Thanks, I really appreciate your words of encouragement.
I would love to specialize and feel really competent at some form of programming but my fate in life seems to be the trashcan where all the orphan projects go because no one else wants to deal with them and I'm always up for anything. On one hand, it can be very stimulating learning new things but on the other hand, it can be very frustrating to always feel like I've never really mastered anything.
On the otherOther hand, I have to admit that I like having a life involving non-tech related activities once in a while so my desire to learn and achieve does have its limits.
I'm with you. I've always been fascinated by computers. When my dad brought home a computer in the early 1980s, once I knew that typing "dir" would bring up a list of stuff, I was hooked. I executed every command I could find including "Format" - my poor dad had to reinstall DOS from 12 huge floppy disks after that and then I had to sneak onto the computer after school before he got home from work, mainly to play Loderunner and beat my brother's score.
Attending a private highschool in the mid 1980s, yes I know I'm dating myself here, gave me the privilege of having access to computers at school and some basic programming instruction. I used to spend many of my free periods in the computer room (sometimes just to whip out an english paper just before class).
Once I attended college, I considered majoring in computer science. I took a programming class (even got an A in it), it was me and one other girl in the class, with 20+ guys. We sat on one side of the room and they sat as far away as possible from us on the other side of the room, (we both were quite cute, I might add, so it's not like we were physically repulsive or anything). Obviously, we did all the programming projects together since the boys in the class would never interact with us. The professor wouldn't even look at us during class and if I ever went up to him after class to ask him a question, he kept his distance from me like I might give him leprosy.
Since I had stayed home a year after highschool to work both a full- and part-time job to afford to go to college, I decided that I had worked too hard and was paying too much money to deal with such a hostile environment so I decided not to pursue computer science. I also took an advanced calculus class that I really enjoyed where I had a very encouraging male professor but I had some dumb notion about not majoring in the same thing as my closest in age brother had. This particular brother was very competitive and I didn't want to deal with the comparisons he would make as to why he was smarter than me - a typically female trait, I suppose. I ended up majoring in political science and minoring in music and fortunately, had exceptional professors even though it was not my first choice of majors.
But I loved computers. I worked in the dining hall as a Senior Student Manager (ooh, the power) and once I found excel on the office computers, I re-did the schedule and payroll, programming macros just because I wanted to. I knew more about computers than the managers there did and they were more than happy to have me set everything up for the measely $7/hr they were paying me but I didn't care, I enjoyed doing it.
Since college, all my jobs have been computer-oriented. I am a mostly self-taught programmer, have gotten some formal training along the way and am a competent (not brilliant by any stretch) generalist who works with whatever language or environment is required of me. I currently develop custom applications as my full-time job and in spite of frustrating politics, I still love my work.
While I love working with computers and applications, I am constantly humbled by my lack of knowledge and barely average comprehension of math and computers. I definitely understand the lack of confidence aspect, there's just so much to learn and not enough time to learn it. Sometimes I feel like I am a fake because my knowledge of computers and software seems so shallow and any second someone is going to find me out and expose me for a fraud. Yet I can't imagine not working with computers. Whatever industry I may end up working in, I am certain it will be IT related, I just can't help but gravitate towards computers, the internet and basically all things technology-related, I think they're just the coolest things ever.
Sometimes I regret not majoring in computer science or math as I was originally inclined to do and wonder if my life would be any different now had I done so.
Oh, and I think a computer camp would have been pure heaven as a kid.:)
- tokengeekgrrl
Re:I think the Time article misses the point
on
Meet Joe Blog
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· Score: 1
"Well, I don't think blogging is going to replace Time magazine, CBS nightly news or the New York Times next week, but it DOES impact these institutions. Specifically, it raises the bar substantially on what readers will PAY for in their reading habits."
Agreed. Case in point, a few months ago when I was talking to a girlfriend of mine who lives in NY, (I live in California), and I mentioned something I had read on a blog and she asked, "Blog? What's that?"
I have gotten that same remark from several friends and family members who live on the east coast.
