You're worried about security and privacy? Then why are you using Gmail and Google Docs for that oh-so-important data? If you're going to be paranoid, you might want to start there...
I mean, I use Gmail too, but as a student, I don't exactly have a lot to hide - a few forum passwords, slashdot credentials, a few measly bucks in the bank. If you were really AT ALL serious about privacy and security, you should be using services that aren't paid for by a company that makes money from knowing your private data...
Sorry, but this makes it very difficult to take your post seriously...
The thing is, it's a lot easier (and probably cheaper) to buy two 1.5TB SATA drives and just back up from one to the other every now and then, instead of burning 1500/4.7 discs once a month. I've moved to a completely hard-drive based backup solution, where I have every piece of important data on two separate hard drives. (Incremental) backups take 5 minutes instead of half a month, and all I need to store is two 3.5" hard drives... far better than hundreds of optical discs...
As for optical media failures: I've had _a lot_. Sure, I never used archival quality media or a top-of-the-line burner, but I hardly think that most people who backed up their family photos on CDs or DVDs use archival media or top-of-the-line burners... Hard drive failures? Not so much. In ten years or so, one failure (so about one out of thirty), which is OK if you're aware of it and use some sort of backup scheme or RAID1 to protect against mechanical failure.
Apple sees iTunes as a piece of software that adds value to their hardware. It makes sense for them to restrict access if they think people will gravitate to Apple hardware in order to be able to make full use of iTunes syncing. Now why exactly is that a bad, monopolistic move?
The iPod/iPhone + iTunes package is a seamless package that (supposedly... I don't have much experience with it, to tell the truth) just works in conjunction with their store. That in itself is a feature, and of course it's in Apples best interests to keep that feature for its own hardware...
Sure, it's not benevolent-open-source-mumbo-jumbo, but what makes you say that Apple isn't perfectly within its rights to restrict iTunes syncing to the devices the software was developed for?
Actually, I'd say he's perfectly right. You can sync your tracks with pretty much any other program... why would you want to use iTunes if you're not forced to?
If you're only using Apple hardware because of iTunes, there's something seriously wrong with you...
Hmmm, what do you need pressure sensing for on a netvetible? Isn't the whole point of this thing being able to take notes in meetings/lectures? It's not like artists are gonna be buying them for highly detailed shadings etc...
I dunno, $500 seems pretty steep for a machine that's slower than most N270/280 netbooks and has less battery life even though it's got a non-removable battery. Wake me when they get 8 hours of (wi-fi browsing, note-taking, word-document-editing, divx/xvid playing) battery life...
Why on Earth would you think a resistive touchscreen is useless? Did you go to a school that exclusively used finger paints and A2 pages of paper for writing?
I don't understand what the big deal about capacitive touch is - as far as I'm concerned it's useless for everything that's not web browsing or multi-touch gestures...
Having used an EeePC 1000H for over 6 months, I have to disagree. The touchpad on that thing was AWESOME - way better than the Synaptics one on my Thinkpad's Ultranav. In fact, it actually rivals the Thinkpad's trackpoint for ease of use, accuracy and speed... IF you spend some time learning to use it (not to mention multi-touch tapping etc.).
If you were just willing to try something new, you might find that a halfway decent, properly set up trackpad isn't necessarily inferior to a trackpoint on any more than a subjective level... Don't get me wrong, trackpoints are awesome - but when done correctly, trackpads are decent too.
The only problem is that the 1000H's trackpad is the first one I've actually been satisfied with...
Hmmm, that may be true, but (not having seen them before) I thought that the contents of the copy&paste were pretty interesting. Definitely made me think...
I don't understand why this is modded troll. Sure, it's well thought out and glorious in its self-loathing - is that such a bad thing on Slashdot? Seems like a fine post to me - one that actually made me think about my own media purchasing & pirating habits...
Is that supposed to work? All I get is a Youtube page with all the thumbnails and videos empty/black (FF3.5).
As for regular Youtube not working on any browser other than IE6 - get the newest Flash, update your "modern browser" to the latest version, and if that doesn't work, just stop using Youtube... that's pretty much what I did when all Flash video stopped playing sound for some reason (on a fresh XP install)...
The missing of each non-Ultimate-version Windows distro are listed somewhere, and probably don't even number in the dozens. When you buy a cheaper version of Windows, you check the list and decide if you're willing to live without the features. IIRC you can also upgrade the version you have purchased from within the OS, so it's just a question of cash.
As for Linux... well, you download an ISO, install the damned thing hoping it'll work, find out it doesn't work because package so and so doesn't exist for the distro you downloaded, and that you'd have to compile it yourself (which includes finding, possibly compiling and installing all the packages that the package you're actually trying to install depends on). So you try to compile it, give up after half an hour, kill a bottle of vodka and throw the PC out the window (or put Windows back on it)...
