There is an historical context for building PHYSICAL (not virtual BS) walls that protect one territory from another. Honestly, I would be for copying the engineering plans that the israelis used to build their wall in the west bank. Use those plans to build one just like it across the mexican border.. ALL of it and then implement the plan that was suggested by another user for 31,000 guards every 1/4 mi along the wall with machine gun nests, snipers, electronic sensors, AND the wall set back enough to have a mine field. Further, I'd have underground microphones or seismomoters that measure for vibrations. If someone is detected digging underground then we go out, drill a hole in the ground down to where the tunnel is and drop some C4 in and be done with it. I would not play games with this. The great wall of china worked great for a while and for a time so did Hadrian's Wall in England during the roman empire.
As for those already here? If they have been here a while and have been well behaved, have a job, etc then give them work visas and a chance at citizenship if they keep a clean criminal record for 11 years. There is no way we are going to deport 15-30 million people back across the border who are here illegally.
This is why for all their platitudes and supposed small government aims that I will not vote for Republicons. The Dems are guilty too. But the republicons lie more when they claim small government. They want all the low taxes in the world (to help subsidize their industries) and then whey get a chance they use the government to step in subsidize business even when its not in the best interest of the country or in this NASA. They block out competition which is anti-competitive behavior and has nothing to do with the "free market" economics that the republicans claim to uphold. They are all liars the whole bunch of them. Duplicitious, greedy liars who only support their own company and their own aims. The only reason they don't want any regulations is so they can make a faster buck and take more public money for themselves and their own corrupt corporations. Many will argue loudly. The more loudly they argue the less any should listen to them. All their bunch with the tea partiers, haters, homophobes, corporate welfare state mergers, Glenn Becks, Rush Limbaughs and other literalists are a bunch of crazy, lunatic, psychopathic fascists. Cast them out and ignore them. They are self delusional and out of control. Well, my vote didn't go for them. Good day.
Well, he got his due. Thats about all I can say. For playing this game he gets the slammer where he belongs. Enough jobs have already been lost to China as it is. Ford has greatly improved their products recently and they have a right to protect and prosecute on lost IP like this. This means american jobs and so I am all for what happened. Maybe Chinese will think twice again before trying to steal trade secrets and plans. Go make your own and stop worrying about what ours are.
Valid points were made about mobile computing. It seems to me that mobile devices are the future. For that matter, I can imagine having a computer and interface system built into a set of sunglasses or eyeglasses to where its hard to even tell they are there. That is a little way off from now. However, I can definitely see an android device in the near future that has a built in projector for video display and then another laser projection device to project a virtual keyboard and mousing/pointing/trackpad virtual device. Add on top of this the possibility of cloud services like Google Apps (which really is not yet developed anywhere to its full potential yet) and you can see that Windows 7, mac os, or whatever desktop OS will not matter (as much). Of course, they will still be around especially in school labs and in offices. But the mobile device will be king especially with a built in projector, virtual keyboard device and virtual pointing or motion based system. It will not be long before mobile devices have the computing power of a laptop (but not a good desktop). That will be enough for most people I suspect.:)
Very interesting discussion. For a time I used Ubuntu 10.04 and finally I think there is a version for the average person. However, there is a problem. Myself and a bunch of other people have quite a bit of money and time sunk into windows programs. I've heard all the arguments and have used openoffice myself. It is pretty good! But it doesn't have absolutely 100% compatability with office and I don't have time to play around with that unless it works right with word, excel, etc formats perfectly every single time without a hitch. That is not a realistic expectation though. Basically, until there is an easy way to run all windows programs (or nearly all of them) under linux without a lot of hassle and configuration and to where it is a one or two click install people are not going to bother with it. We can kid ourselves all night and all day for the next 20 years that people should be using linux. But if they already have windows on the computer they bought and linux won't run the software they've already invested 100's in then I don't see it happening. I know there is crossover office which is pretty good but that is not a solution for 99%+ software compatability. WINE is impressive but is even more difficult to get working with some programs. No one has the time or the energy to D*^& around with it and then still not have it work like they need to. Add to this the fact that Win 7 is now pretty good even good and there is not much motivation to change. I like Ubuntu 10.04. It is easy to use, well designed (as a consumer grade OS), easy to install programs and many comparable programs to windows. The quality of the software is pretty good. But its gotta run windows programs. Plenty of people will be offended by that. Even with compatability it would be no guarantee. Even history shows that from the OS/2 experience in the early 90's. There was a very nice OS that ran most dos and windows programs seamlessly (or nearly) but then IBM released subsequent buggy versions of the OS in a hurry and M$ stomped them with win 95 and imcompatible Win32 libraries and API's later. So, there even with compatability there is not a guarantee that people will switch. But nearly full compatability would be a huge step toward attracting more users (myself included). I am saying this from observation, from experience, and the resistance to change which is part of human nature (for most people). Windows is not perfect but Win 7 has improved stability, security, and usability to a high level (relative to all other previous versions of windows). So it makes it even harder to convince people to switch. And people are afraid of change.