So obviously that's not a real statisitcal sample but I don't think I'm making too erroneous of a statement by saying that I bet there are many, many people who don't read or even know what blogs are.
- tokengeekgrrl
being a geek doesn't turn off women...
on
Dating Design Patterns
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
...whining about how no women want you because you're a geek does.
To all you whiners, if you want to get laid, I highly recommend getting over yourselves already.
12/19/2003 - Z92 (92.3FM) held their annual "Sexy Santa" contest this morning... and I was there represent'n! I can't believe I won the $1,000 Grand Prize, paid by "Doctor John's Erotic Gift's"....
I have to laugh at all the suckers (or possibly slashdotters) I am sure have sent her money for her "legal defense fund" - if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
"He has done business in two dozen countries, and has never visited any of them. He buys mailing lists from people in Sweden and India. And these days, he says, he sends his mail from computers in China and three other countries."
Won't all spammers who don't already email from other countries do so to get around the law? What can legally be done to stop or punish the spammers from doing this?
He says he's worried but I don't think he is at all. I think he's just playing to the press.
I realize that pay is an issue for experienced and well-educated professionals. Obviously, upgrading their pay structure would be a big bonus but they could always contract out the work to qualified people (such as yourself). I imagine that the first step for the patent office would be to have someone do research and create a set of guidelines or policy outlining how computer software/hardware patents are to be reviewed, using current patents as examples. Then, a group of qualified people could be on an on-call contract to perform reviews and analysis of software/hardware patents as needed. Once the guidelines are in place, though, it should limit the need for outside anaylsis to a manageable number of contract hours.
I don't know if it will really do anything but any bit helps. Of course, getting someone into the patent office who actually has a clue as to how computer software/hardware works would be much more effective. These kinds of patents are akin to a rock band having a patent for a standard rock song chord progression and suing everybody who uses the same chords. Ridiculous.
"Although based in North Carolina, Virginia is asserting jurisdiction over Jaynes because he sent messages through computers located in the state.
Roughly 50 percent of the world's Internet traffic passes through Virginia, home to big Internet companies like Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE:TWX - news) American Online unit and MCI (Other OTC:WCOEQ - news)."
So that means he can be charged in federal court, too, since his crime involves multiple states, doesn't it? Or does it have to be shown that his email crossed into multiple states in order to take it to federal court? I would like to see more spammers be tried in federal court because the financial penalties are more significant and injurous than in many states. I would think a case could be made for the intent to damage people in multiple states just by accessing Virginia given its backbone status.
Of course, having a spammer charged in multiple states would be fine, too, just as long as it sticks and he pays for his crime in a way that deters him and others like him (I know, small chance of that).
Not to ask a stupid question, but what's the difference between them given these upgrades to the iBook besides price? The SuperDrive? Memory expansion?
Since there is only so much money to go around to fund IT infrastructure/application development, an integral part of my dept's mandate is to be cost-effective in order to be fair to all users across the state (which is a significant group since I'm in CA).
In light of that clarification, I don't think your comparison to US mail or paved roads or education or my deciding which candy bar to buy (twixt is my current favorite) is really applicable.;)
I think local control is as important as cost savings. From my experience, it is often overlooked as something desirable because some government managers don't want the full responsibility that brings, they always want to be able to point their finger at a vendor. I think the public deserves better than that.
...that I am currently re-writing proprietary applications bought from vendors, (one client-server app based on Oracle powerbuilder and another 32-bit windows-based). Once my team is done, we will own the code but the technology underneath (I'm thinking of Oracle specifically and other middleware applications) will still be owned by someone else. Once say Oracle decides to no longer support whichever of their products we are using, we have to upgrade and re-program it again if necessary, etc...
Basically, I think the cost-effectiveness will be recognizeable in the longterm because of the total ownership over the technology and investment made into resources so I understand your point in regards to open source by itself not necessarily being cost-effective. I have worked in the state government for 5+ years which, while not an extraordinarily long period of time, has revealed to me the expensive process that is endured with throwing money into "current" technology only to have it fade away within a few years and require replacing.
