Give me a ring when I can sue Linux devs for not including Firewire support in a supposedly usable OS.
Unless you have an SLA with MSFT (or some other vendor), you can't sue anyone when FireWire support is missing. (Hint: You don't enter into such an agreement when you purchase Windows off the shelf or from an OEM. You have to pay *extra* and sign papers for that.) You can enter in to such agreements with Linux vendors... They'll cost you money, though.
Wait, what? 1) How does a stock install CD know about your username and password? 2) Would you still get stonewalled if you threatened to take your business elsewhere?
The OP was speaking of the halcyon days when Mainframes were used by well trained Computer Operators and maintained by highly trained System Administrators. That's kinda the point here... general-purpose computers are *still* not appliances. Most folks would like to have a machine that does email, basic web browsing, and simple typesetting. They never get that... they get a complex, full-featured device that can do just about any goddamned thing.
This is, in my eyes, a failing of the consumer electronics industry. This should have been solved years ago.
Then her school & her ISP told her she *needed* MSFT Office & a Windows install CD to get her networking functional.
FTFA: (Probably Copyright 2009 Dan Cassuto: dcassuto@wkowtv.com. Used without permission)
Verizon says it will dispatch a technician to try to assist her accessing the internet without using the Windows-only installation disk. Verizon says its high-speed internet does indeed support Ubuntu, but some advanced features and installation disks clearly don't work with Linux.
MATC also says it promises to accept any of Schubert's papers or class documents using whatever software she has installed.
All that was required of this lady was for her to explain her situation to her ISP and her Uni Help Desk (or professor). They seem to be more than happy to help her. Moreover, it would seem that her Ubuntu-powered laptop will do everything that her courses require.
At what point do you stop blaming the user...
There's noone to blame here but the user. She curled up in a corner and gave up at the first sign of trouble. What might she have done when Office didn't come preinstalled on her bread-n-butter Windows-powered laptop? Assuming that she had the wherewithal to run to a store, would she have freaked the fuck out if the prof. "required" Office 2003, but she could only buy Office 2008?
Hnnh. One learns new things every day! Too bad you need to set up a DC (or AD machine) to make all of that work... and manually dump the MSIs on the DC... And fiddle with GPOs...:/
(Not that fiddling with GPOs is hard, mind you... it's just that this feature is next to useless for the home user.) [Not that you made any claims to the contrary.]
'Yanno, MSFT could add a list of web browsers to its "Add and Remove Programs" tool. When installing a web browser, the tool could then use FTP (or BitTorrent, or whatever) behind the scenes to snatch the installer off of the web.
Does this sound like an unreasonable way to do software installation?
My email and internet machine at work runs XP Pro and has 512 MB of RAM. When the corporate updater instructs me to reboot, I take a minute or so to close Firefox and Outlook, then reboot. I'll get up, make some breakfast, and be back in five minutes to log in. I'll take five minutes to finish my breakfast, another five or so to wash my dishes, and come back to my computer (which has autostarted Outlook and Firefox for me, so's I'm ready to go.)
Your mom isn't willing to sacrifice fifteen minutes of downtime per month for the cause of increased security? You might wanna give her a pep-talk.
I check for security updates every day. (In the distro that I use, these are known as GLSAs) On average, I see one security update that applies to any of my systems every other week.
/dev/random is the reason you were getting short keys.
Does dd *really* terminate when/dev/random doesn't have enough data to serve? I would have thought that reads on/dev/random would block until it had enough data to serve the request.
You are aware of how minimal the difference between MSFT Windows Server Edition and MSFT Windows Desktop Edition is, yes? It really boils down to some UI changes and a few disabled "server only" features like DFS.
You must not have carefully R'd TFA. Had you done so, you would have noticed that the Ubuntu choice came while she was ordering the machine. She attempted to change the OS *before* the machine was shipped, not after she recieved it:
Schubert says she ordered her laptop online at Dell.com expecting to buy your classic bread-and-butter computer.
She didn't realize until the next morning her laptop defaulted to the Ubuntu operating system.
"It's been a mess," she said. "I regret ordering the computer."
Schubert says she never heard of Ubuntu until learning that she accidentally bought it. She called Dell the very next day and says the representative told her there was still time to change back to Windows.
FTFA, used without permission, (probably) Copyright 2009 Dan Cassuto: dcassuto@wkowtv.com
Stop me if you've heard this one... This dude has a Linux box pushing 50Kbyte of data up a 54Kbyte wide channel while simultaneously using another Linux box to pull an average of 740Kbyte of data down a 750KByte channel AND using a Windows box to play Left 4 Dead on a server half-way across the United States. This dude is *still* getting ~60msec pings to said server. His router doesn't do QoS or packet shaping, neither.
Slashdot Mirror
Guns cause video games?!?!
Ah, crap... I screwed up again!
Give me a ring when I can sue Linux devs for not including Firewire support in a supposedly usable OS.
Unless you have an SLA with MSFT (or some other vendor), you can't sue anyone when FireWire support is missing. (Hint: You don't enter into such an agreement when you purchase Windows off the shelf or from an OEM. You have to pay *extra* and sign papers for that.)
You can enter in to such agreements with Linux vendors... They'll cost you money, though.
It isn't - it only has 65535 rows.
To be "fair", this was a limitation in Excel until recently.
Full disclosure: I think that OO.org sucks muchly. (Have you ever tried to compile the fucker? It's bigger than all of KDE!)