What you are mentioning is a reflection of experience at our university where I work as well. Nearly the same anyway. In fact, 90+% of the computers on this campus are windows based PC's. Macs are popular but far from a majority even with the students here. This fantasy land that universities are almost entirely mac dominated is false. Certainly, there is a higher percentage of students and faculty that use macs at universities than elsewhere but its hardly a majority. I also reflect what is said about lab and office machines that take forever to start up. But then again I think we are one of the last to still be using Novell. There is an active directory migration and win 7 migration occurring but it will take a long time to finish. I only wish the XP machines would boot faster. Taking 5+ minutes to boot a machine is ridiculous. But they have 100+ applications and network login etc along with novell that occur at startup. There has to be a better way though. I'll be glad to say good riddance to XP but now they just want to use the old XP image in vmware booting which defeats the point of going with 7 in the first place. Nonsense.
Now seriously Intel? Do you really take users for being this kind of a moron? Its easy! If I see something like this I'll simply not buy a computer with an intel chip in it that I have to pay extra money to activate a feature? This is about the same as the cable companies, etc that were trying to experiment with "metered billing" and then now the CEO gets mad because customers threw a pie in his face for treating the customer as if they are really that dumb to consider it! Come on! Seriously! Absolute BS. AMD is STILL making alternate CPU's after all. Hmmm, Intel! *knock knock* are you in there!?
Actually the Amiga was quite an advanced machine at the time. It is too bad that Commodore did not market it aggressively enough over time. Someone mentioned how poor PC programs looked compared to the Amiga. This is true. But I don't think the "three magic letters" are what made PC's so popular but rather the fact that PC's at the time already had all of the popular and "killer" business applications of the day. It also had M$'s monopolostic marketing and sales strategies which are exactly the strategies that Commodore should have used and actually were used when Tramiel was at the helm. Well, nothing is perfect in this world. Commodore made some of the most innovative computer products of the 80's and early 90's. It is a shame they have faded into relative computing obscurity. The Amiga OS itself was amazing for the time.
If you are not going to attend class then why are you in college? I recently graduated and most of the prof's where I went to school took attendance and counted it as part of your grade. There were some students who scoffed at it but I don't care. If you are going to waste the prof's time, the college's time, and your own time why not stay in your mother's basement and veg in front of the xbox? I even had one prof that would quietly walk over to the lecturn and silently write down a -1 in his grade book anytime a student came in late or left early. He didn't argue, he didn't yell, he just automatically deducted a point when people behaved irresponsibly.
I don't see why the RFID shouldn't be used. Attendance can be taken instantly and also record the time the student enters or leaves the room and then can be used to partially calcuate the final grade at the end of the semester and save a lot of time not having to take roll and send around roll sheets and things like this. Faster, more efficient, and holding people accountable and responsible for their actions. Especially, this is true in public universities where tax money is used to pay for people's education. People should be held accountable for their behavior. Counter to the idea that its treating people like children its actually expecting people to act like adults and be responsible. Maybe I am too "old school" but I am not. The rotten drift wood won't make it in an RFID roll system. I agree that huge classes are silly but even then the lecture can be useful. And in fact, I remember sitting in a class trying to pay attention to the prof when others were talking in the back of the room. Finally the prof yelled at them and told them to be quiet or leave. I also learned to sit at the front of the room to pay attention and see and hear what was going on rather than sit in the back with the idiots that interrupt, and text, etc.
So, in this case, even though I am usually against "big brother" initiatives I think this one is good. Put the RFID tag inside the student's ID card and they must have it to enter the room and their attendance and time of entry and departure are automatically recorded and automatically used to calculate the attendance portion of their grade. If they don't like it then tough balls and kiss behind. Go to school somewhere else or go home to mom's basement and veg in front of the xbox.
Well, I at least took the time to read many of the posts (though I hardly have time to read all of them). I will be calm and intelligent in my response. First off, if a company is truly evading taxes in an illegal way then they need to be visited by a court with judges who will apply the law accurately. You may interpret that anyway you want. Secondly, Even in my strategic management course in a reputable college of business we talk about corporate governance and corporate responsibility. From what I am reading in our text as well as the lectures from our professor I can tell you that mostly the idiots who watch the Faux news channel and who want the lowest possible taxes are the ones who (for the most part) are the fools. Every corporation has a responsibility to its stakeholders starting with 1) investors (who have questionable judgement though) 2) employees 3) customers and 4) communities (this includes citizens of a town or state and the government in said locations).
So on this basis a company that simply avoids taxes and then threatens to move his operations overseas is no better than Kim Jong Il threatening with his finger on the button every time he wants to scare the west. IN this case, Ballmer may do it. But don't get any idea that he is anything more than an overgrown child. His behavior proves that. Additionally, this is the same man that is known for throwing chairs in his office when he gets mad and having temper tantrums when things don't go his way. It seems that he is a man child having a fit due to Microsoft's recently reported lower revenue. Like Detroit, they have no one to blame but themselves. Not unions, not government, none of that. It boils down to the executives and the board of directors and also a bunch of avarice filled myopic investors who care more about every penny they can get now rather than long term profitability. Additionally, it must be said that microsoft losing sales due to problems with Vista is additionally their own problem. They released an OS that later became acceptable but during the first year they expected customers to keep buying an OS that was not ready.