But you are quite right in that open source does not guarantee anything but it does offer great potential.
...distros build colloboratively by the IT departments from various state governments.
I realize it would most likely have to occur on departmental levels, for example, I work for the courts and develop case management systems so I would work with the IT departments of other courts in other states.
The current system in place for some of my appellate courts are based on a system that was developed by a vendor for a different state but since it's proprietary to the vendor, we can't enhance it so we have to re-write it so that we own the code and can make changes as needed. Imagine if we could create a baseline application for all the courts in the state and leverage all the programmers in those IT departments to work on it? Ok, so maybe it's just my fantasy.
"Last month, Japan, China and South Korea met in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh to sign an agreement to jointly research and develop non-Windows, open source OS."
Wouldn't it be great if state governments (yes, I'm fixated on state governments because I work for one but also because it is the public's money that is being spent) here in the US would do the same thing? I've seen individual states start various research projects but no larger effort that leverages all the resources in all states.
Tangent: my graduate thesis is going to be on why governments should have an open source technology preferential mandate given the cost-savings and total ownership provided by doing so. Call me crazy but I really believe that government should always choose the least expensive option whenever possibe. Currently, you ask for funding for a project and once you get it the rule is use it or lose it, thus, more money is spent than is really necessary for most projects in order to keep the funding for future years.
...could see that if Hollywood, which invests millions of dollars into movies and technology, uses Linux for performance-intensive digital animation rendering and authoring, then it is most likely robust and stable enough to handle government database applications (which are not all that complex).
I thought IBM embracing Linux would be enough to convince them that it should be considered but it wasn't. Maybe this will open their minds to the possibility a bit, especially given the huge cost-savings moving to Linux brings. With all the budget cuts, you'd think they'd be demanding we atleast look into Linux and run some pilot programs. Then again, 3 years ago it took them a while tp "be okay" with using Apache web server instead of Netscape Enterprise. Whatever.
...and I know many horrible tech recruiting agencies in San Francisco who have long-term relationships with my employer (state government) but still send over unqualified and/or horribly incompetent people. One alleged Oracle DBA lasted less than a week before they were fired and they still managed to do quite a bit of damage in those few days.
Why would an agency be so thoughtless when there are obviously so many qualified people looking for tech work you may ask? Because they know the government HAS to use a "government certified agency" - read has over $100,000+ in liability insurance and has filled out a bunch of forms.
I would LOVE to work with a real recruiter but for now, they are just resume sifters, handing us a pile that WE sort through and then WE narrow the choices and interview people so basically the recruiter gets paid for NOT doing their job. Beautiful.
Intellectually, I'm sure there are some non-scummy and integral recruiters out there somewhere but I'm so bitter and jaded over the many wretched experiences I've had that I'll always be skeptical of their existence.
...I worked with an immigrant from the Phillipines. She is a fantastic Oracle DBA, very easy to work with and knowledgeable. She was hired as a contractor in the middle of the dotcom boom when tech people were scarce and then was moved to an H1-B visa to hire her fulltime. When it expired, after about 3 years, it could not be renewed because I work for a government agency and the change in the job market indicated that we could no longer justify her in lieu of a US citizen. She is still in the country as her husband has an H1-B visa and she is working on getting her own work authorization approved by the INS. I hope her position will still be unfilled by the time her work authorization comes through so that we can hire her back.
To replace her with a contractor we cannot hire someone directly, due to liability issues (read lawsuit happy culture), and HAVE to use an "approved" agency/pimp. We told them what we needed and they sent over someone completely incompetent - we dismissed them after a week during which time they completely messed up 2 of my applications with their sloppiness, setting me back 4-6 weeks in development. We now have a contractor who is atleast competent but he insists on complaining to me about how much more he is used to getting paid (to which I replied that he should negotiate with his agency since we are paying an absurd amount for him given the current market).
With the current budget crisis (I'm in CA) we are not able to fill the DBA position so we will keep the contractor for a while. Meanwhile, I miss my old DBA - she was worth every penny and I still would prefer her over anybody, US citizen or Non-US citizen, just because of what a joy she was to work with. She made my life easy.
