Despite guns not being legal here to others than police, athlete shooters and hunters, they still manage to shoot after eachothers in public.
Well, despite that I'm personally not very fond of guns, I can't let go of the thought that all the restriction of firearms does here, is to guarantee that only authorities and bad guys have guns.
While I trust the police and military here very much, I don't trust that bad guys will only shoot after bad guys or the police. I would like more liberal laws around defense weapons here, not even pepper spray is legal.
However, I would not mind if getting a permit would require some training and testing, and I would not mind to be registered so the police would know if and what weapon I have, they could also very well limit how powerful it would be allowed to be and how many guns I could have, but I would like it to be more liberal than it is.
This is exactly what I evaluate when choosing OS. One this is corporate class support, the other is what the OS itself supports.
I don't know if it has been fixed today, but when I last tried and tested OpenSolaris as a replacement for my Linux, I ended up ditching it because of lacking support for Bluetooth.
While this particular feature isn't vital to a server, other features may be. So my general advice to OP would be first to make clear what the requirements are, and put priority to the corporate support vs. license question. Since OpenSolaris and BSD are what's left to decide between, I would guess the license isn't that important.
So if OpenSolaris supports all the hardware and features needed for the task, I would go for that in a corporate environment, because of the posibility of corporate class support. If the company already have plenty of experienced un*x admins to provide a 24/7 3hr support on its own, I'd say go for FreeBSD, because development is more agile than OpenSolaris, new features and hardware are supported quicker on this platform, and given you have these skillfull admins already, the new stuff could be made to work easily.
It's important to remember that not all equipment works with a 110-250V range, at least remember to check it.
As for the plug adapter, I have two, one of those terrible multi-plugs which slides and all, mostly because in some countries, you never know what plug your hotel has chosen to settle on. However for the american plug I found a brilliant kind of plug that allowes almost anything to be plugged into it, bought it for $4 in one of New York's chinatowns.
For charging my phone, i bought a cable that uses the USB to charge it, since i have one where you can enable USB power to stay on while the computer is off, besides, many phones charges from USB even without a special cable.
I usually don't bring more electronics than that, sometimes a camera, but I prefer to experience things rather than seeing them on an LCD.
Hotels most often include wifi in the room price, and internet stations in their lobbies, I see no reason to stalk an internet café, disgusting keyboards, and some are very noisy as many are about gaming these days.
How are the british rules about inspecting/confiscating electronics? Can they do like they can in US, i mean, confiscate with no reciepe nor time limit?
Not that i believe the OP would be much happier losing it on the way home.
it's such a hassle to convince security that it's alright for you to bring a bottle of liquids on board the plane, anal lube may be okay if put into a sealed clear plastic bag.
Anyway most (non-discount) airlines offer free drinks during intercontinental flights, including whisky.
I don't know if there's a legal drinking age in the air, but I've never heard them ask anyone for ID.
hmmm... not wearing a watch can be just as much a statement as wearing one.
But you're right, watches are much longer standing statements of style and status than any mobile phone, which will anyway be changed every 6-12 months.
I've not been wearing a watch for several years now, I do find it troublesome to pull out my phone for it and it certainly isn't something to attract ladies. However not wearing a watch may signal "I've got time for you", "I can manage my day unassistedly" or "I'm not handcuffed to time", and I always show up on time.
All I'm saying is that not wearing a watch can be just as strong a signal as wearing a Rolex or whatever, as long as you're not a slack regarding time.
However you do lose opportunity of looking busy and checking your watch if you're in a situation you'd rather escape from.
1200 in the US die every day from smoking related illnesses
135 of these are from passive smoke
115 fatal car accidents happen every day in the US (no mention of how many die in each)
People die from one or the other, but how much is a life worth?
Passive smoke and roadkill isn't that different really. Where the real hipocracy is, is when life-time smokers expect expensive treatment to keep them alive for another 5 years.
As a rake (and smoker) myself, i am already aware of the years (of boring life) I won't get, I need no treatment, i may live 5-10 years shorter, but i enjoyed every single day of what i had. As for the 135 passive smoke deaths, it could be avoided with considerate smokers, just as considerate drivers rarely kill anyone.
Liberty isn't just about money, guns and cars, it's just as much about what kind of life you wanna lead urself.
Well, I'm european, and I understand your perspective.