Ballmer and M$ are not taking responsibility here. If Ballmer cannot adjust their business model to survive then perhaps the shareholders should vote him off the board and put someone in his seat less prone to temper tantrums and childish outbreaks of insanity. I think it is a common problem among corporate execs these days. They seem to feel entitled to private jets, $200,000 cars, etc. There are plenty of people who feel entitled to things including sometimes people in poverty. The difference here is that the impact of Microsoft's decisions are far greater reaching than those of someone in the middle of detroit, DC, Atlanta, LA, NYC, etc. Not that those individual decisions as a collective aren't a drag (they are). However, in this case Ballmer sets a bad example which is "I deserve and I will have" which are the hallmarks also of 3rd World Dictators and those who rob banks.
Anyway, that is my patient rant for today. I am no idiot. You all need to stop watching faux news and believing the talking heads there. And additionally it would be advisable to shut off the afternoon AM talk radio while your at it. There is almost nothing in fact presented from these outlets.
Have a nice day. Thank you.:)
HAHAHA i remember those. Growing up we had TWO of those phones. One was a nice desk phone with the rotary dial and then the really great one was the wall phone with a super long handset cord on it. Both phones were hardwired to the line and they were both rented from the phone company. LOL Yes, they both had the message that they were property of the phone company. Rotary dialing seems archaic now. In those days it was Southern Bell which was later BellSouth and now AT&T Southeast.
I also remember calling my grandparents long distance. lOL They lived in oklahoma and we were in NC. Back then it sounded like they were talking at me from a very long distance as even when they talked loud the sound wasn't that loud on long distance calls and there was some noise in the background when we called them.
Its amazing how much better technology is now versus 30 years ago.
Well, i like a lot of new AND old computer technology. Given that is the case i have a few relics of my own. I have a 25 year old Commodore 64 with monitor and disk drive that still work fine. I still play games on it occasionally. Additionally, I have a Pentium IV PC that is a frankenstein. The newest component in it is about six years old and the oldest component in it which is the DVD-ROM drive is 10 years old and still works perfectly. It also has a 30GB WD hard drive in it that is over 8 years old and still working perfectly. In my closet I have an original model IMac which still works perfectly. I still have all the manuals and the restore disk from apple for it. For that matter the newest Piece of hardware I have is already 5 years old. It is a Sony VAIO P4/3.0Ghz PC which still works great. The only thing I did to it was upgrade the memory in it to 2GB RAM. By the way, 32 Bit Vista works fine on it and I have a DX9 compatible video card so it works fine with Aero etc. I was skeptical that Vista would work reasonably well with it but it does!:) I have two older PIII PC's that are in various states of disrepair and will be an upcoming project to combine some of the parts in them into a working machine. The old "frankenstein" P4 system has Ubuntu 9.04 on it now. Fun stuff.:)
Seriously, this is about the dumbest idea I've ever heard of. Try passing this off on the Top Gear crowd and I guarantee that something will happen in the courts in England! LOL
Having said that I do think people should obey the speed limits and the rules of the road (most of the time). However, this electronic device is begging to create accidents. There are occasionally times when I am on the highway and need to accelerate to pass, etc and it would not be good to turn off the engine at the second I am trying to pass someone.
This sounds like an initiative from someone who has too much time on their hands and just wants to benefit the business of a buddy who will be manufacturing the devices.
Surely there are more important things to worry with. *yawn*
AT&T will have increased costs on their part as a result of this agreement. As a result it will likely result in increased internet rates for me as an AT&T customer. If I find out that my rates go up as a result of this agreement with the RIAA I wil cancel my subscription to AT&T DSL. AT&T should not be in the business of playing Nanny for the RIAA. If the RIAA wants this they should be the ones to foot the bill and pay the costs.
AT&T needs to stop wasting time and money on initiatives like this and focus on getting broadband into rural areas. All the money thats being wasted to support the RIAA could be used for rural broadband initiatives.
I understand that its not good to pirate stuff. However, like hell I am paying more to my ISP to support pursuit of people who download "illegal" content. The RIAA does a good enough job of that on their own. They are a sneaky, smug, hand wringing bunch of litigious thugs who want to waste the court's and taxpayer's time clogging the dockets with frivolous lawsuits and other wastes of government resources and time.
Well I am glad I don't live in Oklahoma anymore. Attitudes like this are why I left that place. And its not just OK. There are a lot of ignorant morons in this country. They have a right to their opinion but don't try to legislate out someone else's lectures because you disagree? Did you not learn about science or for that matter freedom of speech? I am tired of right wing religious nuts. They need to &*&% themselves and go to &*&?.
It is true that M$ is a much larger company than Apple. However, does any of this come as a surprise. They spend a lot developing their own software but they also spend a lot figuring out how to copy other people's stuff and on how to figure out how to take over smaller innovative companies and make the product their own.
Maybe when shareholders start selling the company out from under them they will have to do something. Personally, I know that windows will never go away because we are all too dependent on its software. However, I will open a champagne bottle the day M$ is forced to open source Windows in order for it to survive and they don't have any money left. Do I feel for the people who would lose their jobs? Absolutely, but its M$ fault. As one person said, turn right into the door where the chairs are flailing around. You can start there with why M$ is beginning its own nasty fall.
Well now, it appears that M$ is still up to the same dishonest, greasy, greedy, money grubbing tactics that they have used in the past. I really want to like M$ for some of the things they have done such as Office for instance which I feel is a good product.
