I just had this conversation at work today. I work at a network tech support centre for a university residence, and generally things are extremely disorganized. I plan to make a disc containing everything I'd need to fix nearly any problem.
This disc may differ from someone who does support in other places...the problems students have are fairly similar in nature (virii, malicious spyware, etc). My kit will contain:
CD: - Bootable to linux or dos - AVG free antivirus software (to leave behind after scanning) - Virus removal tools for Klez and others that are available - Adaware (to stop xupiter, gator, ienhance, etc) - IE6, IE4, Mozilla, Netscape, and Opera - Network diagnostics (traceroute, etc) - Partitionmagic - network drivers for every card I can get my hands on - TCP/IP stuff for windows 95/98 (old OSes don't use network by default...only modem)
on a floppy: - bootable to dos with cd support - fdisk - dos antivirus tool - scandisk, etc.
I also carry copies of windows 2000 and the cab files for 95 and 98. Routinely, too, I take a spare three-port switch (they have a surprisingly high rate of failure) and a length of cat5.
I dunno...the harman/kardon tincan speakers on my toshiba satellite 5100 blow away most average multimedia speakers (and all but one TV in my house). They're downright tiny too, with a subwoofer built into the bottom of the thing. I highly reccomend getting a laptop with a speaker system like this.
Though it would be nice to put a centre chanel into the display, you'd have no channel separation without at least some form of standard speakers. The new wide-screen laptops would be a good market for these sorts of things...put two speaker-pads on either side of the wide screen, or on either side of the keyboard...no extra bulk, but more sound-producing area.
Wow, I can remember watching a documentary about the world's first magnetic hard drive. It was 5MB in capacity, and was about the size of my bedroom...but don't try putting your favourite MP3 on it, because the data access speed was slower than a 300 baud modem!
My first hard drive was a 25 megabyte hard drive for an IBM compatible. It was about 20 pounds, and at the time I thought "wow, I'll never fill this thing up!". All the text files I could ever want, and even a few images and 1-second WAVs! Suddenly, though, I realized it was ludicrously cramped when windows made its appearance.
Now today I was holding in my hand a 1 square inch piece of plastic that was holding 128MB of pictures. A barely postage stamp-sized object was holding more than 5 times what my first hard drive held, and at.1% of the size and weight. One of these days, we'll have solid state flash cards small enough to fit up your nose that hold a terrabyte of full-quality movies and audio (RIAA willing). That'll be neat, yeah?
After reading through all the comments attached to this windows-like GUI for linux, I'm wondering why so many people are opposed to it. After having used windows 3.1 for five years, followed by 9x and 2000/XP for the remaining 7 years, I've become quite used to every aspect of the user interface, and have found it to be incredibly efficient. Sure, the kernel is inefficient and unstable sometimes, but if I can do everything I need to do (edit a spreadsheet, print a textfile, compile some sourcecode) with a few familiar clicks and shortcut keys, that's just great.
The main question I have, though, is why exactly you want to have a different interface JUST because it *is* different. I'm not at all bashing those of you who are more used to the kde/gnome/whatever inteface...if you're more comfortable and fast with that sort of interface, all the power to you. The truth is, I find that the windows interface has everything where I expect it. I want to change something about my computer? Go to control panel. I want to change a setting related to my keyboard? It's in the keyboard section. In Mandrake 9.0 KDE, for example, there are three seperate locations in which I could change an option for my keyboard...all with different options and made by different people with different interfaces. I have to remember whether the option I saw was in menu A, B, or C, and then remember how to get to that menu...and where it is within that menu!
For power users, still not used to the wide world of linux, and not yet capable of reconfiguring and recreating their "perfect interface", this is in fact a good idea. Everything is where one would expect, but still runs under linux with its excellent efficiency and open sourced power. If the Microsoft interface is what it takes to make you feel comfortable, then so be it.
One of these days, I'm sure there'll be this "perfect interface" for linux...the windows one may not be it...but it certainly isn't the current spawn of KDE and GNOME that we see most popularly on terminals -- at least not how they exist now. Things need to be streamlined into an intrinsicly logical and efficient system.