Apparently, yes. I'm certain that companies having been doing all sorts of things that no one is aware of and that the general public would find appalling, if they knew about it.
On the other hand, I would rather see companies willingly forgoe certain activities due to public pressure as opposed to having it regulated and legislated to death. The basic premise of a company wanting to protect itself from theft should not be undermined.
Thanks. This quote from Marcus Arnold says it all:
So what differs me from a real attorney is that I have no license from the Bar Assocation and I am only 16 years old.
..ummm...and he never attended law school. Oh wait, make that he never attended either college or law school or even paralegal school or legal secretary school.
The arrogance and egoism is mind-blowing.
(head shake in disbelief)
I read an in-depth article about him online, can't find the link to save my life but I will post it once I do, and it was a bit disturbing. His mom thinks he is some sort of genius prodigy and encourages him. Marcus believes he is a legal expert and gives out the home phone number to anyone and spends hours giving people his form of legal advice and monitoring his score on askme.com. It seemed to me that he almost sees it as a kind of game. His father is quite suspect of these people who are asking his 15-year old son for legal advice, especially when most of his son's "clients" always seem to be calling from payphones.
I had signed up with ricochet when it first came out at 28.8k service to not have to deal with hooking up a separate phone line (DSL was not available). The quality of connectivity was intermittent but the mobility made up for it. Overall, I was pleased with the service.
Once 128k went into beta, 28.8k users were dumped off onto a different vendor, (or atleast my service area was), who was *horrible* to deal with, totally incompetent. I was actually anxious to upgrade to get the faster service AND get away from this vendor and back to being supported by Metricom.
Then everything got switched - Metricom was supporting 28.8k users again but in order to have the 128k service, you had to order it from one of many vendors. I tried to order it through one who had each sent me a special upgrade offer as an existing ricochet user. When I went online to take advantage of the specials, I hit 404 errors all over the place. I tried a different vendor but their online registration wasn't ready yet either, even though they had already spammed me with an "Upgrade NOW" special offer. It was completely frustrating, especially given how expensive the service was.
Even if I had wanted to continue the 28.8k service, it was still $30/month, even though there were plenty of cheaper 56k diakup services available, and they required 1 year pre-payment. Forget it.
I have had a chance to use the 128k service via a company bought modem and it has been okay. Sometimes the connectivity has been fantastic, other times ok, and other times nonexistent. The only reason I used it was because I didn't have to pay for it. Even if I hadn't had an unpleasant prior experience with them, the service is just too expensive given the intermittent quality of connectivity.
The existence of evil is no reason for it's acceptance. An evil being common is no argument for it's maintenance.
Ummm...just to clarify. I never argued for it's maintenance. I only pointed out how common it is for authors to both publish their work and retain their rights to it.
Excerpt from the article: Currently, Eisen said, "We volunteer the material, the reviewing, the editing, and then we pay to get access to it"--a process he likened to a midwife who delivers a baby and then charges its parents to visit it. In response, the initiative has proposed that publishers should be paid to produce the manuscript, but should not own the material after publication.
Unfortunately, this type of outright ownership by publishers and distributors of other people's work is quite common. Many writers, whether they be scientists or freelance columnists or journalists, are forced to sign draconian contracts where in order to get their work published, they are forced to relinquish all rights to it.
Hopefully, the Public Library of Science Initiative will have an effect and take hold, starting a new trend in publishing practices.
Sure. All of the links reference Walt Mossberg's Wall Street Journal tech column. He writes in clear terms that most consumers can understand. He even makes the point that an upgrade really isn't necessary if your current system is working just fine. Don't fix what isn't broke.
The email I sent:
Dear family and friends,
Just in case any of you are considering upgrading your computers operating system to Microsoft Windows XP, I highly recommend you consider *not* doing it due to the underhanded tactics Microsoft has incorporated into its purchase.
Please read the following articles for more information:
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks, I really appreciate your words of encouragement.