On the other hand, who earns on the american model? The banks and insurance companies, not you as a citizen. I bet you that you spend just as much on percent of your income on loans + savings + insurances + taxes as I do, if not even more.
You have to either save up or borrow money for education, I don't, and it's reflected in the reputation that general american education has versus the european. I pay extra for smoking, can't wait until they realize that fat should be taxed like tobacco and alcohol, basically these added taxes ensures that at least on healthcare, no one are cheating anyone (except from the fat people so far).
Of course there are lazy slackers around living off government money, but at least I don't have to reject 20-30 beggers each time I go for a downtown walk or train trip, they're at their home, spending my money on beer and drugs probably. The relief of this alone is worth the money, never feel guilty, never waste my time, don't have to look at poverty and a failure of society each second I'm outdoors.
I have done what I could do for the poor, so they're not really poor anymore, but slackers? yes maybe, I don't care.
The Danish public service TV/Radio company is accused of being biased against the govt. from time to time. Just to add to the pile of "Tax/Govt. supported news sources can be fair" comments. The quality of the entertainment programmes varies tho, but mostly it's good.
I do like the trend towards legal and convenient offerings, but when 10 mins of ads in the beginning of a stream is enough to pay for the movie, why don't the media corps go together and make a torrent tracker with their movies with ads in the beginning, in a standard format without DRM?
Sure, they would have no control over the files after someone downloaded it, it could be distibuted further out, spreading the ads, and someone may cut off the ads and distribute that, but I'd think the convenience of their movie site would still be good enough for a huge majority of users.
Another solution would be to stream the movies, still in standard format and without DRM. Of course those determined to make copies can't be stopped, but again the convenience would win.
Why does it make sense for them to keep those old fashion regions of distribution? Don't tell me because of different languages, DVD's have been able to play different chapters for different languages, not just audio or captions. Only reason I see is solidarity with the old meatspace distributors, who still want money.
Of course they want money, but why should they be paid for nothing? Let them sell physical discs and what so ever, but let the internet be free from geographical licensing. It would be cheaper to the consumer, not having to feed those lazy distributors for allowing online distribution in their area, and the big media corps could still earn more.
It's worth to note that not all cinemas let people rush and fight for their seats. Some allow you to reserve a seat number, from home, online, then it works great to show up late. Being late on purpose can have many benefits, not just going to the movies, ever been waiting forever in line to check in or boarding while traveling?
Because getting several kilometers radius of coverage from one antenna to hundreds of phones without causing intolerable interference cannot be done in theory alone, field testing and measurements are necessary and needs expensive equipment before any federal organization would dare to assign a radio frequency spectrum to your standard.
Also because antenna design has gone from internal to internal, and makes a big difference in range, another task that needs more than theory. This has nothing to do with the standard as such, it would just require iPhone to have a little external antenna, remember those good times?
It's simple, not everything can be done in software and theory, and real world costs real money... unfortunately
Sure, one can jailbreak an iPhone or root an Android, but those are still limited frameworks.
The jailbreak iPhone community wouldn't get to be as big as the community making appstore apps over night.
Android could end up having quite a community, but since android is (mostly) open the huge Linux community can easily keep their systems Android compatible without locking the rest of the system up so much that they could not benefit from all the other good stuff going on around Linux.
So Nokia not committing to Android is a clever move in my eyes, because it opens up possibilities rather than limiting them.
Agreed, decentralization is hardly slowing anything down. There is however another major disadvantage when there's no central control, which was somewhat dealt with on eDonkey, anyone remember when ShareReactor was the thing? However, the media corporations managed to stop it for long enough for most people to move on to other technologies.
What is really slow is true anonymization, encrypted packets that have to jump thru several nodes to hide sender and receiver, generally not very suitable for large filetransfers. I saw someone suggesting to use Tor to anonymize it, and that's what makes it slow. However some hybrid could be beneficial, with the centralized parts hidden on an anonymous network like Tor, while the actual file transfers would not be anonymous, direct connections between sender and receiver, and thus still of acceptable speed.
NAT works, if no machine on the LAN is infected with something that allows remote control.
Updates will eventually obsolete this trick, of course servers are taken extra care of, clients would be vulnerable the longest.