The point of my rant: There is no need to make a different interface because it's "not MS". MS may be horrible at some things, but other things do in fact work, and don't need change. If the shoe fits, wear it.
The Geforce4 440 mobile on my Toshiba Satellite 5100 can't even run the benchmark...I just bought this thing, and I'm already outdated?!
What gives? Shouldn't they provide at least a couple benchmarks for older cards? Furthermore, the demos in 3dmarken are usually quite impressive, and I'd like to see it.
Is it just me, or does this guy sound a lot like any nameless character out of George Orwell's 1984?
Seriously, though, this entire "Homeland Security" craze to prevent more "terrorist" attacks is just silly. It limits the freedom of Americans (and isn't that what the country is sorta based around?), it does NOTHING to prevent further attacks (even if there were one to happen), and makes people like this more paranoid than they already were!
This sort of device has already been available (in Canada) at least for a good little while. No web link, sorry, but it's called the "Air vest". It hooks onto your motorcycle with a steel cable, and when you get separated from your bike, it inflates like a large puffy life preserver, using CO2 canisters. Pretty neat things if I do say so myself.
Rogers (and numerous other Canadian affiliates of @home) started moving people onto their own networks and mail servers a few weeks ago. There wasn't a single noticable glitch.
Being the resident computer genius in everyone's family, my friend, Kyle tells me to check out his computer. I open the thing up to find about 6 pounds of dust in and around the computer. The processor fan was CAKED in dust to the point where I could no longer turn it manually, even! It's an extreme wonder that the thing didn't die and burn...those pentium 1s sure get hot when there's nothing but a tiny tiny little heatsink on them! Nearly burned myself on that one...
Aaaaaactually, long range probes and gps sats would most likely slow down due to friction (and several other forces at work), *not* due to reverse gravity. You realize, of course, that there is many billions of tonnes of inter-stellar dust and debris just floating around up there, slowing down the spacecraft, much like wind while riding your human-powered, mono-passenger, two-wheeled transportation device.
How this got moderated up to 5, I know not...But really, it's just my job to be an ass now.
All serial rapists drink water...OUTLAW WATER!
The gaming companies make these games with the intent that the players of the game take their agressions out on pixels not people, and that's what has retained my sanity thus far in life. So what, if they played a few games of doom every once in a while, is that so odd? I play a game of doom at least every week, and to my best knowlege I have never commited mass-murder. The shooting is a horrible thing to have happened, and I can understand the mental upset which the parents are having...but the media is to blame on this one. Nobody would have even thought about "violent and graphic" video games as a cause of this, if the media had not said "they were satan worshipers and played the evil violent horrible video game called DOOM! *ominous organ music*" Note that there have been at least 5 copycat killings which would not have happened if the media did not concentrate on this event so heavily. They do it all for the ratings, and the ratings are no consolation for the damage the media has done on this one.
This is fake for the following reasons:
1) NOBODY would be stupid enough to make a series set so far in the past that it would mess up every timeline in existance.
2) The vulcan alone disproves it. A 40 year old vulcan would be like a 20 year old commander of a starship.
3) There's various other inconsistancies which make things not right.
Aaaanyways...
*goes back to his conspiracy theories*
Yes, finally a cheap and effective way to store some of my MP3 collection!
But then again, you realize what I said once about 5 and a quarter floppy disks..."Holy cow! I'm never going to need more than 10 of these things! They're HUGE!"
Slashdot Mirror
Finally! The missing step has been filled in! So THAT'S what I do to make heaps of money.
Batteries not included!
Yes, actually...Alberta's full of it.
Great, now I'm fearing for my life...next thing I know some "glorious" American army is going to "liberate" me from my "prison".
You all know the sayings:
War is peace
Freedom is slavery
Ignorance is strength
I just had this conversation at work today. I work at a network tech support centre for a university residence, and generally things are extremely disorganized. I plan to make a disc containing everything I'd need to fix nearly any problem.