I would love to specialize and feel really competent at some form of programming but my fate in life seems to be the trashcan where all the orphan projects go because no one else wants to deal with them and I'm always up for anything. On one hand, it can be very stimulating learning new things but on the other hand, it can be very frustrating to always feel like I've never really mastered anything.
On the otherOther hand, I have to admit that I like having a life involving non-tech related activities once in a while so my desire to learn and achieve does have its limits.
- tokengeekgrrl
I'm with you. I've always been fascinated by computers. When my dad brought home a computer in the early 1980s, once I knew that typing "dir" would bring up a list of stuff, I was hooked. I executed every command I could find including "Format" - my poor dad had to reinstall DOS from 12 huge floppy disks after that and then I had to sneak onto the computer after school before he got home from work, mainly to play Loderunner and beat my brother's score.
:)
Attending a private highschool in the mid 1980s, yes I know I'm dating myself here, gave me the privilege of having access to computers at school and some basic programming instruction. I used to spend many of my free periods in the computer room (sometimes just to whip out an english paper just before class).
Once I attended college, I considered majoring in computer science. I took a programming class (even got an A in it), it was me and one other girl in the class, with 20+ guys. We sat on one side of the room and they sat as far away as possible from us on the other side of the room, (we both were quite cute, I might add, so it's not like we were physically repulsive or anything). Obviously, we did all the programming projects together since the boys in the class would never interact with us. The professor wouldn't even look at us during class and if I ever went up to him after class to ask him a question, he kept his distance from me like I might give him leprosy.
Since I had stayed home a year after highschool to work both a full- and part-time job to afford to go to college, I decided that I had worked too hard and was paying too much money to deal with such a hostile environment so I decided not to pursue computer science. I also took an advanced calculus class that I really enjoyed where I had a very encouraging male professor but I had some dumb notion about not majoring in the same thing as my closest in age brother had. This particular brother was very competitive and I didn't want to deal with the comparisons he would make as to why he was smarter than me - a typically female trait, I suppose. I ended up majoring in political science and minoring in music and fortunately, had exceptional professors even though it was not my first choice of majors.
But I loved computers. I worked in the dining hall as a Senior Student Manager (ooh, the power) and once I found excel on the office computers, I re-did the schedule and payroll, programming macros just because I wanted to. I knew more about computers than the managers there did and they were more than happy to have me set everything up for the measely $7/hr they were paying me but I didn't care, I enjoyed doing it.
Since college, all my jobs have been computer-oriented. I am a mostly self-taught programmer, have gotten some formal training along the way and am a competent (not brilliant by any stretch) generalist who works with whatever language or environment is required of me. I currently develop custom applications as my full-time job and in spite of frustrating politics, I still love my work.
While I love working with computers and applications, I am constantly humbled by my lack of knowledge and barely average comprehension of math and computers. I definitely understand the lack of confidence aspect, there's just so much to learn and not enough time to learn it. Sometimes I feel like I am a fake because my knowledge of computers and software seems so shallow and any second someone is going to find me out and expose me for a fraud. Yet I can't imagine not working with computers. Whatever industry I may end up working in, I am certain it will be IT related, I just can't help but gravitate towards computers, the internet and basically all things technology-related, I think they're just the coolest things ever.
Sometimes I regret not majoring in computer science or math as I was originally inclined to do and wonder if my life would be any different now had I done so.
Oh, and I think a computer camp would have been pure heaven as a kid.
- tokengeekgrrl
Agreed. Case in point, a few months ago when I was talking to a girlfriend of mine who lives in NY, (I live in California), and I mentioned something I had read on a blog and she asked, "Blog? What's that?"
I have gotten that same remark from several friends and family members who live on the east coast.
So obviously that's not a real statisitcal sample but I don't think I'm making too erroneous of a statement by saying that I bet there are many, many people who don't read or even know what blogs are.
- tokengeekgrrl
...whining about how no women want you because you're a geek does.
To all you whiners, if you want to get laid, I highly recommend getting over yourselves already.