Windows Firewall... I don't trust it, countless times have I been able to launch programmes not allowed thru windows firewall, it pops up asking me if i want to keep blocking it... however in the background i can see PuTTy or whatever establishing a connection just fine without my approval, just until i choose to block it, which would be too late had it been malicious software. And I've seen this on all windows from XP to 7... When it can't even keep local programs from getting out, why should i trust it would keep anything outside? What comes from outside has got to be much more unpredictable than what runs locally trying to get out... so I don't trust it...
You're right it won't be as severe as it was with the old windows counting percent, but counting the number of people that's gonna experience it, I don't know if it'll be fewer, there's a lot more computers around today than late 90's, don't know if it'll be more either...
The company I work for kept win2k until support ended before XP was deployed. Not so much because of the fear that XP was a bad OS, simply because win2k worked fine and they wanted to be sure that none of the software used internally would break. Same reason why IE6 is still the browser in use internally (in house webapps), it requires a documented need to get permission to have a newer IE. In this case the question may be, does Win7 run IE6? or will MS bet their entire salary that a newer IE/Windows doesn't break anything?
The day MS guarantees money back, losses covered and free re-implementation if it breaks, my employer wouldn't need to test new things for years before deployment, until then, we have to do it ourselfes, and while we do that, MS doesn't earn much. That's life and that's the curse of being the corporate OS of choice and being dependant on corporate customers. I'll say Win7 sees at least its 3 year birthday before it really gets to real corporate desktops, perhaps up to 5 years.
Then the corp network you're trying on is probably not using these restrictions.
The place i work is very relaxed regarding executables and installs, because it is necessary to be able to test and so forth as a developer, so each user is in the local administrators group.
Yes of course i have Firefox installed, it works great and i prefer it over any newer IE, anyway if I try to download and install a newer IE than IE6, i'm not allowed to, and why? because of some internal webapps they don't want to untangle from IE6 compatible into standards compliant.
So the major benefit of webapps is void, it's not platform independent and it's not future proof, some day even the standards of today will be void, so what webapps are is an infinite job security for web developers.
Unfortunately I can't avoid IE6 completely, because it comes installed with the certificates needed to browse our intranet, this browser won't die right away, too many non-tech users on corporate networks around the world, and some places they're even more restrictive when it comes to executables, which is a good thing for the non-techs ("I can have those smileys for my msn?"). The internet should have had more courage back in the IE4-5-6 days, but everybody just accepted, many even made pages that only worked for IE, this is just the aftermath of ignorant/lazy web developers.
You may call me a freetard, but you have the same kind of prejudice towards tcl as i read it, where I'm not so picky about the language I need to use for a task.
Anyway I wasn't really up to bash your choices, it's fine to have preferences, I was just saying that it's overkill when compared to other solutions.
My best guess now on the bad NX performance would be the CPU, altho I personally haven't seen it have trouble with compressing X11 on anything above a 800MHz CPU. (Yes it is difficult for me to understand how NX could perform so bad, never had that kind of problems myself)
You're right that most phones are terrible for typing, on the other hand you can't answer the ones on the screen of an unused desktop until you show up anyway. The whole idea of instant messaging is that people are there to answer, or else email would be just as good for the job, and the messages wouldn't disappear should the system crash.
Use whatever solution suits you, you're the user of it anyway.
Well when you say the bandwidth is not an issue, it probably wasn't the issue with NX either. If I remember correctly NX was designed to run X11 on a 9600 baud connection.
My guess of the fault would be that you connected your NX client to the Linux/Solaris NX server, which then used VNC to show your Windows/MacOS desktop or whatever OS you prefer. A VNC set up the wrong way is a bandwidth hog, and relies very much on transfering pictures, which then takes a lot of CPU to try (and fail) to compress for the NX server, then SSH also needs to spend some energy encrypting the loads of binary data before sending it off to your NX client which then has to do it all in reverse.
NX does support RDP, it has had some keyboard layout issues over time, but it is my experience that it performs really well compared to non-NX'ed (uncompressed) RDP when accessing your desktop from outside your own LAN (over internet connections of uncertain capacity).
But as I understand it, bandwidth is not an issue, the real issue is the IRC bots written for a proprietary platform like mIRC and no-one with the skills to translate it. Altho I'm certainly not a command line zealot, I would agree it's overkill not only to run a desktop but also mIRC to keep one IRC bot alive, when eggdrop hosts can host hundreds of IRC bots per GHz CPU, it's a waste of electricity/money/environment.
