Total up your costs for coping with IE's problems for each of the past several years, extrapolate that for the next few years, and compare all this with the costs of migrating to Firefox (or the browser of your choice). Show them the graphs of total money spent from five years ago to five years from now, and make it clear how much money you would have (or will) save by making the change.
If you can't show the financial gain for the change, it doesn't make business sense. Period. Better = costs less overall. Period. "Less trouble for the tech guys" doesn't cut it. Neither does "but Firefox is more standards compliant!"
You obviously haven't had to administer Windows XP Home for Dad. My Dad downloads and installs software on his own all the time, and while that leads to disaster sometimes (Hotbar), it also means I don't have to run over there every time he needs a system change. He recently bought a 120 GB drive to upgrade his half-full 20 GB drive (his neighbours got a 80 GB drive and I guess he couldn't bear them having a larger hard drive than him), and asked me to install it for him, not realizing that it meant re-installing all of his software. This meant painstakingly locating all the software he downloaded to who-knows-where, and in some instances re-downloading it from a link in an ancient e-mail. I'm still not done after several visits.
That's not all. Did you know that there are only two types of users in XP Home - computer administrators and users? And you can't create new groups with the built-in utilities, since Microsoft felt that no home user would need more than those two classes of users? And you can't disable accounts, only create and delete them? And you can't even grant Users read/write access to the necessary files and folders (for badly written programs that expect to be able to write to C:\Program Files\... as a regular user) because the right-click context menu for Security doesn't exist?
Just try installing a random dozen off-the-shelf programs as Administrator and see how many work at all as a user. People here complain all the time how much better Windows is than Linux for home users, but they assume Win98 (with no real security) or WinXP used as administrator all the time.
It's sad, really, since it's far from rocket science to write programs that only need My Documents and HKCU write access to run properly. This harkens back to another current topic about whether making Linux easier to use will make it more susceptible to viruses and the like. The answer is no, so long as those who write the programs and create the distributions have the self-discipline to stick to the correct user/root separation that has always been the hallmark of Unix programming.
Why do so many people keep saying "twice the physical RAM?" Can anyone really provide technical justification for it? Sure, it's not like we're generally hurting to set up a 1 GB paging file on a 120 GB drive, but as far as I can tell it's futile.
Having a paging file does not increase performance! How can it? It's there to let programs allocate more 'memory' than physically exists in the machine, but if you're doing that regularly performance will suck. Badly. The more of the paging file is used, the more time you spend waiting for data to be read from the disk (slow) instead of RAM (fast). This is not the stuff of good interactive response!
If you must, create a huge paging file, run your favourite programs for a few days without restarting the machine, and see how much of the paging file was actually used. Then reduce your paging file to that size, plus a margin for error. That's enough.
Dude, women (and many of us men) like to talk for more reasons than just to give our jaws exercise! It's how we humans bond, by learning more about each other. Despite what you may think, you don't learn very much about another person by how they play a game.
The forking idea reminded me of Brian Aldiss' "Let's Be Frank" (1957). The protagonist (named Frank) forks naturally by reproducing in the standard way - except the children aren't just copies, his consciousness simply expands to an additional body. One mind sees out of two bodies at the same time (which took some getting used to). The death of one body (of eventual millions) didn't matter much. He got used to his bodies dying.:) Check it out; it's in one or more anthologies.
The whole point of an open source project is the same as that of any other project: it's a goal-based activity, unique (as opposed to, say, on-going operational support; every Boston Marathon is 'unique' in that they don't all take place at the same time;) ), and bounded by a finite time.
Sure, all those other aspects are useful measures, but if you want to know how the project is going, as opposed to how much fun it is, or how useful or 'good' it is, you must learn some basic project management skills.
The three main measures are time, cost and scope. Cost is generally less of an issue with FOSS.:) Time is where you can measure your progress. This is where you can do things like determine milestones, develop feature lists and so on, then during the project you have a standard to compare yourself to. Scope is the same. You may want to reduce the number of features to hit your (self-imposed) deadlines. You can always add more features in v1.1! The most important thing to do (if you're concerned about whether you're making progress is to plan first, before launching into code mode.
That reminds me of a conversation I had with a co-worker once. I brought up the idea that there was "sci-fi" and "real" science-fiction, and what I felt was the difference. Then I went to the Internet and found some definitions I liked and sent them to him. His reply?