You think CLIs are bad? Have you tried using something like Ubuntu WITHOUT the CLI? It's even worse - 5 ways to change the same setting, and only half of them work. Oh, and only one of the five options corresponds to the one you can set via the CLI...
Sure, if all you need is Firefox and Thunderbird you're not going to be changing a lot of system settings, but even simple things like changing screen resolutions or refresh rates for multiple monitors (stuff that takes seconds in properly thought out operating systems) take hours of tweaking and research...
All in all, I don't think Linux without the command line is feasible at the moment... it's just not functional enough without it.
Isn't it your own fault for purchasing DRM'd crap? Oh, and a lot of games run just fine on Linux (at least the important ones, like Unreal Tournament:D) - for the rest, there's Wine or a second OS for gaming...
I actually tried Funambol (albeit half a year ago), and it sucked. Duplicate appointments, missing data in contacts, Appointments that were deleted in Outlook never got deleted in Google Calendar...
I don't have a lot of delays, but my graphics card clocks up to full speed when scrolling Slashdot in Firefox, and that's saying something:D...
Oh, and have I mentioned the momentary Firefox lock-ups when loading Slashdot articles with 200+ comments? Boo Slashdot. Bring on multithreaded Firefox!
It's apalling, really... I've just loaded up Thunderbird and it switches IMAP folders (on Gmail) within a split second. Outlook needs 5 seconds, depending on how many messages are in the folder...
I think I've stumbled onto the most elegant PIM solution for Windows Mobile + Gmail users, though:
Thunderbird for e-mail with contacts synced from Gmail (which are in turn synced directly from the Windows Mobile device to Gmail via Google Sync), and Outlook 2007 for the rest. Outlook's calendar, notes and tasks aren't so excruciatingly slow that it'd bother me, and this way Thunderbird's address book is always updated with the newest contacts from Outlook and the Windows Mobile device...
Looks like I'll be sticking with this until someone finds me a better solution.:)
Slashdot Mirror
You're worried about security and privacy? Then why are you using Gmail and Google Docs for that oh-so-important data? If you're going to be paranoid, you might want to start there...
I mean, I use Gmail too, but as a student, I don't exactly have a lot to hide - a few forum passwords, slashdot credentials, a few measly bucks in the bank. If you were really AT ALL serious about privacy and security, you should be using services that aren't paid for by a company that makes money from knowing your private data...
Sorry, but this makes it very difficult to take your post seriously...
Strange, the only drives I've had fail so far were IDE (OK, 80% of my drives have been IDE so far, so that probably skews the odds a bit).
Nice post though, quite a few interesting tidbits of information in there.
The thing is, it's a lot easier (and probably cheaper) to buy two 1.5TB SATA drives and just back up from one to the other every now and then, instead of burning 1500/4.7 discs once a month. I've moved to a completely hard-drive based backup solution, where I have every piece of important data on two separate hard drives. (Incremental) backups take 5 minutes instead of half a month, and all I need to store is two 3.5" hard drives... far better than hundreds of optical discs...
As for optical media failures: I've had _a lot_. Sure, I never used archival quality media or a top-of-the-line burner, but I hardly think that most people who backed up their family photos on CDs or DVDs use archival media or top-of-the-line burners... Hard drive failures? Not so much. In ten years or so, one failure (so about one out of thirty), which is OK if you're aware of it and use some sort of backup scheme or RAID1 to protect against mechanical failure.
So you run 1000+ CD & DVDs through a "checker" once a year just to see if they're still working? Or do you just not have a lot of stuff to back up? :)
"(Rips off the mask to reveal he's infact a tenticle demon!!)"
So which one's the actual typo? The i or the n? :P
Frackin awesome movie. I must've watched it like 50 times when I was 13 :D
Apple sees iTunes as a piece of software that adds value to their hardware. It makes sense for them to restrict access if they think people will gravitate to Apple hardware in order to be able to make full use of iTunes syncing. Now why exactly is that a bad, monopolistic move?
The iPod/iPhone + iTunes package is a seamless package that (supposedly... I don't have much experience with it, to tell the truth) just works in conjunction with their store. That in itself is a feature, and of course it's in Apples best interests to keep that feature for its own hardware...
Sure, it's not benevolent-open-source-mumbo-jumbo, but what makes you say that Apple isn't perfectly within its rights to restrict iTunes syncing to the devices the software was developed for?
Actually, I'd say he's perfectly right. You can sync your tracks with pretty much any other program... why would you want to use iTunes if you're not forced to?
If you're only using Apple hardware because of iTunes, there's something seriously wrong with you...
Hmmm, thanks for the info. I thought the whole point of HTML5 video was to have it work in every standards-compliant browser... *facepalm*
Hmmm, what do you need pressure sensing for on a netvetible? Isn't the whole point of this thing being able to take notes in meetings/lectures? It's not like artists are gonna be buying them for highly detailed shadings etc...