I don't know how to replace pidgin, other than maybe getting a multi-IM client for your phone, then you'd actually be able to also answer people that write you while you're away.
My opinion about CLI is that it's more suitable for some things than GUI, but in most cases CLI is a waste of time, effort and memory, for instance the very advanced (and also very good) text editors. Been there done that, i simplified my life years ago, by using a simpler and more graphical Linux amongst other things. There's just as many cases where CLI is overkill for a task as the opposite.
I think i read somewhere that more than half of MS's developers are Romanian, and I know that MS also outsources to TCS in India. Of course a lot of money stays in the US, but just as much are sent back out.
Can't really find any sources of my accusations, because googling "Microsoft Developers Romania" gives a whole lot of false positives due to the amount of software houses in Romania developing software for a Microsoft platform.
Ads are theft too, with all their flash, sound and graphics, it costs more to watch the ads than the content if you're on a pay per byte subscription.
So it's fair to place all kinds of heavy and annoying ads, if people are just free to block those that gets too expensive or annoying. Action equals reaction, it's up to the ad-funded to find a profitable business model, including a sensible advertising policy that does not encourage visitors to block. If visitors block your ads, your product was not worth paying for anyway.
Alright I do know that blockers like ABP simply blocks everything and I gotta admit that may be unfair, but on the other hand, the majority of ads online are excessive, so the ones i feel sorry for are the minority who actually have a sane advertising policy.
I actually thought that it was an EU rule that software or services provided over the Internet are not subjects to VAT, or maybe that's just in Denmark.
No matter what, this rules have saved me and my family a lot of Euros on software.
Anyway, if localisation is the reason, why's the International/English version of Windows more expensive than the Danish one here?
I will just keep buying my software as downloads from whoever has the best price (No I'm not talking piracy), I prefer English versions anyway and it takes less than an hour to fetch a DVD worth of software, while it would take more than 24 hours to get here by mail from a local distributor.
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, you know my neighbours!
Despite guns not being legal here to others than police, athlete shooters and hunters, they still manage to shoot after eachothers in public.
Well, despite that I'm personally not very fond of guns, I can't let go of the thought that all the restriction of firearms does here, is to guarantee that only authorities and bad guys have guns.
While I trust the police and military here very much, I don't trust that bad guys will only shoot after bad guys or the police. I would like more liberal laws around defense weapons here, not even pepper spray is legal.
However, I would not mind if getting a permit would require some training and testing, and I would not mind to be registered so the police would know if and what weapon I have, they could also very well limit how powerful it would be allowed to be and how many guns I could have, but I would like it to be more liberal than it is.
This is exactly what I evaluate when choosing OS. One this is corporate class support, the other is what the OS itself supports.
I don't know if it has been fixed today, but when I last tried and tested OpenSolaris as a replacement for my Linux, I ended up ditching it because of lacking support for Bluetooth.
While this particular feature isn't vital to a server, other features may be. So my general advice to OP would be first to make clear what the requirements are, and put priority to the corporate support vs. license question. Since OpenSolaris and BSD are what's left to decide between, I would guess the license isn't that important.
So if OpenSolaris supports all the hardware and features needed for the task, I would go for that in a corporate environment, because of the posibility of corporate class support. If the company already have plenty of experienced un*x admins to provide a 24/7 3hr support on its own, I'd say go for FreeBSD, because development is more agile than OpenSolaris, new features and hardware are supported quicker on this platform, and given you have these skillfull admins already, the new stuff could be made to work easily.
Hmmm I wonder if the previous flights that NWA operated codesharing with KLM will then lose this benefit too when they're now Delta...
It's important to remember that not all equipment works with a 110-250V range, at least remember to check it.
As for the plug adapter, I have two, one of those terrible multi-plugs which slides and all, mostly because in some countries, you never know what plug your hotel has chosen to settle on. However for the american plug I found a brilliant kind of plug that allowes almost anything to be plugged into it, bought it for $4 in one of New York's chinatowns.
For charging my phone, i bought a cable that uses the USB to charge it, since i have one where you can enable USB power to stay on while the computer is off, besides, many phones charges from USB even without a special cable.
I usually don't bring more electronics than that, sometimes a camera, but I prefer to experience things rather than seeing them on an LCD.