Diversity=pain. If you have a 'huge number of diverse applications', it sounds like your organisation's IT policy is out of control. The vast majority of corporate users use very little beyond the core of OS, browser, mail, office and their groupware/CRM app.
I concur with Crisco. For a typical example, see the Government of Manitoba Department directory. Tell me again it's "out of control", and all they need is OS/browser/mail/office/groupware!
Anyway, the point is if he has Windows NT/2K/XP users and they aren't Administrators, software distribution is going to require a local software installation Windows service running, most likely. I'm interested, too, since where I work now will be migrating from Netware to Windows 2000, and we can't afford MS SMS. Sigh.
Mainly this is used for os patches and virus scanner updates.
Bah. I worked in a large WAN environment with ~200 servers and ~7,000 desktops (a mix of Windows 95 and NT) and believe me, OS patches and virus scanner updates were the least of it. The provincial government, with numerous Departments and Branches within those departments, has a huge number of diverse applications, both off-the-shelf and custom-written. They use MS SMS, and for good reason!
One of the main reasons, as I see it, for using SMS is distributing applications to Windows NT (or newer) users. Install applications at logon, you say? Do you know that this requires Administrator privs for most apps and updates? Do you also know that the logon script executes with the privs of the user who is logging on? Do you really want all of your users to have administrative access to their PCs? I thought not.
One of the key benefits is SMS can install apps in the background using a service running with elevated privs on Windows NT. No user interaction is required. This gets around that major issue.
I am not overly religious, so I do not know my town names, etc. Do people know where Sodom/Gommorah were? These
places were smitten by god in the Old Testament
Um, smitten? I don't think Sodom or Gomorrah (or the residents thereof) had a crush on (smitten by) God.:-) They were smited by God, though. There's a slight, but amusing, difference in meaning.
I think many people have missed Linus' point: He was comparing Isaac Newton's cadaver's body odour to the smelly arguments Mundie was making, not Mundie's personal hygiene (or lack of it). Hasn't anyone heard the comment "That argument smells"?
These are three key Linux trends to watch for in 2001: a static growth rate
A static growth rate of, say, 30% per year?:-) I could live with that! Perhaps he meant a static installed base, or zero growth rate. A static growth rate doesn't sound too bad.
Rather than comment on his content, I'm going to nit-pick it. He screwed up when he used "negative reinforcement" -- the way he was using it, he should have said "punishment". Tsk. To wit:
Positive reinforcement:
A programmer writes a lot of really good code (behaviour), so you give him a lollipop (the positive stimulus), which you expect will increase the likelihood of that behaviour recurring.
Punishment:
A programmer writes some bad code (behaviour), so you take away his foosball machine (punishment), which you expect will decrease the likelihood of that behaviour recurring.
Negative reinforcement:
You hire someone to lash a programmer continuously (the negative stimulus) until the programmer learns to escape it (removal of the negative stimulus) by writing lots of good code (behaviour). This will increase the likelihood of the desired behaviour. It is hoped that the subject will eventually learn to avoid the negative stimulus entirely, rather than merely escaping it.:-)
You see how both positive and negative reinforcement increase the frequency of a desired behaviour? And punishment decreases it?
For other information on this, simply visit http://www.google.com/ and search for "reinforcement punishment positive negative" and check out the results.
Yes, I know that this may seem nit-picky, but just as we in the computer industry appreciate it when our jargon is used correctly by those not in it, I'm sure the psychologists of the world would appreciate it if we used their terms correctly.
We had a similar deal at EDS Canada. C$150/week (~US$100) for being on-call. Overtime for any calls, with a nightly minimum of 2 hours. There was no on-site support required of us, as on-site stuff was handled by a different organization (EDS Innovations!:-) ) who had their own system for charging (I think it was a minimum of $200). This arrangement was for employees paid on an hourly basis. I think I earned about C$8,000+ in a year this way.
A woman where I worked had the name of Ennis and first initial P. She requested her middle initial (K) be used instead, to form "kennis".:-)
Re:drawing the line, the Microsoft way
on
Is UNIX An OS?
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· Score: 1
If one thinks that "the line dividing an OS and not OS" is moving, the one is using Microsoft's arguments. Microsoft has not sold just an operating system for aeons. Has it ever? Even in the earliest days of MS-DOS, utilities were included. Does that make the utilities part of the OS? No:
Recall what we are debating, and realize that it's okay to say that an OS is pretty much just the kernel. What was MS-DOS then? It is a PRODUCT which Microsoft calls "MS-DOS", which includes the OS, or kernel, and some utilities.
