I'd look at doing at the network infrastructure level. They're connected to network hardware of some kind. If you have some kind of router on their subnet manages the traffic, start setting up filtering rules. You said something about "not being allowed to intercept their traffic with another box," but the network itself has to have some infrastructure in it, so you should have an option there.
How about the "Access-Killer" Rekall from TheKompany?
http://www.thekompany.com/products/rekall/
"Rekall is a database front-end. It is not itself a database -- data is stored somewhere else, in an SQL server, and Rekall is fundamentally just a tool to extract, display and update that data (of course, it does lots more than that, it does forms and reports and scripting and so on). It is database agnostic, and does not have any preferred database in the sense that Access(R) uses the Jet(R) database engine. "
Ha! That'd be great! A home-built USB storage device that's made out of 30-pin SIMMS. OK.
So to reach the 128 MB size some commercial USB keychain devices have, you'd need 32 x 4MB SIMMS. Each of those is about 4in x 1in x 1/8in. Let's say you can stack them up next to each other and you've got a 4in x 1in x 2in block in a plastic case with a circuit board underneath to replace something the size of a keychain. Why not just retrofit a 40 GB laptop harddrive with a USB interface instead! It'll be about the same speed as those old 30-pin SIMMS, too!
And my email: I've been a loyal Dell customer since I bought my first Dell PC, used, from a friend. The machine was already several years old, but it kept on kicking... and after nearly 10 years, now runs SuSE Linux as a great sever for me.
I was so happy to see Dell selling PCs with Linux some time ago, but have disturbed by rumors floating around that Dell didn't like selling Linux boxes. "There isn't enough demand." "They don't make enough money." etc. Despite the lack of immediate demand, I believe that as large PC companies start to push the option more agressively, Linux will indeed make it onto more and more desktops. I hear stories every day about small companies, schools, and government agencies opting not to upgrade Windows PCs to the next iteration of Microsoft's Operating System. Instead, they use older machines and Linux to run their day to day operations. Imagine if they had the choice to purchase new machines, with 1-3 year service and support, WITHOUT Windows installed. $350 / machine. All there needs to be is a PC maker willing to stand up to Microsoft's influence and work to make the industry more competitive and provide better choices for consumers.
Thank you for your time, and I hope that you consider the social ramifications of the decisions that Dell makes as well as the economic and financial considerations.
But I seriously doubt that this will cut off any oxygen from the developers currently working on mono. Two reasons.
1. I doubt any of them really could care less that MS has developed a toy version of the CLI. However, if it is used in universities as a learning tool, that could unknowingly infect up-and-coming developers with Shared Source access, couldn't it? (maybe I read something wrong)
2. As the articles state, Rotor is a toy implementation, not anything that should be used for commercial development. Maybe that's how Bill thinks of open source development tools, but I think that the developers from mono would disagree with that. Just because something is fun, doesn't mean its a toy.
And from the looks of it, mono still has a way to go to catch up to the stats on Rotor.
Rotor is a gzipped tarball weighing in at about 18.5 megabytes (14,000 files and 1.3 million lines of code)
My count puts the current mono cvs at around 12 MB(1,930 files, 265,910 lines of code).
Maybe that means mono is just doing a more efficient job of implementing the ECMA standards.:)
Pretty off-topic, but that would be my favorite part about developing new.NET based software.... no more need for registering components in the registry!! What a crappy way of storing information!
Did you ever stop to consider that maybe, just maybe, the reason that you disagree with the decisions managers make is because you simply don't have the same perspective on the issues surrounding the project and its context within the entire corporation?
That being said, you're probably right that most managers are just winging it. I often have the same kind of feelings about management where I've worked, but I try to give people the benefit of the doubt that they're not as dumb as I think. Maybe they are.
The article states: "the device can run indefinitely -- or at least until the parts wear out, adding that he has supplied all his own domestic power needs free for 17 months."
But, hold on... What causes parts to wear out, typically? Friction, or the heat energy that is associated with friction. At the very least, "wearing out" indicates a change in the physical or chemical characteristics of something. Change can only come through the transfer of energy. So, either the device is able to create not only enough power to light bulbs and keep itself running, but also extra power to wear out its own parts!! I guess it's too efficient for it's own good.
Articles keep comparing J2EE and.NET. One of the unquestionable advantages of J2EE in an enterprise environment is its cross platform capabilities (specifically the ability to run on powerful high-end UNIX servers). With the Mono project building an open source, cross platform,.NET compatible framework, do you have any fear that the.NET style framework for web services might become more of a competition to J2EE than without the Mono project? Would Sun ever consider supporting Mono to enourage interroperability between J2EE and.NET components, or is this an example of an open source project potentially damaging Sun?
I don't really think CDs and DVDs really aren't big enough for regular backup of large sets of files. It's just too inconvenient to have to setup a bunch of different 5GB backups, one per DVD (or swap DVDs). The only convenient solutions are to do what the first poster said: use a second harddrive, they're relatively cheap. Or buy a tape drive to store the backups.
But which platform did he provide the software for!?! That's the important question. He better be insisting that the government be running their Oracle database on Linux... or atleast some UNIX platform.
