined word for English as a standalone concept.