I dunno, $500 seems pretty steep for a machine that's slower than most N270/280 netbooks and has less battery life even though it's got a non-removable battery. Wake me when they get 8 hours of (wi-fi browsing, note-taking, word-document-editing, divx/xvid playing) battery life...
Why on Earth would you think a resistive touchscreen is useless? Did you go to a school that exclusively used finger paints and A2 pages of paper for writing?
I don't understand what the big deal about capacitive touch is - as far as I'm concerned it's useless for everything that's not web browsing or multi-touch gestures...
Having used an EeePC 1000H for over 6 months, I have to disagree. The touchpad on that thing was AWESOME - way better than the Synaptics one on my Thinkpad's Ultranav. In fact, it actually rivals the Thinkpad's trackpoint for ease of use, accuracy and speed... IF you spend some time learning to use it (not to mention multi-touch tapping etc.).
If you were just willing to try something new, you might find that a halfway decent, properly set up trackpad isn't necessarily inferior to a trackpoint on any more than a subjective level... Don't get me wrong, trackpoints are awesome - but when done correctly, trackpads are decent too.
The only problem is that the 1000H's trackpad is the first one I've actually been satisfied with...
Hmmm, that may be true, but (not having seen them before) I thought that the contents of the copy&paste were pretty interesting. Definitely made me think...
I don't understand why this is modded troll. Sure, it's well thought out and glorious in its self-loathing - is that such a bad thing on Slashdot? Seems like a fine post to me - one that actually made me think about my own media purchasing & pirating habits...
Bhahahahahh. Nice one :D
Is that supposed to work? All I get is a Youtube page with all the thumbnails and videos empty/black (FF3.5).
As for regular Youtube not working on any browser other than IE6 - get the newest Flash, update your "modern browser" to the latest version, and if that doesn't work, just stop using Youtube... that's pretty much what I did when all Flash video stopped playing sound for some reason (on a fresh XP install)...
If Linux did everything I wanted except for games, I'd have no problem only using my XP install for games. Everything else I'd do in Linux.
As it stands, however, I can't do half the stuff I'd like to do in Linux, so I'm stuck with XP all the way :P
Guess I'd better not try the calendar sync then ;)
The missing of each non-Ultimate-version Windows distro are listed somewhere, and probably don't even number in the dozens. When you buy a cheaper version of Windows, you check the list and decide if you're willing to live without the features. IIRC you can also upgrade the version you have purchased from within the OS, so it's just a question of cash.
As for Linux... well, you download an ISO, install the damned thing hoping it'll work, find out it doesn't work because package so and so doesn't exist for the distro you downloaded, and that you'd have to compile it yourself (which includes finding, possibly compiling and installing all the packages that the package you're actually trying to install depends on). So you try to compile it, give up after half an hour, kill a bottle of vodka and throw the PC out the window (or put Windows back on it)...
You think CLIs are bad? Have you tried using something like Ubuntu WITHOUT the CLI? It's even worse - 5 ways to change the same setting, and only half of them work. Oh, and only one of the five options corresponds to the one you can set via the CLI...
Sure, if all you need is Firefox and Thunderbird you're not going to be changing a lot of system settings, but even simple things like changing screen resolutions or refresh rates for multiple monitors (stuff that takes seconds in properly thought out operating systems) take hours of tweaking and research...
All in all, I don't think Linux without the command line is feasible at the moment... it's just not functional enough without it.
I say this as an XP Pro user:
Isn't it your own fault for purchasing DRM'd crap? Oh, and a lot of games run just fine on Linux (at least the important ones, like Unreal Tournament :D) - for the rest, there's Wine or a second OS for gaming...
I actually tried Funambol (albeit half a year ago), and it sucked. Duplicate appointments, missing data in contacts, Appointments that were deleted in Outlook never got deleted in Google Calendar...
As for the elegance... meh :P
I don't have a lot of delays, but my graphics card clocks up to full speed when scrolling Slashdot in Firefox, and that's saying something :D...
Oh, and have I mentioned the momentary Firefox lock-ups when loading Slashdot articles with 200+ comments? Boo Slashdot. Bring on multithreaded Firefox!
It's apalling, really... I've just loaded up Thunderbird and it switches IMAP folders (on Gmail) within a split second. Outlook needs 5 seconds, depending on how many messages are in the folder...
I think I've stumbled onto the most elegant PIM solution for Windows Mobile + Gmail users, though:
Thunderbird for e-mail with contacts synced from Gmail (which are in turn synced directly from the Windows Mobile device to Gmail via Google Sync), and Outlook 2007 for the rest. Outlook's calendar, notes and tasks aren't so excruciatingly slow that it'd bother me, and this way Thunderbird's address book is always updated with the newest contacts from Outlook and the Windows Mobile device...
Looks like I'll be sticking with this until someone finds me a better solution. :)