And the worst part really is that the computer will someday be a classic! Power Computing!! That was my first computer in college. They sold those for around a year, but boy did I love that computer company.
Long live the clones!! (Speaking of clone wars... Maybe that's where the Star Wars title comes from?)
I've actually thought about that question before and came to only a limited conclusion. It's one or a combination of a few things probably.
First is that there are very few individual people that would sit down and say to themselves "For my next hobby project, I want to build a multi-dimensional OLAP database. That'll come in handy in my everyday life... I can plug in my check book numbers and get some GREAT analytics out of it... AND FAST!" And (although I may be wrong), many Open Source projects seem to spawn from the same thing as most inventions - a personal itch. So, if you ever had personal itch (that was strong enough to actually make you write code) to build your own OLAP database, then it would seem that you're the first!
Also, I'm not sure there's a big enough demand for new OLAP services to warrant that kind of project. If you're using a multi-dimensional OLAP database, you've probably had it for a little while now and already own the software.
There may be other justified reasons, or it could just be that no one has bothered yet. If you get a project going, though, I'd be interested in hacking on it some!
Maybe your wife would enjoy strategy games like WarCraft. Playing networked WarCraft II was one of the first things my wife and I did together when we started dating. She likes to game, is good with computers already, but it certainly isn't a major hobby. Still after a few years together we still play WarCraft II every once in a while. (And if FreeCraft supports network gaming -- not sure -- you can even play under Linux!)
Just for some insight, what she likes about WarCraft II is two things:
First, that the graphics are kind of cute. Not tulips and roses cute, but cartoon cute.
And then, the fact that it's a real-time strategy. Just the right combination of real-time action and strategic planning.
Slashdot Mirror
It's a good thing that spelling doesn't risk lives, though!!
"the 27 km. circunference"
I'd look at doing at the network infrastructure level. They're connected to network hardware of some kind. If you have some kind of router on their subnet manages the traffic, start setting up filtering rules. You said something about "not being allowed to intercept their traffic with another box," but the network itself has to have some infrastructure in it, so you should have an option there.
Obviously her model is flawed somewhere.
--Former Wyoming Country Boy
AT&T has a pretty awesome global operations center:r ojects_software/photo_global_center.jpg
http://www.research.att.com/areas/visualization/p
How about the "Access-Killer" Rekall from TheKompany?
http://www.thekompany.com/products/rekall/
"Rekall is a database front-end. It is not itself a database -- data is stored somewhere else, in an SQL server, and Rekall is fundamentally just a tool to extract, display and update that data (of course, it does lots more than that, it does forms and reports and scripting and so on). It is database agnostic, and does not have any preferred database in the sense that Access(R) uses the Jet(R) database engine. "
That's got to be my least favorite, except of course when people mean it literally.
"We did this 9 month project, and at the end of the day, the client got a poorly designed, difficult to maintain, and overpriced solution."
It's always nice to listen to NPR. Usually they make intelligent arguments that very precisely make your point. That show did just that...
The summary was "not only do you have to be creative and intelligent to make something successful, but you also have to share it."
Ha! That'd be great! A home-built USB storage device that's made out of 30-pin SIMMS. OK.
So to reach the 128 MB size some commercial USB keychain devices have, you'd need 32 x 4MB SIMMS. Each of those is about 4in x 1in x 1/8in. Let's say you can stack them up next to each other and you've got a 4in x 1in x 2in block in a plastic case with a circuit board underneath to replace something the size of a keychain. Why not just retrofit a 40 GB laptop harddrive with a USB interface instead! It'll be about the same speed as those old 30-pin SIMMS, too!
While I didn't write my government official, I did write an email to Dell directly. Enough emails, and it might actually make a difference. You can contact Dell here: http://support.dell.com/us/en/dellcare/segtopic_cc are_nav_notlisted_ccare.asp
6 24 3&mode=thread&tid=98
:) VERY nice case!
And my email:
I've been a loyal Dell customer since I bought my first Dell PC, used, from a friend. The machine was already several years old, but it kept on kicking... and after nearly 10 years, now runs SuSE Linux as a great sever for me.
I was so happy to see Dell selling PCs with Linux some time ago, but have disturbed by rumors floating around that Dell didn't like selling Linux boxes. "There isn't enough demand." "They don't make enough money." etc. Despite the lack of immediate demand, I believe that as large PC companies start to push the option more agressively, Linux will indeed make it onto more and more desktops. I hear stories every day about small companies, schools, and government agencies opting not to upgrade Windows PCs to the next iteration of Microsoft's Operating System. Instead, they use older machines and Linux to run their day to day operations. Imagine if they had the choice to purchase new machines, with 1-3 year service and support, WITHOUT Windows installed. $350 / machine. All there needs to be is a PC maker willing to stand up to Microsoft's influence and work to make the industry more competitive and provide better choices for consumers.
Thank you for your time, and I hope that you consider the social ramifications of the decisions that Dell makes as well as the economic and financial considerations.
--Paul
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/03/19/051
P.S. I really love my new Dimension 4300 1.6 GHz machine.