However, last night is a good example of using more than 2 applications. I was working in two instances of office plus I had AIM, yahoo, and firefox running. There is no way in hell I will pay more just operate more than two programs at a time. This is BS. It is about as honest as the caps that Charter and the other ISP's are trying to lay upon us. M$ and other greedy companies, go F&*&! yourselves!
I am home sitting at my mom's computer now! LOL It is working fine. However, I too have had to implement some strategies to help her and my grandmother have an operational computer.
First of all they have an old PC, PIII/800Mhz with 512Mb RAM (yes I gave it to them). Anyway, it works and runs with Windows 2000 workstation edition.
I installed all the normal utilities on this computer including AVG which has automatic update (but not automatic scan) and of course automatic updates from M$ for the OS. Additionally, I installed logmein so that I may log in remotely to fix problems which has already saved a lot of trouble once since I installed it.
Other than that they have been using AOL for their email for years and it would be hard to change them over to some other email service which sucks but thats what they like. Anyway, AOL is on here (hehe) and it is set to access through TCP/IP over their DSL connection. Of course, Firefox 3 and all the necessary plugins are installed.
If they have a real problem they can call me, start up the computer and let me log in remotely to see whats going on with it.:)
Our Labor Cost in the US is too high. We have long had the ability to feel we are entitled to new TV's, computers and other things and thus feel justified in a high salary and an insular economic attitude. We can no longer afford this. When programmers in India can be hired for $20,000/yr we need to reassess our expectations for our standard of living. I know this pisses off a lot of people. However, look at Detroit. The UAW demanded $79/Hr to build cars and they were still crap. If we insist on these kind of wages and the standard of living that comes with them then we are dead in the water, especially with the economy tanking now like it hasn't in 25 years.
This is silly. Microsoft SHOULD have another WinHEC before releasing windows. They are trying to put everything on the hardware manufacturers to write proper drivers when they aren't even willing to follow through on supporting it themselves. Lets see how many hardware support problems exist when Windows 7 ships.
On the other hand the hardware manufacturers are dooming themselves if they ignore this issue. A lot of their revenue is derived from selling hardware for windows PC's.
Microsoft needs to step up to the plate and so do the hardware manufacturers. It sounds like they are going to wind up pointing fingers at each other. And that never really accomplishes anything.
Well now this is not a new occurence. For decades now technology that was originally invented by Americans winds up being implemented by foreign companies. Really, it is our OWN fault.
If we had companies that were actually willing and interested in investing in "risky" technologies we would be OK. A good example is when the transistor was invented in the 50's. The dumb heads that ran RCA weren't interested so the technology was taken to Japan.
For that matter look at Xerox. They could've owned the personal computer industry. But the conservative idiots in NY that run the company were not interested in what the PARC lab in CA was doing. Now, in that case Apple picked up the technology for a graphical user interface.
If we want to stop this export of technology then we have to stop having companies that shun promising technologies because their corporate thinking prevents the development of radical new technologies. Instead, low risk is the name of the game and lining one's pockets with a quick buck.
Without risk you don't get anywhere. There have been examples of risk taking in the US. Getting to the moon in the 60's comes to mind. However, other examples of corporate stodginess and group think have killed innovation in American business as well. Look at detroit. Only now did they start really building some good cars before they are almost completely bankrupt. No, instead the mismanagement and bean counting techniques in Detroit killed the American car business.:)
I just wonder if a collection of PS3's with its very good Cell processor running YD Linux or a bunch of cheap quad core PC's could not be configured more affordably. It would not have the management features of a cray which obviously will have "cadillac" level features for managability and redundancy not to mention internal bandwidth and buses that are far more efficient than a linux cluster. Still, in terms of bang for the buck I wonder if the two ideas I propose wouldn't be a better idea for a small supercomputer system. For that matter, especially considering that this cray ships with lipstick on a pig (ie Windows).
Very interesting. I think its good for schools who need small super computers affordably. I imagine the fact that it uses the Data Center edition of Windows Server 2008 is an advantage in some ways but also a huge disadvantage. I mean most people who have need for a supercomputer are probably not going to want to be using windows.
LOL, thats like Having a brand new high performance BMW M5 but having it fitted with a clown car body with polka dots and neon lights.:)
One additional note. While I was at the Cisco office in Charlotte the office staff there told me that since they installed the telepresence system, Cisco has cut out virtually all travel. They can do that simply because the telepresence experience is so good that there is not much reason to travel. Also, of course the telepresence system is quite expensive so they had to compensate for that somewhere.
Telepresence is a very cool technology. It is not just another video teleconference system. Anyone who has experienced it in person will be able to explain why it is not just another VTC.
I visited the Cisco Office in Charlotte not too long ago and was able to experience a telepresence conference with Cisco in Research Triangle Park. It really is quite amazing. Yes, it is expensive but if you see it yourself in person you will understand why.
It seems like a pretty good idea for cisco to have this system setup in hotels and other locations where it can be rented for corporations and other uses.
In fact, I can see where this could be used as a solution for conferences that would normally require a lot of travel. Instead, a small or medium size company that has an office in Atlanta and another office in Denver can simply rent time in a telepresence room at a hotel in atlanta and then in denver and probably still make it a lot cheaper than flying people half way across the country esp with airline tickets and fuel costs as high as they are right now.