What is Red Hat Linux? It is an OS/kernel, with LOTS of utilities, applications, a GUI, etc.
What is Windows NT? It's (surprise) an OS/kernel, with some utilities, a GUI, Notepad, etc. A software product, which Microsoft sometimes calls an Operating System, an Operating Environment, or an innovative product, depending on who they are trying to sway at the moment.
But what an operating system is HAS NOT changed after all these years. It's a program or group of programs that manage the execution of and resources required by application programs. The rest is just the extras that are included to sell the actual OS.
I recall some time ago Digital was trying to develop a micropayment system called "Millicent". I think I read about it long ago in a Jerry Pournelle column. Has anyone heard about it? It makes sense from a consumer point of view (or me, anyway): If there were 10 pieces of music in the world, they'd be worth a LOT, but how much is each worth if there are 10,000,000? 10,000,000,000? Now there's an interesting topic for research. And lots of debate.:-) The trouble is (as everyone's noticing) how do you efficiently bill someone for $0.0001? (Hm, a centicent.)
I don't buy many albums, and download much less. Unpaid advert: see & hear Karen Kosowki!
I hate to diagree with CNN, but... no, wait, I love to disagree with CNN! Darwinism does not say anything about evolution taking hundreds of millions of years (just "a really long time"), or the Earth being billions of years old.
In fact, in the main, The Origin Of Species describes how new species come about, through speciation. In short, random mutations and variation (which Darwin didn't know the source of) were selected from by "natural selection" meaning differential reproductive success. A new variation somehow has more babies/offspring by dealing with the local environment better, and so on. Is evolution "random"? No, but the initial variations are (and are undirected -- evolution doesn't mean "heading for more complexity", necessarily).
And the T. Rex wasn't around in the Jurassic Period. He ruled during the late Cretaceous. Michael Crichton was dismayed when Stephen Jay Gould pointed that out to him. Mike should have done more homework!
Of course, "extrodinaire" wouldn't have passed a spell-check.:) Then again, there's the question of what the "community extraordinaire" would mean, anyway!
1) The largest drive I've seen retail (Future Shop) was 40 GB (for C$500). There was a/. article a while back about IBM producing a 73 GB drive which should be available now.
2) Yes.
3) I thought I was the only one to notice this! "Miles per square centimeter," anyone? Gigajoules per cubic Celsius? Huh?
The point is, these days no one should have to know their monitor specs. The information is available automatically (Windows can do it), so any Linux installer attempting to set up X should be able to avail itself of the proper specs without involving the user.
There's no need to be bitter about it. You can always edit XF86Config after the installation to "optimize" the modelines. I don't want to, though, and neither do most people. I see it as a big waste of time for me. I was setting up Linux on my Compaq with an Optiquest monitor, and had a great deal of trouble figuring out just what modelines would do what I wanted. And you know, all I wanted was the VESA standard modes! I scrounged around for any documentation, eventually found some, and labouriously calculated modelines that my monitor recognizes as VESA standard. I do not want to do this ever again.
If anyone wants my modelines, e-mail me. I'd be happy to share. They go up to 1600x1200/85 Hz.
Less than a week ago, we were trying to set up an IBM laptop with Linux to output to an LCD projector for our User Group meeting, and the only mode that worked was text. This was embarassing and threw a bucket of cold water on the affair. Despite a fair amount of expertise, we couldn't get it working. Next time, I'll bring my VESA modelines and see if they work, but I hadn't expected to need them.:-(
"Canada's version of Hell"? I laughed out loud when I read that one. I've never heard Winnipeg referred to quite that way. We have a lot of problems here, but likely no more than many other locations. At least we get talked about, and better infamous than unknown, eh?:-) I make about C$43,000, plus if I get my MCSE by the end of the year, another C$5,000 on top of that for the next three years, and the cost of living is low.
How is vacation time doled out? I find that important. I get four weeks per year. How does that compare to other people's experience?
At least I don't live in Saskatchewan.:) Or on the Rock!
Slashdot Mirror
Total up your costs for coping with IE's problems for each of the past several years, extrapolate that for the next few years, and compare all this with the costs of migrating to Firefox (or the browser of your choice). Show them the graphs of total money spent from five years ago to five years from now, and make it clear how much money you would have (or will) save by making the change.
If you can't show the financial gain for the change, it doesn't make business sense. Period. Better = costs less overall. Period. "Less trouble for the tech guys" doesn't cut it. Neither does "but Firefox is more standards compliant!"