This disc may differ from someone who does support in other places...the problems students have are fairly similar in nature (virii, malicious spyware, etc). My kit will contain:
CD:
- Bootable to linux or dos
- AVG free antivirus software (to leave behind after scanning)
- Virus removal tools for Klez and others that are available
- Adaware (to stop xupiter, gator, ienhance, etc)
- IE6, IE4, Mozilla, Netscape, and Opera
- Network diagnostics (traceroute, etc)
- Partitionmagic
- network drivers for every card I can get my hands on
- TCP/IP stuff for windows 95/98 (old OSes don't use network by default...only modem)
on a floppy:
- bootable to dos with cd support
- fdisk
- dos antivirus tool
- scandisk, etc.
I also carry copies of windows 2000 and the cab files for 95 and 98. Routinely, too, I take a spare three-port switch (they have a surprisingly high rate of failure) and a length of cat5.
I dunno...the harman/kardon tincan speakers on my toshiba satellite 5100 blow away most average multimedia speakers (and all but one TV in my house). They're downright tiny too, with a subwoofer built into the bottom of the thing. I highly reccomend getting a laptop with a speaker system like this.
Though it would be nice to put a centre chanel into the display, you'd have no channel separation without at least some form of standard speakers. The new wide-screen laptops would be a good market for these sorts of things...put two speaker-pads on either side of the wide screen, or on either side of the keyboard...no extra bulk, but more sound-producing area.
Wow, I can remember watching a documentary about the world's first magnetic hard drive. It was 5MB in capacity, and was about the size of my bedroom...but don't try putting your favourite MP3 on it, because the data access speed was slower than a 300 baud modem!
.1% of the size and weight. One of these days, we'll have solid state flash cards small enough to fit up your nose that hold a terrabyte of full-quality movies and audio (RIAA willing). That'll be neat, yeah?
My first hard drive was a 25 megabyte hard drive for an IBM compatible. It was about 20 pounds, and at the time I thought "wow, I'll never fill this thing up!". All the text files I could ever want, and even a few images and 1-second WAVs! Suddenly, though, I realized it was ludicrously cramped when windows made its appearance.
Now today I was holding in my hand a 1 square inch piece of plastic that was holding 128MB of pictures. A barely postage stamp-sized object was holding more than 5 times what my first hard drive held, and at
Mmmmm, nose-media.
Question: If the shoe fits, why not wear it?
After reading through all the comments attached to this windows-like GUI for linux, I'm wondering why so many people are opposed to it. After having used windows 3.1 for five years, followed by 9x and 2000/XP for the remaining 7 years, I've become quite used to every aspect of the user interface, and have found it to be incredibly efficient. Sure, the kernel is inefficient and unstable sometimes, but if I can do everything I need to do (edit a spreadsheet, print a textfile, compile some sourcecode) with a few familiar clicks and shortcut keys, that's just great.
The main question I have, though, is why exactly you want to have a different interface JUST because it *is* different. I'm not at all bashing those of you who are more used to the kde/gnome/whatever inteface...if you're more comfortable and fast with that sort of interface, all the power to you. The truth is, I find that the windows interface has everything where I expect it. I want to change something about my computer? Go to control panel. I want to change a setting related to my keyboard? It's in the keyboard section. In Mandrake 9.0 KDE, for example, there are three seperate locations in which I could change an option for my keyboard...all with different options and made by different people with different interfaces. I have to remember whether the option I saw was in menu A, B, or C, and then remember how to get to that menu...and where it is within that menu!
For power users, still not used to the wide world of linux, and not yet capable of reconfiguring and recreating their "perfect interface", this is in fact a good idea. Everything is where one would expect, but still runs under linux with its excellent efficiency and open sourced power. If the Microsoft interface is what it takes to make you feel comfortable, then so be it.
One of these days, I'm sure there'll be this "perfect interface" for linux...the windows one may not be it...but it certainly isn't the current spawn of KDE and GNOME that we see most popularly on terminals -- at least not how they exist now. Things need to be streamlined into an intrinsicly logical and efficient system.
The point of my rant: There is no need to make a different interface because it's "not MS". MS may be horrible at some things, but other things do in fact work, and don't need change. If the shoe fits, wear it.
Funny story. A book called "The man who mistook his wife for a hat" contains a reccord about a man who couldn't make new memories. His name: John G.
Connections to Memento? Methinks so.