Wait, what?
1) How does a stock install CD know about your username and password?
2) Would you still get stonewalled if you threatened to take your business elsewhere?
I agree.
*sigh*
The OP was speaking of the halcyon days when Mainframes were used by well trained Computer Operators and maintained by highly trained System Administrators.
That's kinda the point here... general-purpose computers are *still* not appliances. Most folks would like to have a machine that does email, basic web browsing, and simple typesetting. They never get that... they get a complex, full-featured device that can do just about any goddamned thing.
This is, in my eyes, a failing of the consumer electronics industry. This should have been solved years ago.
Then her school & her ISP told her she *needed* MSFT Office & a Windows install CD to get her networking functional.
FTFA: (Probably Copyright 2009 Dan Cassuto: dcassuto@wkowtv.com. Used without permission)
Verizon says it will dispatch a technician to try to assist her accessing the internet without using the Windows-only installation disk. Verizon says its high-speed internet does indeed support Ubuntu, but some advanced features and installation disks clearly don't work with Linux.
MATC also says it promises to accept any of Schubert's papers or class documents using whatever software she has installed.
All that was required of this lady was for her to explain her situation to her ISP and her Uni Help Desk (or professor). They seem to be more than happy to help her. Moreover, it would seem that her Ubuntu-powered laptop will do everything that her courses require.
At what point do you stop blaming the user...
There's noone to blame here but the user. She curled up in a corner and gave up at the first sign of trouble. What might she have done when Office didn't come preinstalled on her bread-n-butter Windows-powered laptop? Assuming that she had the wherewithal to run to a store, would she have freaked the fuck out if the prof. "required" Office 2003, but she could only buy Office 2008?
*hands you a cookie*
Ah, crap. I screwed that up again!
In most of the Southeastern US, a High School "Comp Sci" course is really "Intro to the MS Office suite" combined with "Touch Typing 090".
*raises hand*
I'm already in this don't-give-a-shit army. Where were you at our last drill? You missed out on all the good beer!
*blink*
You can do email over XMPP?
Heh. You learn something new every day!
Hnnh. One learns new things every day! Too bad you need to set up a DC (or AD machine) to make all of that work... and manually dump the MSIs on the DC... And fiddle with GPOs... :/
(Not that fiddling with GPOs is hard, mind you... it's just that this feature is next to useless for the home user.) [Not that you made any claims to the contrary.]
'Yanno, MSFT could add a list of web browsers to its "Add and Remove Programs" tool. When installing a web browser, the tool could then use FTP (or BitTorrent, or whatever) behind the scenes to snatch the installer off of the web.
Does this sound like an unreasonable way to do software installation?
My email and internet machine at work runs XP Pro and has 512 MB of RAM.
When the corporate updater instructs me to reboot, I take a minute or so to close Firefox and Outlook, then reboot. I'll get up, make some breakfast, and be back in five minutes to log in. I'll take five minutes to finish my breakfast, another five or so to wash my dishes, and come back to my computer (which has autostarted Outlook and Firefox for me, so's I'm ready to go.)
Your mom isn't willing to sacrifice fifteen minutes of downtime per month for the cause of increased security? You might wanna give her a pep-talk.
Meh. I must run less buggy software than you do.
I check for security updates every day. (In the distro that I use, these are known as GLSAs) On average, I see one security update that applies to any of my systems every other week.
*blink*
Isn't MD5 busted?
*points* *screams "TROOOOLL!"*
You're not fooling me. You're just interested in discovering the states of our PRNGs!
/dev/random is the reason you were getting short keys.
Does dd *really* terminate when /dev/random doesn't have enough data to serve? I would have thought that reads on /dev/random would block until it had enough data to serve the request.
an obscure, server-centric operating system
You are aware of how minimal the difference between MSFT Windows Server Edition and MSFT Windows Desktop Edition is, yes? It really boils down to some UI changes and a few disabled "server only" features like DFS.
You must not have carefully R'd TFA. Had you done so, you would have noticed that the Ubuntu choice came while she was ordering the machine. She attempted to change the OS *before* the machine was shipped, not after she recieved it:
Schubert says she ordered her laptop online at Dell.com expecting to buy your classic bread-and-butter computer.
She didn't realize until the next morning her laptop defaulted to the Ubuntu operating system.
"It's been a mess," she said. "I regret ordering the computer."
Schubert says she never heard of Ubuntu until learning that she accidentally bought it. She called Dell the very next day and says the representative told her there was still time to change back to Windows.
FTFA, used without permission, (probably) Copyright 2009 Dan Cassuto: dcassuto@wkowtv.com
"Private". I don't think that that word means what you think it does.
Mmm.
She didn't even have to do that. A phone call to her ISP and her Uni Helpdesk would have sufficed. She apparently failed to do either.
Cute, stupid, willfully helpless people can all DIAF.
Stop me if you've heard this one...
This dude has a Linux box pushing 50Kbyte of data up a 54Kbyte wide channel while simultaneously using another Linux box to pull an average of 740Kbyte of data down a 750KByte channel AND using a Windows box to play Left 4 Dead on a server half-way across the United States. This dude is *still* getting ~60msec pings to said server. His router doesn't do QoS or packet shaping, neither.
Pretty neat story, eh?
This is the best old-school troll that I've seen on /. in a long time. Kudos!