Pretty cool stuff.
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There is an historical context for building PHYSICAL (not virtual BS) walls that protect one territory from another. Honestly, I would be for copying the engineering plans that the israelis used to build their wall in the west bank. Use those plans to build one just like it across the mexican border.. ALL of it and then implement the plan that was suggested by another user for 31,000 guards every 1/4 mi along the wall with machine gun nests, snipers, electronic sensors, AND the wall set back enough to have a mine field. Further, I'd have underground microphones or seismomoters that measure for vibrations. If someone is detected digging underground then we go out, drill a hole in the ground down to where the tunnel is and drop some C4 in and be done with it. I would not play games with this. The great wall of china worked great for a while and for a time so did Hadrian's Wall in England during the roman empire. As for those already here? If they have been here a while and have been well behaved, have a job, etc then give them work visas and a chance at citizenship if they keep a clean criminal record for 11 years. There is no way we are going to deport 15-30 million people back across the border who are here illegally.
This is why for all their platitudes and supposed small government aims that I will not vote for Republicons. The Dems are guilty too. But the republicons lie more when they claim small government. They want all the low taxes in the world (to help subsidize their industries) and then whey get a chance they use the government to step in subsidize business even when its not in the best interest of the country or in this NASA. They block out competition which is anti-competitive behavior and has nothing to do with the "free market" economics that the republicans claim to uphold. They are all liars the whole bunch of them. Duplicitious, greedy liars who only support their own company and their own aims. The only reason they don't want any regulations is so they can make a faster buck and take more public money for themselves and their own corrupt corporations. Many will argue loudly. The more loudly they argue the less any should listen to them. All their bunch with the tea partiers, haters, homophobes, corporate welfare state mergers, Glenn Becks, Rush Limbaughs and other literalists are a bunch of crazy, lunatic, psychopathic fascists. Cast them out and ignore them. They are self delusional and out of control. Well, my vote didn't go for them. Good day.
Well, he got his due. Thats about all I can say. For playing this game he gets the slammer where he belongs. Enough jobs have already been lost to China as it is. Ford has greatly improved their products recently and they have a right to protect and prosecute on lost IP like this. This means american jobs and so I am all for what happened. Maybe Chinese will think twice again before trying to steal trade secrets and plans. Go make your own and stop worrying about what ours are.
Valid points were made about mobile computing. It seems to me that mobile devices are the future. For that matter, I can imagine having a computer and interface system built into a set of sunglasses or eyeglasses to where its hard to even tell they are there. That is a little way off from now. However, I can definitely see an android device in the near future that has a built in projector for video display and then another laser projection device to project a virtual keyboard and mousing/pointing/trackpad virtual device. Add on top of this the possibility of cloud services like Google Apps (which really is not yet developed anywhere to its full potential yet) and you can see that Windows 7, mac os, or whatever desktop OS will not matter (as much). Of course, they will still be around especially in school labs and in offices. But the mobile device will be king especially with a built in projector, virtual keyboard device and virtual pointing or motion based system. It will not be long before mobile devices have the computing power of a laptop (but not a good desktop). That will be enough for most people I suspect. :)
Very interesting discussion. For a time I used Ubuntu 10.04 and finally I think there is a version for the average person. However, there is a problem. Myself and a bunch of other people have quite a bit of money and time sunk into windows programs. I've heard all the arguments and have used openoffice myself. It is pretty good! But it doesn't have absolutely 100% compatability with office and I don't have time to play around with that unless it works right with word, excel, etc formats perfectly every single time without a hitch. That is not a realistic expectation though. Basically, until there is an easy way to run all windows programs (or nearly all of them) under linux without a lot of hassle and configuration and to where it is a one or two click install people are not going to bother with it. We can kid ourselves all night and all day for the next 20 years that people should be using linux. But if they already have windows on the computer they bought and linux won't run the software they've already invested 100's in then I don't see it happening. I know there is crossover office which is pretty good but that is not a solution for 99%+ software compatability. WINE is impressive but is even more difficult to get working with some programs. No one has the time or the energy to D*^& around with it and then still not have it work like they need to. Add to this the fact that Win 7 is now pretty good even good and there is not much motivation to change. I like Ubuntu 10.04. It is easy to use, well designed (as a consumer grade OS), easy to install programs and many comparable programs to windows. The quality of the software is pretty good. But its gotta run windows programs. Plenty of people will be offended by that. Even with compatability it would be no guarantee. Even history shows that from the OS/2 experience in the early 90's. There was a very nice OS that ran most dos and windows programs seamlessly (or nearly) but then IBM released subsequent buggy versions of the OS in a hurry and M$ stomped them with win 95 and imcompatible Win32 libraries and API's later. So, there even with compatability there is not a guarantee that people will switch. But nearly full compatability would be a huge step toward attracting more users (myself included). I am saying this from observation, from experience, and the resistance to change which is part of human nature (for most people). Windows is not perfect but Win 7 has improved stability, security, and usability to a high level (relative to all other previous versions of windows). So it makes it even harder to convince people to switch. And people are afraid of change.