Hotels most often include wifi in the room price, and internet stations in their lobbies, I see no reason to stalk an internet café, disgusting keyboards, and some are very noisy as many are about gaming these days.
How are the british rules about inspecting/confiscating electronics? Can they do like they can in US, i mean, confiscate with no reciepe nor time limit?
Not that i believe the OP would be much happier losing it on the way home.
it's such a hassle to convince security that it's alright for you to bring a bottle of liquids on board the plane, anal lube may be okay if put into a sealed clear plastic bag.
Anyway most (non-discount) airlines offer free drinks during intercontinental flights, including whisky.
I don't know if there's a legal drinking age in the air, but I've never heard them ask anyone for ID.
hmmm... not wearing a watch can be just as much a statement as wearing one.
But you're right, watches are much longer standing statements of style and status than any mobile phone, which will anyway be changed every 6-12 months.
I've not been wearing a watch for several years now, I do find it troublesome to pull out my phone for it and it certainly isn't something to attract ladies. However not wearing a watch may signal "I've got time for you", "I can manage my day unassistedly" or "I'm not handcuffed to time", and I always show up on time.
All I'm saying is that not wearing a watch can be just as strong a signal as wearing a Rolex or whatever, as long as you're not a slack regarding time.
However you do lose opportunity of looking busy and checking your watch if you're in a situation you'd rather escape from.
1200 in the US die every day from smoking related illnesses 135 of these are from passive smoke 115 fatal car accidents happen every day in the US (no mention of how many die in each)
People die from one or the other, but how much is a life worth?
Passive smoke and roadkill isn't that different really. Where the real hipocracy is, is when life-time smokers expect expensive treatment to keep them alive for another 5 years.
As a rake (and smoker) myself, i am already aware of the years (of boring life) I won't get, I need no treatment, i may live 5-10 years shorter, but i enjoyed every single day of what i had. As for the 135 passive smoke deaths, it could be avoided with considerate smokers, just as considerate drivers rarely kill anyone.
Liberty isn't just about money, guns and cars, it's just as much about what kind of life you wanna lead urself.
Well, I'm european, and I understand your perspective.
On the other hand, who earns on the american model? The banks and insurance companies, not you as a citizen. I bet you that you spend just as much on percent of your income on loans + savings + insurances + taxes as I do, if not even more.
You have to either save up or borrow money for education, I don't, and it's reflected in the reputation that general american education has versus the european. I pay extra for smoking, can't wait until they realize that fat should be taxed like tobacco and alcohol, basically these added taxes ensures that at least on healthcare, no one are cheating anyone (except from the fat people so far).
Of course there are lazy slackers around living off government money, but at least I don't have to reject 20-30 beggers each time I go for a downtown walk or train trip, they're at their home, spending my money on beer and drugs probably. The relief of this alone is worth the money, never feel guilty, never waste my time, don't have to look at poverty and a failure of society each second I'm outdoors.
I have done what I could do for the poor, so they're not really poor anymore, but slackers? yes maybe, I don't care.
The Danish public service TV/Radio company is accused of being biased against the govt. from time to time. Just to add to the pile of "Tax/Govt. supported news sources can be fair" comments. The quality of the entertainment programmes varies tho, but mostly it's good.
getent services | grep 139
getent services | grep 445
Well they aren't losing any business either.
I do like the trend towards legal and convenient offerings, but when 10 mins of ads in the beginning of a stream is enough to pay for the movie, why don't the media corps go together and make a torrent tracker with their movies with ads in the beginning, in a standard format without DRM?
Sure, they would have no control over the files after someone downloaded it, it could be distibuted further out, spreading the ads, and someone may cut off the ads and distribute that, but I'd think the convenience of their movie site would still be good enough for a huge majority of users.
Another solution would be to stream the movies, still in standard format and without DRM. Of course those determined to make copies can't be stopped, but again the convenience would win.
Why does it make sense for them to keep those old fashion regions of distribution? Don't tell me because of different languages, DVD's have been able to play different chapters for different languages, not just audio or captions. Only reason I see is solidarity with the old meatspace distributors, who still want money.
Of course they want money, but why should they be paid for nothing? Let them sell physical discs and what so ever, but let the internet be free from geographical licensing. It would be cheaper to the consumer, not having to feed those lazy distributors for allowing online distribution in their area, and the big media corps could still earn more.