That's not all. Did you know that there are only two types of users in XP Home - computer administrators and users? And you can't create new groups with the built-in utilities, since Microsoft felt that no home user would need more than those two classes of users? And you can't disable accounts, only create and delete them? And you can't even grant Users read/write access to the necessary files and folders (for badly written programs that expect to be able to write to C:\Program Files\... as a regular user) because the right-click context menu for Security doesn't exist?
Just try installing a random dozen off-the-shelf programs as Administrator and see how many work at all as a user. People here complain all the time how much better Windows is than Linux for home users, but they assume Win98 (with no real security) or WinXP used as administrator all the time.
It's sad, really, since it's far from rocket science to write programs that only need My Documents and HKCU write access to run properly. This harkens back to another current topic about whether making Linux easier to use will make it more susceptible to viruses and the like. The answer is no, so long as those who write the programs and create the distributions have the self-discipline to stick to the correct user/root separation that has always been the hallmark of Unix programming.
Why do so many people keep saying "twice the physical RAM?" Can anyone really provide technical justification for it? Sure, it's not like we're generally hurting to set up a 1 GB paging file on a 120 GB drive, but as far as I can tell it's futile.
Having a paging file does not increase performance! How can it? It's there to let programs allocate more 'memory' than physically exists in the machine, but if you're doing that regularly performance will suck. Badly. The more of the paging file is used, the more time you spend waiting for data to be read from the disk (slow) instead of RAM (fast). This is not the stuff of good interactive response!
If you must, create a huge paging file, run your favourite programs for a few days without restarting the machine, and see how much of the paging file was actually used. Then reduce your paging file to that size, plus a margin for error. That's enough.
Dude, women (and many of us men) like to talk for more reasons than just to give our jaws exercise! It's how we humans bond, by learning more about each other. Despite what you may think, you don't learn very much about another person by how they play a game.
The forking idea reminded me of Brian Aldiss' "Let's Be Frank" (1957). The protagonist (named Frank) forks naturally by reproducing in the standard way - except the children aren't just copies, his consciousness simply expands to an additional body. One mind sees out of two bodies at the same time (which took some getting used to). The death of one body (of eventual millions) didn't matter much. He got used to his bodies dying. :) Check it out; it's in one or more anthologies.
The whole point of an open source project is the same as that of any other project: it's a goal-based activity, unique (as opposed to, say, on-going operational support; every Boston Marathon is 'unique' in that they don't all take place at the same time ;) ), and bounded by a finite time.
Sure, all those other aspects are useful measures, but if you want to know how the project is going, as opposed to how much fun it is, or how useful or 'good' it is, you must learn some basic project management skills.
The three main measures are time, cost and scope. Cost is generally less of an issue with FOSS. :) Time is where you can measure your progress. This is where you can do things like determine milestones, develop feature lists and so on, then during the project you have a standard to compare yourself to. Scope is the same. You may want to reduce the number of features to hit your (self-imposed) deadlines. You can always add more features in v1.1! The most important thing to do (if you're concerned about whether you're making progress is to plan first, before launching into code mode.
I think what he's describing is also called "internal fragmentation" in some circles.
"I thought it was just all that space shit."
Sigh.
I concur with Crisco. For a typical example, see the Government of Manitoba Department directory. Tell me again it's "out of control", and all they need is OS/browser/mail/office/groupware!
Anyway, the point is if he has Windows NT/2K/XP users and they aren't Administrators, software distribution is going to require a local software installation Windows service running, most likely. I'm interested, too, since where I work now will be migrating from Netware to Windows 2000, and we can't afford MS SMS. Sigh.
Bah. I worked in a large WAN environment with ~200 servers and ~7,000 desktops (a mix of Windows 95 and NT) and believe me, OS patches and virus scanner updates were the least of it. The provincial government, with numerous Departments and Branches within those departments, has a huge number of diverse applications, both off-the-shelf and custom-written. They use MS SMS, and for good reason!
One of the main reasons, as I see it, for using SMS is distributing applications to Windows NT (or newer) users. Install applications at logon, you say? Do you know that this requires Administrator privs for most apps and updates? Do you also know that the logon script executes with the privs of the user who is logging on? Do you really want all of your users to have administrative access to their PCs? I thought not.
One of the key benefits is SMS can install apps in the background using a service running with elevated privs on Windows NT. No user interaction is required. This gets around that major issue.