What you are mentioning is a reflection of experience at our university where I work as well. Nearly the same anyway. In fact, 90+% of the computers on this campus are windows based PC's. Macs are popular but far from a majority even with the students here. This fantasy land that universities are almost entirely mac dominated is false. Certainly, there is a higher percentage of students and faculty that use macs at universities than elsewhere but its hardly a majority. I also reflect what is said about lab and office machines that take forever to start up. But then again I think we are one of the last to still be using Novell. There is an active directory migration and win 7 migration occurring but it will take a long time to finish. I only wish the XP machines would boot faster. Taking 5+ minutes to boot a machine is ridiculous. But they have 100+ applications and network login etc along with novell that occur at startup. There has to be a better way though. I'll be glad to say good riddance to XP but now they just want to use the old XP image in vmware booting which defeats the point of going with 7 in the first place. Nonsense.
Now seriously Intel? Do you really take users for being this kind of a moron? Its easy! If I see something like this I'll simply not buy a computer with an intel chip in it that I have to pay extra money to activate a feature? This is about the same as the cable companies, etc that were trying to experiment with "metered billing" and then now the CEO gets mad because customers threw a pie in his face for treating the customer as if they are really that dumb to consider it! Come on! Seriously! Absolute BS. AMD is STILL making alternate CPU's after all. Hmmm, Intel! *knock knock* are you in there!?
Actually the Amiga was quite an advanced machine at the time. It is too bad that Commodore did not market it aggressively enough over time. Someone mentioned how poor PC programs looked compared to the Amiga. This is true. But I don't think the "three magic letters" are what made PC's so popular but rather the fact that PC's at the time already had all of the popular and "killer" business applications of the day. It also had M$'s monopolostic marketing and sales strategies which are exactly the strategies that Commodore should have used and actually were used when Tramiel was at the helm. Well, nothing is perfect in this world. Commodore made some of the most innovative computer products of the 80's and early 90's. It is a shame they have faded into relative computing obscurity. The Amiga OS itself was amazing for the time.
If you are not going to attend class then why are you in college? I recently graduated and most of the prof's where I went to school took attendance and counted it as part of your grade. There were some students who scoffed at it but I don't care. If you are going to waste the prof's time, the college's time, and your own time why not stay in your mother's basement and veg in front of the xbox? I even had one prof that would quietly walk over to the lecturn and silently write down a -1 in his grade book anytime a student came in late or left early. He didn't argue, he didn't yell, he just automatically deducted a point when people behaved irresponsibly. I don't see why the RFID shouldn't be used. Attendance can be taken instantly and also record the time the student enters or leaves the room and then can be used to partially calcuate the final grade at the end of the semester and save a lot of time not having to take roll and send around roll sheets and things like this. Faster, more efficient, and holding people accountable and responsible for their actions. Especially, this is true in public universities where tax money is used to pay for people's education. People should be held accountable for their behavior. Counter to the idea that its treating people like children its actually expecting people to act like adults and be responsible. Maybe I am too "old school" but I am not. The rotten drift wood won't make it in an RFID roll system. I agree that huge classes are silly but even then the lecture can be useful. And in fact, I remember sitting in a class trying to pay attention to the prof when others were talking in the back of the room. Finally the prof yelled at them and told them to be quiet or leave. I also learned to sit at the front of the room to pay attention and see and hear what was going on rather than sit in the back with the idiots that interrupt, and text, etc. So, in this case, even though I am usually against "big brother" initiatives I think this one is good. Put the RFID tag inside the student's ID card and they must have it to enter the room and their attendance and time of entry and departure are automatically recorded and automatically used to calculate the attendance portion of their grade. If they don't like it then tough balls and kiss behind. Go to school somewhere else or go home to mom's basement and veg in front of the xbox.
Well, I at least took the time to read many of the posts (though I hardly have time to read all of them). I will be calm and intelligent in my response. First off, if a company is truly evading taxes in an illegal way then they need to be visited by a court with judges who will apply the law accurately. You may interpret that anyway you want. Secondly, Even in my strategic management course in a reputable college of business we talk about corporate governance and corporate responsibility. From what I am reading in our text as well as the lectures from our professor I can tell you that mostly the idiots who watch the Faux news channel and who want the lowest possible taxes are the ones who (for the most part) are the fools. Every corporation has a responsibility to its stakeholders starting with 1) investors (who have questionable judgement though) 2) employees 3) customers and 4) communities (this includes citizens of a town or state and the government in said locations). So on this basis a company that simply avoids taxes and then threatens to move his operations overseas is no better than Kim Jong Il threatening with his finger on the button every time he wants to scare the west. IN this case, Ballmer may do it. But don't get any idea that he is anything more than an overgrown child. His behavior proves that. Additionally, this is the same man that is known for throwing chairs in his office when he gets mad and having temper tantrums when things don't go his way. It seems that he is a man child having a fit due to Microsoft's recently reported lower revenue. Like Detroit, they have no one to blame but themselves. Not unions, not government, none of that. It boils down to the executives and the board of directors and also a bunch of avarice filled myopic investors who care more about every penny they can get now rather than long term profitability. Additionally, it must be said that microsoft losing sales due to problems with Vista is additionally their own problem. They released an OS that later became acceptable but during the first year they expected customers to keep buying an OS that was not ready. Ballmer and M$ are not taking responsibility here. If Ballmer cannot adjust their business model to survive then perhaps the shareholders should vote him off the board and put someone in his seat less prone to temper tantrums and childish outbreaks of insanity. I think it is a common problem among corporate execs these days. They seem to feel entitled to private jets, $200,000 cars, etc. There are plenty of people who feel entitled to things including sometimes people in poverty. The difference here is that the impact of Microsoft's decisions are far greater reaching than those of someone in the middle of detroit, DC, Atlanta, LA, NYC, etc. Not that those individual decisions as a collective aren't a drag (they are). However, in this case Ballmer sets a bad example which is "I deserve and I will have" which are the hallmarks also of 3rd World Dictators and those who rob banks. Anyway, that is my patient rant for today. I am no idiot. You all need to stop watching faux news and believing the talking heads there. And additionally it would be advisable to shut off the afternoon AM talk radio while your at it. There is almost nothing in fact presented from these outlets. Have a nice day. Thank you. :)
HAHAHA i remember those. Growing up we had TWO of those phones. One was a nice desk phone with the rotary dial and then the really great one was the wall phone with a super long handset cord on it. Both phones were hardwired to the line and they were both rented from the phone company. LOL Yes, they both had the message that they were property of the phone company. Rotary dialing seems archaic now. In those days it was Southern Bell which was later BellSouth and now AT&T Southeast. I also remember calling my grandparents long distance. lOL They lived in oklahoma and we were in NC. Back then it sounded like they were talking at me from a very long distance as even when they talked loud the sound wasn't that loud on long distance calls and there was some noise in the background when we called them. Its amazing how much better technology is now versus 30 years ago.