It's worth to note that not all cinemas let people rush and fight for their seats. Some allow you to reserve a seat number, from home, online, then it works great to show up late. Being late on purpose can have many benefits, not just going to the movies, ever been waiting forever in line to check in or boarding while traveling?
Because getting several kilometers radius of coverage from one antenna to hundreds of phones without causing intolerable interference cannot be done in theory alone, field testing and measurements are necessary and needs expensive equipment before any federal organization would dare to assign a radio frequency spectrum to your standard.
Also because antenna design has gone from internal to internal, and makes a big difference in range, another task that needs more than theory. This has nothing to do with the standard as such, it would just require iPhone to have a little external antenna, remember those good times?
It's simple, not everything can be done in software and theory, and real world costs real money... unfortunately
Sure, one can jailbreak an iPhone or root an Android, but those are still limited frameworks.
The jailbreak iPhone community wouldn't get to be as big as the community making appstore apps over night.
Android could end up having quite a community, but since android is (mostly) open the huge Linux community can easily keep their systems Android compatible without locking the rest of the system up so much that they could not benefit from all the other good stuff going on around Linux.
So Nokia not committing to Android is a clever move in my eyes, because it opens up possibilities rather than limiting them.
Just my five cents...
Agreed, decentralization is hardly slowing anything down. There is however another major disadvantage when there's no central control, which was somewhat dealt with on eDonkey, anyone remember when ShareReactor was the thing? However, the media corporations managed to stop it for long enough for most people to move on to other technologies.
What is really slow is true anonymization, encrypted packets that have to jump thru several nodes to hide sender and receiver, generally not very suitable for large filetransfers. I saw someone suggesting to use Tor to anonymize it, and that's what makes it slow. However some hybrid could be beneficial, with the centralized parts hidden on an anonymous network like Tor, while the actual file transfers would not be anonymous, direct connections between sender and receiver, and thus still of acceptable speed.
NAT works, if no machine on the LAN is infected with something that allows remote control.
Updates will eventually obsolete this trick, of course servers are taken extra care of, clients would be vulnerable the longest.
Windows Firewall... I don't trust it, countless times have I been able to launch programmes not allowed thru windows firewall, it pops up asking me if i want to keep blocking it... however in the background i can see PuTTy or whatever establishing a connection just fine without my approval, just until i choose to block it, which would be too late had it been malicious software. And I've seen this on all windows from XP to 7... When it can't even keep local programs from getting out, why should i trust it would keep anything outside? What comes from outside has got to be much more unpredictable than what runs locally trying to get out... so I don't trust it...
You're right it won't be as severe as it was with the old windows counting percent, but counting the number of people that's gonna experience it, I don't know if it'll be fewer, there's a lot more computers around today than late 90's, don't know if it'll be more either...
This is very true.
The company I work for kept win2k until support ended before XP was deployed. Not so much because of the fear that XP was a bad OS, simply because win2k worked fine and they wanted to be sure that none of the software used internally would break. Same reason why IE6 is still the browser in use internally (in house webapps), it requires a documented need to get permission to have a newer IE. In this case the question may be, does Win7 run IE6? or will MS bet their entire salary that a newer IE/Windows doesn't break anything?
The day MS guarantees money back, losses covered and free re-implementation if it breaks, my employer wouldn't need to test new things for years before deployment, until then, we have to do it ourselfes, and while we do that, MS doesn't earn much. That's life and that's the curse of being the corporate OS of choice and being dependant on corporate customers. I'll say Win7 sees at least its 3 year birthday before it really gets to real corporate desktops, perhaps up to 5 years.
Then the corp network you're trying on is probably not using these restrictions.
The place i work is very relaxed regarding executables and installs, because it is necessary to be able to test and so forth as a developer, so each user is in the local administrators group.
Yes of course i have Firefox installed, it works great and i prefer it over any newer IE, anyway if I try to download and install a newer IE than IE6, i'm not allowed to, and why? because of some internal webapps they don't want to untangle from IE6 compatible into standards compliant.
So the major benefit of webapps is void, it's not platform independent and it's not future proof, some day even the standards of today will be void, so what webapps are is an infinite job security for web developers.
Unfortunately I can't avoid IE6 completely, because it comes installed with the certificates needed to browse our intranet, this browser won't die right away, too many non-tech users on corporate networks around the world, and some places they're even more restrictive when it comes to executables, which is a good thing for the non-techs ("I can have those smileys for my msn?"). The internet should have had more courage back in the IE4-5-6 days, but everybody just accepted, many even made pages that only worked for IE, this is just the aftermath of ignorant/lazy web developers.