Just trying to help. Flame away.
tokengeekgrrl
keep reading the logs:
12/19/2003 - Z92 (92.3FM) held their annual "Sexy Santa" contest this morning... and I was there represent'n! I can't believe I won the $1,000 Grand Prize, paid by "Doctor John's Erotic Gift's"....
I have to laugh at all the suckers (or possibly slashdotters) I am sure have sent her money for her "legal defense fund" - if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
- tokengeekgrrl
"He has done business in two dozen countries, and has never visited any of them. He buys mailing lists from people in Sweden and India. And these days, he says, he sends his mail from computers in China and three other countries."
Won't all spammers who don't already email from other countries do so to get around the law? What can legally be done to stop or punish the spammers from doing this?
He says he's worried but I don't think he is at all. I think he's just playing to the press.
- tokengeekgrrl
I realize that pay is an issue for experienced and well-educated professionals. Obviously, upgrading their pay structure would be a big bonus but they could always contract out the work to qualified people (such as yourself). I imagine that the first step for the patent office would be to have someone do research and create a set of guidelines or policy outlining how computer software/hardware patents are to be reviewed, using current patents as examples. Then, a group of qualified people could be on an on-call contract to perform reviews and analysis of software/hardware patents as needed. Once the guidelines are in place, though, it should limit the need for outside anaylsis to a manageable number of contract hours.
Just speculating, though.
-- tokengeekgrrl
http://www.petitiononline.com/pasp01/petition.html
I don't know if it will really do anything but any bit helps. Of course, getting someone into the patent office who actually has a clue as to how computer software/hardware works would be much more effective. These kinds of patents are akin to a rock band having a patent for a standard rock song chord progression and suing everybody who uses the same chords. Ridiculous.
-- tokengeekgrrl
From the article:
"Although based in North Carolina, Virginia is asserting jurisdiction over Jaynes because he sent messages through computers located in the state.
Roughly 50 percent of the world's Internet traffic passes through Virginia, home to big Internet companies like Time Warner Inc.'s (NYSE:TWX - news) American Online unit and MCI (Other OTC:WCOEQ - news)."
So that means he can be charged in federal court, too, since his crime involves multiple states, doesn't it? Or does it have to be shown that his email crossed into multiple states in order to take it to federal court? I would like to see more spammers be tried in federal court because the financial penalties are more significant and injurous than in many states. I would think a case could be made for the intent to damage people in multiple states just by accessing Virginia given its backbone status.
Of course, having a spammer charged in multiple states would be fine, too, just as long as it sticks and he pays for his crime in a way that deters him and others like him (I know, small chance of that).
- tokengeekgrrl
Not to ask a stupid question, but what's the difference between them given these upgrades to the iBook besides price? The SuperDrive? Memory expansion?
- tokengeekgrrl
Since there is only so much money to go around to fund IT infrastructure/application development, an integral part of my dept's mandate is to be cost-effective in order to be fair to all users across the state (which is a significant group since I'm in CA).
;)
In light of that clarification, I don't think your comparison to US mail or paved roads or education or my deciding which candy bar to buy (twixt is my current favorite) is really applicable.
- tokengeekgrrl
...but I have now, thanks! :)
I think local control is as important as cost savings. From my experience, it is often overlooked as something desirable because some government managers don't want the full responsibility that brings, they always want to be able to point their finger at a vendor. I think the public deserves better than that.
- tokengeekgrrl
...that I am currently re-writing proprietary applications bought from vendors, (one client-server app based on Oracle powerbuilder and another 32-bit windows-based). Once my team is done, we will own the code but the technology underneath (I'm thinking of Oracle specifically and other middleware applications) will still be owned by someone else. Once say Oracle decides to no longer support whichever of their products we are using, we have to upgrade and re-program it again if necessary, etc...
Basically, I think the cost-effectiveness will be recognizeable in the longterm because of the total ownership over the technology and investment made into resources so I understand your point in regards to open source by itself not necessarily being cost-effective. I have worked in the state government for 5+ years which, while not an extraordinarily long period of time, has revealed to me the expensive process that is endured with throwing money into "current" technology only to have it fade away within a few years and require replacing.