The Geforce4 440 mobile on my Toshiba Satellite 5100 can't even run the benchmark...I just bought this thing, and I'm already outdated?!
What gives? Shouldn't they provide at least a couple benchmarks for older cards? Furthermore, the demos in 3dmarken are usually quite impressive, and I'd like to see it.
Is it just me, or does this guy sound a lot like any nameless character out of George Orwell's 1984?
Seriously, though, this entire "Homeland Security" craze to prevent more "terrorist" attacks is just silly. It limits the freedom of Americans (and isn't that what the country is sorta based around?), it does NOTHING to prevent further attacks (even if there were one to happen), and makes people like this more paranoid than they already were!
Paranoia causes war and violence! Make it stop!
This sort of device has already been available (in Canada) at least for a good little while. No web link, sorry, but it's called the "Air vest". It hooks onto your motorcycle with a steel cable, and when you get separated from your bike, it inflates like a large puffy life preserver, using CO2 canisters. Pretty neat things if I do say so myself.
No, felts, not pelts.
The mercury was used to make top hats shiny.
I don't know about you guys, but a lot of the people I hear speaking now adays sound like a bunch of mutants, anyways.
*cough*georgebush*cough*
Turned a gameboy advance into a portable mp3 player? I've sorta been wanting to do something like that, but lack the resources.
Well, I mean...If your mother walks in on you while you were looking at porn, the excuse of "I wasn't looking at that!" is impossible to make!
April fool's day was WEEKS ago, why are they still continuing this joke?
Rogers (and numerous other Canadian affiliates of @home) started moving people onto their own networks and mail servers a few weeks ago. There wasn't a single noticable glitch.
Woo hoo for them!
Damnit...I guess this means no more calculator pr0n for the geeks in the back of math class.
Being the resident computer genius in everyone's family, my friend, Kyle tells me to check out his computer. I open the thing up to find about 6 pounds of dust in and around the computer. The processor fan was CAKED in dust to the point where I could no longer turn it manually, even! It's an extreme wonder that the thing didn't die and burn...those pentium 1s sure get hot when there's nothing but a tiny tiny little heatsink on them! Nearly burned myself on that one...
Aaaaaactually, long range probes and gps sats would most likely slow down due to friction (and several other forces at work), *not* due to reverse gravity. You realize, of course, that there is many billions of tonnes of inter-stellar dust and debris just floating around up there, slowing down the spacecraft, much like wind while riding your human-powered, mono-passenger, two-wheeled transportation device.
How this got moderated up to 5, I know not...But really, it's just my job to be an ass now.
All serial rapists drink water...OUTLAW WATER!
The gaming companies make these games with the intent that the players of the game take their agressions out on pixels not people, and that's what has retained my sanity thus far in life. So what, if they played a few games of doom every once in a while, is that so odd? I play a game of doom at least every week, and to my best knowlege I have never commited mass-murder. The shooting is a horrible thing to have happened, and I can understand the mental upset which the parents are having...but the media is to blame on this one. Nobody would have even thought about "violent and graphic" video games as a cause of this, if the media had not said "they were satan worshipers and played the evil violent horrible video game called DOOM! *ominous organ music*" Note that there have been at least 5 copycat killings which would not have happened if the media did not concentrate on this event so heavily. They do it all for the ratings, and the ratings are no consolation for the damage the media has done on this one.
You dropped the ball. Pick it up.
This is fake for the following reasons:
1) NOBODY would be stupid enough to make a series set so far in the past that it would mess up every timeline in existance.
2) The vulcan alone disproves it. A 40 year old vulcan would be like a 20 year old commander of a starship.
3) There's various other inconsistancies which make things not right.
Aaaanyways...
*goes back to his conspiracy theories*
Yes, finally a cheap and effective way to store some of my MP3 collection!
But then again, you realize what I said once about 5 and a quarter floppy disks..."Holy cow! I'm never going to need more than 10 of these things! They're HUGE!"
Actually, that tiny toons episode is the thing that got me liking TMBG. I was 8 when I first saw it...
*gets all reminiscent*
ahhh, the memories.
Do idiots follow me around or something? I tell ya.