You may call me a freetard, but you have the same kind of prejudice towards tcl as i read it, where I'm not so picky about the language I need to use for a task.
Anyway I wasn't really up to bash your choices, it's fine to have preferences, I was just saying that it's overkill when compared to other solutions.
My best guess now on the bad NX performance would be the CPU, altho I personally haven't seen it have trouble with compressing X11 on anything above a 800MHz CPU. (Yes it is difficult for me to understand how NX could perform so bad, never had that kind of problems myself)
You're right that most phones are terrible for typing, on the other hand you can't answer the ones on the screen of an unused desktop until you show up anyway. The whole idea of instant messaging is that people are there to answer, or else email would be just as good for the job, and the messages wouldn't disappear should the system crash.
Use whatever solution suits you, you're the user of it anyway.
Well when you say the bandwidth is not an issue, it probably wasn't the issue with NX either. If I remember correctly NX was designed to run X11 on a 9600 baud connection.
My guess of the fault would be that you connected your NX client to the Linux/Solaris NX server, which then used VNC to show your Windows/MacOS desktop or whatever OS you prefer. A VNC set up the wrong way is a bandwidth hog, and relies very much on transfering pictures, which then takes a lot of CPU to try (and fail) to compress for the NX server, then SSH also needs to spend some energy encrypting the loads of binary data before sending it off to your NX client which then has to do it all in reverse.
NX does support RDP, it has had some keyboard layout issues over time, but it is my experience that it performs really well compared to non-NX'ed (uncompressed) RDP when accessing your desktop from outside your own LAN (over internet connections of uncertain capacity).
But as I understand it, bandwidth is not an issue, the real issue is the IRC bots written for a proprietary platform like mIRC and no-one with the skills to translate it. Altho I'm certainly not a command line zealot, I would agree it's overkill not only to run a desktop but also mIRC to keep one IRC bot alive, when eggdrop hosts can host hundreds of IRC bots per GHz CPU, it's a waste of electricity/money/environment.
I don't know how to replace pidgin, other than maybe getting a multi-IM client for your phone, then you'd actually be able to also answer people that write you while you're away.
My opinion about CLI is that it's more suitable for some things than GUI, but in most cases CLI is a waste of time, effort and memory, for instance the very advanced (and also very good) text editors. Been there done that, i simplified my life years ago, by using a simpler and more graphical Linux amongst other things. There's just as many cases where CLI is overkill for a task as the opposite.
CO2 under pressure becomes denser than water, so if done right, it'll stay down there.
An example of this is the idea of sinking liquid CO2 to the bottom of the oceans:
http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2008-06/10-audacious-ideas-save-planet?page=3
I think i read somewhere that more than half of MS's developers are Romanian, and I know that MS also outsources to TCS in India. Of course a lot of money stays in the US, but just as much are sent back out.
Can't really find any sources of my accusations, because googling "Microsoft Developers Romania" gives a whole lot of false positives due to the amount of software houses in Romania developing software for a Microsoft platform.
Ads are theft too, with all their flash, sound and graphics, it costs more to watch the ads than the content if you're on a pay per byte subscription.
So it's fair to place all kinds of heavy and annoying ads, if people are just free to block those that gets too expensive or annoying. Action equals reaction, it's up to the ad-funded to find a profitable business model, including a sensible advertising policy that does not encourage visitors to block. If visitors block your ads, your product was not worth paying for anyway.
Alright I do know that blockers like ABP simply blocks everything and I gotta admit that may be unfair, but on the other hand, the majority of ads online are excessive, so the ones i feel sorry for are the minority who actually have a sane advertising policy.
I actually thought that it was an EU rule that software or services provided over the Internet are not subjects to VAT, or maybe that's just in Denmark.
No matter what, this rules have saved me and my family a lot of Euros on software.
Anyway, if localisation is the reason, why's the International/English version of Windows more expensive than the Danish one here?
I will just keep buying my software as downloads from whoever has the best price (No I'm not talking piracy), I prefer English versions anyway and it takes less than an hour to fetch a DVD worth of software, while it would take more than 24 hours to get here by mail from a local distributor.