But you are quite right in that open source does not guarantee anything but it does offer great potential.
- tokengeekgrrl
...distros build colloboratively by the IT departments from various state governments.
I realize it would most likely have to occur on departmental levels, for example, I work for the courts and develop case management systems so I would work with the IT departments of other courts in other states.
The current system in place for some of my appellate courts are based on a system that was developed by a vendor for a different state but since it's proprietary to the vendor, we can't enhance it so we have to re-write it so that we own the code and can make changes as needed. Imagine if we could create a baseline application for all the courts in the state and leverage all the programmers in those IT departments to work on it? Ok, so maybe it's just my fantasy.
- tokengeekgrrl
"Last month, Japan, China and South Korea met in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh to sign an agreement to jointly research and develop non-Windows, open source OS."
Wouldn't it be great if state governments (yes, I'm fixated on state governments because I work for one but also because it is the public's money that is being spent) here in the US would do the same thing? I've seen individual states start various research projects but no larger effort that leverages all the resources in all states.
Tangent: my graduate thesis is going to be on why governments should have an open source technology preferential mandate given the cost-savings and total ownership provided by doing so. Call me crazy but I really believe that government should always choose the least expensive option whenever possibe. Currently, you ask for funding for a project and once you get it the rule is use it or lose it, thus, more money is spent than is really necessary for most projects in order to keep the funding for future years.
- tokengeekgrrl
...could see that if Hollywood, which invests millions of dollars into movies and technology, uses Linux for performance-intensive digital animation rendering and authoring, then it is most likely robust and stable enough to handle government database applications (which are not all that complex).
I thought IBM embracing Linux would be enough to convince them that it should be considered but it wasn't. Maybe this will open their minds to the possibility a bit, especially given the huge cost-savings moving to Linux brings. With all the budget cuts, you'd think they'd be demanding we atleast look into Linux and run some pilot programs. Then again, 3 years ago it took them a while tp "be okay" with using Apache web server instead of Netscape Enterprise. Whatever.
- tokengeekgrrl
...and I know many horrible tech recruiting agencies in San Francisco who have long-term relationships with my employer (state government) but still send over unqualified and/or horribly incompetent people. One alleged Oracle DBA lasted less than a week before they were fired and they still managed to do quite a bit of damage in those few days.
Why would an agency be so thoughtless when there are obviously so many qualified people looking for tech work you may ask? Because they know the government HAS to use a "government certified agency" - read has over $100,000+ in liability insurance and has filled out a bunch of forms.
I would LOVE to work with a real recruiter but for now, they are just resume sifters, handing us a pile that WE sort through and then WE narrow the choices and interview people so basically the recruiter gets paid for NOT doing their job. Beautiful.
Intellectually, I'm sure there are some non-scummy and integral recruiters out there somewhere but I'm so bitter and jaded over the many wretched experiences I've had that I'll always be skeptical of their existence.
- tokengeekgrrl
...I worked with an immigrant from the Phillipines. She is a fantastic Oracle DBA, very easy to work with and knowledgeable. She was hired as a contractor in the middle of the dotcom boom when tech people were scarce and then was moved to an H1-B visa to hire her fulltime. When it expired, after about 3 years, it could not be renewed because I work for a government agency and the change in the job market indicated that we could no longer justify her in lieu of a US citizen. She is still in the country as her husband has an H1-B visa and she is working on getting her own work authorization approved by the INS. I hope her position will still be unfilled by the time her work authorization comes through so that we can hire her back.
To replace her with a contractor we cannot hire someone directly, due to liability issues (read lawsuit happy culture), and HAVE to use an "approved" agency/pimp. We told them what we needed and they sent over someone completely incompetent - we dismissed them after a week during which time they completely messed up 2 of my applications with their sloppiness, setting me back 4-6 weeks in development. We now have a contractor who is atleast competent but he insists on complaining to me about how much more he is used to getting paid (to which I replied that he should negotiate with his agency since we are paying an absurd amount for him given the current market).