Um, smitten? I don't think Sodom or Gomorrah (or the residents thereof) had a crush on (smitten by) God. :-) They were smited by God, though. There's a slight, but amusing, difference in meaning.
These are three key Linux trends to watch for in 2001: a static growth rate
A static growth rate of, say, 30% per year? :-) I could live with that! Perhaps he meant a static installed base, or zero growth rate. A static growth rate doesn't sound too bad.
Positive reinforcement:
A programmer writes a lot of really good code (behaviour), so you give him a lollipop (the positive stimulus), which you expect will increase the likelihood of that behaviour recurring.
Punishment:
A programmer writes some bad code (behaviour), so you take away his foosball machine (punishment), which you expect will decrease the likelihood of that behaviour recurring.
Negative reinforcement: :-)
You hire someone to lash a programmer continuously (the negative stimulus) until the programmer learns to escape it (removal of the negative stimulus) by writing lots of good code (behaviour). This will increase the likelihood of the desired behaviour. It is hoped that the subject will eventually learn to avoid the negative stimulus entirely, rather than merely escaping it.
You see how both positive and negative reinforcement increase the frequency of a desired behaviour? And punishment decreases it? For other information on this, simply visit http://www.google.com/ and search for "reinforcement punishment positive negative" and check out the results.
Yes, I know that this may seem nit-picky, but just as we in the computer industry appreciate it when our jargon is used correctly by those not in it, I'm sure the psychologists of the world would appreciate it if we used their terms correctly.
A woman where I worked had the name of Ennis and first initial P. She requested her middle initial (K) be used instead, to form "kennis". :-)
Recall what we are debating, and realize that it's okay to say that an OS is pretty much just the kernel. What was MS-DOS then? It is a PRODUCT which Microsoft calls "MS-DOS", which includes the OS, or kernel, and some utilities.
What is Red Hat Linux? It is an OS/kernel, with LOTS of utilities, applications, a GUI, etc.
What is Windows NT? It's (surprise) an OS/kernel, with some utilities, a GUI, Notepad, etc. A software product, which Microsoft sometimes calls an Operating System, an Operating Environment, or an innovative product, depending on who they are trying to sway at the moment.
But what an operating system is HAS NOT changed after all these years. It's a program or group of programs that manage the execution of and resources required by application programs. The rest is just the extras that are included to sell the actual OS.
Resist the Microsoft definition! :-)
I don't buy many albums, and download much less. Unpaid advert: see & hear Karen Kosowki!
In fact, in the main, The Origin Of Species describes how new species come about, through speciation. In short, random mutations and variation (which Darwin didn't know the source of) were selected from by "natural selection" meaning differential reproductive success. A new variation somehow has more babies/offspring by dealing with the local environment better, and so on. Is evolution "random"? No, but the initial variations are (and are undirected -- evolution doesn't mean "heading for more complexity", necessarily).
And the T. Rex wasn't around in the Jurassic Period. He ruled during the late Cretaceous. Michael Crichton was dismayed when Stephen Jay Gould pointed that out to him. Mike should have done more homework!
Of course, "extrodinaire" wouldn't have passed a spell-check. :) Then again, there's the question of what the "community extraordinaire" would mean, anyway!
2) Yes.
3) I thought I was the only one to notice this! "Miles per square centimeter," anyone? Gigajoules per cubic Celsius? Huh?
There's no need to be bitter about it. You can always edit XF86Config after the installation to "optimize" the modelines. I don't want to, though, and neither do most people. I see it as a big waste of time for me. I was setting up Linux on my Compaq with an Optiquest monitor, and had a great deal of trouble figuring out just what modelines would do what I wanted. And you know, all I wanted was the VESA standard modes! I scrounged around for any documentation, eventually found some, and labouriously calculated modelines that my monitor recognizes as VESA standard. I do not want to do this ever again.
If anyone wants my modelines, e-mail me. I'd be happy to share. They go up to 1600x1200/85 Hz.
Less than a week ago, we were trying to set up an IBM laptop with Linux to output to an LCD projector for our User Group meeting, and the only mode that worked was text. This was embarassing and threw a bucket of cold water on the affair. Despite a fair amount of expertise, we couldn't get it working. Next time, I'll bring my VESA modelines and see if they work, but I hadn't expected to need them. :-(
How is vacation time doled out? I find that important. I get four weeks per year. How does that compare to other people's experience?
At least I don't live in Saskatchewan. :) Or on the Rock!