Well, i like a lot of new AND old computer technology. Given that is the case i have a few relics of my own. I have a 25 year old Commodore 64 with monitor and disk drive that still work fine. I still play games on it occasionally. Additionally, I have a Pentium IV PC that is a frankenstein. The newest component in it is about six years old and the oldest component in it which is the DVD-ROM drive is 10 years old and still works perfectly. It also has a 30GB WD hard drive in it that is over 8 years old and still working perfectly. In my closet I have an original model IMac which still works perfectly. I still have all the manuals and the restore disk from apple for it. For that matter the newest Piece of hardware I have is already 5 years old. It is a Sony VAIO P4/3.0Ghz PC which still works great. The only thing I did to it was upgrade the memory in it to 2GB RAM. By the way, 32 Bit Vista works fine on it and I have a DX9 compatible video card so it works fine with Aero etc. I was skeptical that Vista would work reasonably well with it but it does! :) I have two older PIII PC's that are in various states of disrepair and will be an upcoming project to combine some of the parts in them into a working machine. The old "frankenstein" P4 system has Ubuntu 9.04 on it now. Fun stuff. :)
Seriously, this is about the dumbest idea I've ever heard of. Try passing this off on the Top Gear crowd and I guarantee that something will happen in the courts in England! LOL Having said that I do think people should obey the speed limits and the rules of the road (most of the time). However, this electronic device is begging to create accidents. There are occasionally times when I am on the highway and need to accelerate to pass, etc and it would not be good to turn off the engine at the second I am trying to pass someone. This sounds like an initiative from someone who has too much time on their hands and just wants to benefit the business of a buddy who will be manufacturing the devices. Surely there are more important things to worry with. *yawn*
AT&T will have increased costs on their part as a result of this agreement. As a result it will likely result in increased internet rates for me as an AT&T customer. If I find out that my rates go up as a result of this agreement with the RIAA I wil cancel my subscription to AT&T DSL. AT&T should not be in the business of playing Nanny for the RIAA. If the RIAA wants this they should be the ones to foot the bill and pay the costs. AT&T needs to stop wasting time and money on initiatives like this and focus on getting broadband into rural areas. All the money thats being wasted to support the RIAA could be used for rural broadband initiatives. I understand that its not good to pirate stuff. However, like hell I am paying more to my ISP to support pursuit of people who download "illegal" content. The RIAA does a good enough job of that on their own. They are a sneaky, smug, hand wringing bunch of litigious thugs who want to waste the court's and taxpayer's time clogging the dockets with frivolous lawsuits and other wastes of government resources and time.
Well I am glad I don't live in Oklahoma anymore. Attitudes like this are why I left that place. And its not just OK. There are a lot of ignorant morons in this country. They have a right to their opinion but don't try to legislate out someone else's lectures because you disagree? Did you not learn about science or for that matter freedom of speech? I am tired of right wing religious nuts. They need to &*&% themselves and go to &*&?.
It is true that M$ is a much larger company than Apple. However, does any of this come as a surprise. They spend a lot developing their own software but they also spend a lot figuring out how to copy other people's stuff and on how to figure out how to take over smaller innovative companies and make the product their own. Maybe when shareholders start selling the company out from under them they will have to do something. Personally, I know that windows will never go away because we are all too dependent on its software. However, I will open a champagne bottle the day M$ is forced to open source Windows in order for it to survive and they don't have any money left. Do I feel for the people who would lose their jobs? Absolutely, but its M$ fault. As one person said, turn right into the door where the chairs are flailing around. You can start there with why M$ is beginning its own nasty fall.