With the current budget crisis (I'm in CA) we are not able to fill the DBA position so we will keep the contractor for a while. Meanwhile, I miss my old DBA - she was worth every penny and I still would prefer her over anybody, US citizen or Non-US citizen, just because of what a joy she was to work with. She made my life easy.
Just my 2 cents.
Apparently, yes. I'm certain that companies having been doing all sorts of things that no one is aware of and that the general public would find appalling, if they knew about it.
On the other hand, I would rather see companies willingly forgoe certain activities due to public pressure as opposed to having it regulated and legislated to death. The basic premise of a company wanting to protect itself from theft should not be undermined.
- tokengeekgrrl
So what differs me from a real attorney is that I have no license from the Bar Assocation and I am only 16 years old.
The arrogance and egoism is mind-blowing.
(head shake in disbelief)
tokengeekgrrl
In the case of Marcus Arnold, he is very much listened to even after it was revealed that he was only a teenager with no formal law school or even law office experience, although his askme.com profile indicates otherwise. Of course, I'm sure he has some legally viable explanation for being able to say he's "recognized by the American Bar Association" but I can't help but think that his "credentials" are a stretch at best.
I read an in-depth article about him online, can't find the link to save my life but I will post it once I do, and it was a bit disturbing. His mom thinks he is some sort of genius prodigy and encourages him. Marcus believes he is a legal expert and gives out the home phone number to anyone and spends hours giving people his form of legal advice and monitoring his score on askme.com. It seemed to me that he almost sees it as a kind of game. His father is quite suspect of these people who are asking his 15-year old son for legal advice, especially when most of his son's "clients" always seem to be calling from payphones.
- tokengeekgrrl
Once 128k went into beta, 28.8k users were dumped off onto a different vendor, (or atleast my service area was), who was *horrible* to deal with, totally incompetent. I was actually anxious to upgrade to get the faster service AND get away from this vendor and back to being supported by Metricom.
Then everything got switched - Metricom was supporting 28.8k users again but in order to have the 128k service, you had to order it from one of many vendors. I tried to order it through one who had each sent me a special upgrade offer as an existing ricochet user. When I went online to take advantage of the specials, I hit 404 errors all over the place. I tried a different vendor but their online registration wasn't ready yet either, even though they had already spammed me with an "Upgrade NOW" special offer. It was completely frustrating, especially given how expensive the service was.
Even if I had wanted to continue the 28.8k service, it was still $30/month, even though there were plenty of cheaper 56k diakup services available, and they required 1 year pre-payment. Forget it.
I have had a chance to use the 128k service via a company bought modem and it has been okay. Sometimes the connectivity has been fantastic, other times ok, and other times nonexistent. The only reason I used it was because I didn't have to pay for it. Even if I hadn't had an unpleasant prior experience with them, the service is just too expensive given the intermittent quality of connectivity.
Regardless, Metricom deserves an A for effort.
- tokengeekgrrl
Ummm...just to clarify. I never argued for it's maintenance. I only pointed out how common it is for authors to both publish their work and retain their rights to it.
Regardless, I enjoyed reading your post.
- tokengeekgrrl - tokengeekgrrl
Unfortunately, this type of outright ownership by publishers and distributors of other people's work is quite common. Many writers, whether they be scientists or freelance columnists or journalists, are forced to sign draconian contracts where in order to get their work published, they are forced to relinquish all rights to it.
Hopefully, the Public Library of Science Initiative will have an effect and take hold, starting a new trend in publishing practices.
- tokengeekgrrl
The email I sent:
Dear family and friends,
Just in case any of you are considering upgrading your computers operating system to Microsoft Windows XP, I highly recommend you consider *not* doing it due to the underhanded tactics Microsoft has incorporated into its purchase.
Please read the following articles for more information:
OfficeXP:
http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/ptech-20010517.html
XP Upgrade Cost:l
http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/mailbox-20010628.htm
MS Controlling the "activation" of XPl
http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/ptech-20010705.html
http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/mailbox-20010712.htm
- tokengeekgrrl