Or you can download sharpdevelop (sharpdevelop.sourceforge.net) and have a pretty slick, Visual Studio-like IDE.
But I seriously doubt that this will cut off any oxygen from the developers currently working on mono. Two reasons.
1. I doubt any of them really could care less that MS has developed a toy version of the CLI. However, if it is used in universities as a learning tool, that could unknowingly infect up-and-coming developers with Shared Source access, couldn't it? (maybe I read something wrong)
2. As the articles state, Rotor is a toy implementation, not anything that should be used for commercial development. Maybe that's how Bill thinks of open source development tools, but I think that the developers from mono would disagree with that. Just because something is fun, doesn't mean its a toy.
Rotor is a gzipped tarball weighing in at about 18.5 megabytes (14,000 files and 1.3 million lines of code)
My count puts the current mono cvs at around 12 MB(1,930 files, 265,910 lines of code).
Maybe that means mono is just doing a more efficient job of implementing the ECMA standards. :)
Pretty off-topic, but that would be my favorite part about developing new .NET based software.... no more need for registering components in the registry!! What a crappy way of storing information!
Did you ever stop to consider that maybe, just maybe, the reason that you disagree with the decisions managers make is because you simply don't have the same perspective on the issues surrounding the project and its context within the entire corporation?
That being said, you're probably right that most managers are just winging it. I often have the same kind of feelings about management where I've worked, but I try to give people the benefit of the doubt that they're not as dumb as I think. Maybe they are.
The article states: "the device can run indefinitely -- or at least until the parts wear out, adding that he has supplied all his own domestic power needs free for 17 months."
But, hold on... What causes parts to wear out, typically? Friction, or the heat energy that is associated with friction. At the very least, "wearing out" indicates a change in the physical or chemical characteristics of something. Change can only come through the transfer of energy. So, either the device is able to create not only enough power to light bulbs and keep itself running, but also extra power to wear out its own parts!! I guess it's too efficient for it's own good.
Holes in the story ALL OVER the place!
There's good and bad in everything, I guess.
Articles keep comparing J2EE and .NET. One of the unquestionable advantages of J2EE in an enterprise environment is its cross platform capabilities (specifically the ability to run on powerful high-end UNIX servers). With the Mono project building an open source, cross platform, .NET compatible framework, do you have any fear that the .NET style framework for web services might become more of a competition to J2EE than without the Mono project? Would Sun ever consider supporting Mono to enourage interroperability between J2EE and .NET components, or is this an example of an open source project potentially damaging Sun?
I don't really think CDs and DVDs really aren't big enough for regular backup of large sets of files. It's just too inconvenient to have to setup a bunch of different 5GB backups, one per DVD (or swap DVDs). The only convenient solutions are to do what the first poster said: use a second harddrive, they're relatively cheap. Or buy a tape drive to store the backups.
Personally, I backup to a second harddrive.
Blah blah blah...
But which platform did he provide the software for!?! That's the important question. He better be insisting that the government be running their Oracle database on Linux... or atleast some UNIX platform.
:)
And the worst part really is that the computer will someday be a classic! Power Computing!! That was my first computer in college. They sold those for around a year, but boy did I love that computer company.
Long live the clones!! (Speaking of clone wars... Maybe that's where the Star Wars title comes from?)
I've actually thought about that question before and came to only a limited conclusion. It's one or a combination of a few things probably.
First is that there are very few individual people that would sit down and say to themselves "For my next hobby project, I want to build a multi-dimensional OLAP database. That'll come in handy in my everyday life... I can plug in my check book numbers and get some GREAT analytics out of it... AND FAST!" And (although I may be wrong), many Open Source projects seem to spawn from the same thing as most inventions - a personal itch. So, if you ever had personal itch (that was strong enough to actually make you write code) to build your own OLAP database, then it would seem that you're the first!
Also, I'm not sure there's a big enough demand for new OLAP services to warrant that kind of project. If you're using a multi-dimensional OLAP database, you've probably had it for a little while now and already own the software.
There may be other justified reasons, or it could just be that no one has bothered yet. If you get a project going, though, I'd be interested in hacking on it some!
Oops.
There I go jumping the gun...
(Thanks for not flaming my butt.)
OK. So someone explain why the MP3 file is 20MB of audio only, where as the QuickTime is 17MB of audio AND video...
a) Quick Time quality sucks.
b) MP3 compression sucks.
c) Cowboy Neal sucks.
Maybe your wife would enjoy strategy games like WarCraft. Playing networked WarCraft II was one of the first things my wife and I did together when we started dating. She likes to game, is good with computers already, but it certainly isn't a major hobby. Still after a few years together we still play WarCraft II every once in a while. (And if FreeCraft supports network gaming -- not sure -- you can even play under Linux!)
Just for some insight, what she likes about WarCraft II is two things:
First, that the graphics are kind of cute. Not tulips and roses cute, but cartoon cute.
And then, the fact that it's a real-time strategy. Just the right combination of real-time action and strategic planning.
WOW!! I wish that I could have seen one of those. A 25 millihertz processor! My analog watch can calculate 1+1 faster than that thing.
A goof like that really is just asking for some snide remark...