Well now, it appears that M$ is still up to the same dishonest, greasy, greedy, money grubbing tactics that they have used in the past. I really want to like M$ for some of the things they have done such as Office for instance which I feel is a good product. However, last night is a good example of using more than 2 applications. I was working in two instances of office plus I had AIM, yahoo, and firefox running. There is no way in hell I will pay more just operate more than two programs at a time. This is BS. It is about as honest as the caps that Charter and the other ISP's are trying to lay upon us. M$ and other greedy companies, go F&*&! yourselves!
I am home sitting at my mom's computer now! LOL It is working fine. However, I too have had to implement some strategies to help her and my grandmother have an operational computer. First of all they have an old PC, PIII/800Mhz with 512Mb RAM (yes I gave it to them). Anyway, it works and runs with Windows 2000 workstation edition. I installed all the normal utilities on this computer including AVG which has automatic update (but not automatic scan) and of course automatic updates from M$ for the OS. Additionally, I installed logmein so that I may log in remotely to fix problems which has already saved a lot of trouble once since I installed it. Other than that they have been using AOL for their email for years and it would be hard to change them over to some other email service which sucks but thats what they like. Anyway, AOL is on here (hehe) and it is set to access through TCP/IP over their DSL connection. Of course, Firefox 3 and all the necessary plugins are installed. If they have a real problem they can call me, start up the computer and let me log in remotely to see whats going on with it. :)
Our Labor Cost in the US is too high. We have long had the ability to feel we are entitled to new TV's, computers and other things and thus feel justified in a high salary and an insular economic attitude. We can no longer afford this. When programmers in India can be hired for $20,000/yr we need to reassess our expectations for our standard of living. I know this pisses off a lot of people. However, look at Detroit. The UAW demanded $79/Hr to build cars and they were still crap. If we insist on these kind of wages and the standard of living that comes with them then we are dead in the water, especially with the economy tanking now like it hasn't in 25 years.
This is silly. Microsoft SHOULD have another WinHEC before releasing windows. They are trying to put everything on the hardware manufacturers to write proper drivers when they aren't even willing to follow through on supporting it themselves. Lets see how many hardware support problems exist when Windows 7 ships. On the other hand the hardware manufacturers are dooming themselves if they ignore this issue. A lot of their revenue is derived from selling hardware for windows PC's. Microsoft needs to step up to the plate and so do the hardware manufacturers. It sounds like they are going to wind up pointing fingers at each other. And that never really accomplishes anything.
Well now this is not a new occurence. For decades now technology that was originally invented by Americans winds up being implemented by foreign companies. Really, it is our OWN fault. If we had companies that were actually willing and interested in investing in "risky" technologies we would be OK. A good example is when the transistor was invented in the 50's. The dumb heads that ran RCA weren't interested so the technology was taken to Japan. For that matter look at Xerox. They could've owned the personal computer industry. But the conservative idiots in NY that run the company were not interested in what the PARC lab in CA was doing. Now, in that case Apple picked up the technology for a graphical user interface. If we want to stop this export of technology then we have to stop having companies that shun promising technologies because their corporate thinking prevents the development of radical new technologies. Instead, low risk is the name of the game and lining one's pockets with a quick buck. Without risk you don't get anywhere. There have been examples of risk taking in the US. Getting to the moon in the 60's comes to mind. However, other examples of corporate stodginess and group think have killed innovation in American business as well. Look at detroit. Only now did they start really building some good cars before they are almost completely bankrupt. No, instead the mismanagement and bean counting techniques in Detroit killed the American car business. :)
I just wonder if a collection of PS3's with its very good Cell processor running YD Linux or a bunch of cheap quad core PC's could not be configured more affordably. It would not have the management features of a cray which obviously will have "cadillac" level features for managability and redundancy not to mention internal bandwidth and buses that are far more efficient than a linux cluster. Still, in terms of bang for the buck I wonder if the two ideas I propose wouldn't be a better idea for a small supercomputer system. For that matter, especially considering that this cray ships with lipstick on a pig (ie Windows).
Very interesting. I think its good for schools who need small super computers affordably. I imagine the fact that it uses the Data Center edition of Windows Server 2008 is an advantage in some ways but also a huge disadvantage. I mean most people who have need for a supercomputer are probably not going to want to be using windows. LOL, thats like Having a brand new high performance BMW M5 but having it fitted with a clown car body with polka dots and neon lights. :)
One additional note. While I was at the Cisco office in Charlotte the office staff there told me that since they installed the telepresence system, Cisco has cut out virtually all travel. They can do that simply because the telepresence experience is so good that there is not much reason to travel. Also, of course the telepresence system is quite expensive so they had to compensate for that somewhere.
Telepresence is a very cool technology. It is not just another video teleconference system. Anyone who has experienced it in person will be able to explain why it is not just another VTC. I visited the Cisco Office in Charlotte not too long ago and was able to experience a telepresence conference with Cisco in Research Triangle Park. It really is quite amazing. Yes, it is expensive but if you see it yourself in person you will understand why. It seems like a pretty good idea for cisco to have this system setup in hotels and other locations where it can be rented for corporations and other uses. In fact, I can see where this could be used as a solution for conferences that would normally require a lot of travel. Instead, a small or medium size company that has an office in Atlanta and another office in Denver can simply rent time in a telepresence room at a hotel in atlanta and then in denver and probably still make it a lot cheaper than flying people half way across the country esp with airline tickets and fuel costs as high as they are right now. Pretty cool stuff.