Pfft, phone numbers. That's so 19th century. They really should come up with something a lot more modern. Ahhh yes, I can see it now:
"Oh my number? Sure, no problem. Do you have a pen? Here we go: f3a9d4c1-0bff-4792-bf3b-09513ef61af8. It forwards to my home, though, so don't call too late. You can also use it to text me, or IM me. Looking forward to hearing from you!"
Back maybe a bit more than a decade ago, IT and everything around it (computers in general) were pretty specialized. IT technicians were well-respected almost to an engineering/scientist level. Most were well-versed in their field; they were professional and experts in what they did.
But nowadays, when people think of computer people, they think of Geek Squad or the neighborhood computer nerd. Just fiddle around with some software and BAM, it works. In fact, it's so "easy" to "do computers" that you can find "Idiot's Guide" books on it, people who aren't really technically savvy going to places like ITT Technical Institute, and end up working with computers in a place like help desk, or maybe in the lower echelons of the IT department... so couple this with the fact that most people don't realize that programming and information technology (especially the higher-level jobs in those departments) are basically engineering-grade/scientist-grade positions, and the fact that the knowledge required to call yourself a "computer person" or "IT technician" is getting less and less... IT people, especially professionals, become less well-respected. Some even get treated poorly by fellow employees. Management tends to treat them as "just tech guys" -- like any other employee -- not really realizing that your data-entry person or secretary might be easily replaceable, but an IT person is a valuable asset because of his/her knowledge and experience. The more they know, the more valuable they are to your company, etc.
So, being an IT guy ain't what it used to be... at least to the public at large. And I think that lack of respect/not being appreciated for the kind of work that we do/etc is what's causing a disconnect and a need for professionals to become *consultants*. Because, once you bill at several hundred dollars an hour, people start listening to you a lot more, and respecting you significantly better.
A laptop as a blunt force instrument? The potential energy stored in a laptop battery? The RF radiation created by handheld electronics? The fact that a highschool football player could overpower the flight crew and air marshals? They worry about that tube of toothpaste.
I thought the homebrew argument had no merit because of the X-Box SDK and it being free to download from Microsoft, and you can distribute your applications... so the only reason to mod a console is to play pirated games.
EVERY country needs to be doing this, and not making it voluntary either. Any problem on the internet affects everyone connected to it. Cutting off PCs in one country has limited effect in isolation. Considering botnets are an exclusive Windows problem, Microsoft should be forced to pay for the scheme too. It's their mess after all.
Um, not exactly. Evidence of Linux botnets and OS X variants with confirmed infections in the wild. Methinks you're buying a bit too much into the late 90s / early 2000s era FUD against Microsoft. Maybe if this was ten years ago your sabre-rattling might have been acceptable. But these days, to categorically deny the leaps and bounds at which Microsoft has improved security in both Windows Vista and Windows 7, and not realizing that malware is more and more becoming a user education problem than anything else, is not only foolish but ignorant. Not to mention claiming that neither Linux nor Mac OS is susceptible to the same threat is... well, along the same lines, really.
I'm not saying Windows is perfect. Far from it. But please, let's put it into perspective.
Yes. Use our free Development Tools on our Platform instead of Microsoft's $300 tools. Truly it is a secretive agenda
There, fixed that for you.
No, you broke it.
Visual Studio Express is free, and has everything you need that comes with Visual Studio, save for VSS support, some refactoring support, and a couple of other features that, to most freelance amateur developers, would not be missed. Most professional developers can afford the $300 price tag. Students can also get the professional edition for a fraction of the cost.
I bet you also believe that 'if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear', right?
No, I do not believe in that 100%. If Microsoft required me to provide my driver's license, SSN, and other such information to activate my copy of Windows, I'd be pissed off to no end.
This is different. They have your hardware serial numbers and your IP. They can't track you down without a court order anyway. In which case, *anyone* can track you down, given even just one of those: your IP.
You may be happy to bend over for big corporate profits, but I'm increasingly fed up with this crap -- not just from Microsoft but from other companies who decide to prevent software I've purchased from running until I beg them to fix their god-damn piece of crap 'validation'/'activation'/DRM bullshit
Fewer than 12,000 copies stopped working for less than 12 hours. And if you called for support, your problem was fixed.
More people are affected when EVE's servers go down because of an unforeseen problem. You're a paying customer there, too.
Shit happens. Stuff goes down. You know that, being in the computer industry.
With the high rate of Windows piracy, especially in markets such as China (where piracy rates are as high as 80%), Microsoft having WGA as a core part of their operating system makes sense. Legit users, of course, don't have to worry because Windows will never stop working for them (there are some exceptions, but those are typically solved quickly).
The issue may be privacy. According to the WGA FAQ and an analysis by Groklaw (2006), the following information is sent to Microsoft every time WGA "phones home":
Windows product key
PC manufacturer
Operating System version
PID/SID
BIOS information (make, version, date)
BIOS MD5 Checksum
User locale (language setting for displaying Windows)
System locale (language version of the operating system)
Office product key (if validating Office)
Hard drive serial number
It may be a tad bit disturbing to have all that information being broadcast, but some of it makes sense. Windows Activation is tied to a computer and its hardware, and what WGA is supposed to do is verify that the activation is legit, they'd (presumably) need to broadcast the same information to the WGA servers to verify that activation (since we all know activation can be faked/bypassed).
Microsoft also needs to create a disincentive for people who pirate their software. WGA, besides nagging the user that they have an illegal copy, also prevents optional and recommended updates from being installed, prevents Office users from downloading templates, and prevents the download of certain products/services that would be free to paying customers.
So why is "phoning home" okay? Why not do it once and be done with it? Every day crackers find ways to get around Windows' copy protection. As a developer, Microsoft needs to stay ahead of that and tailor their systems to counter-act innovation on the crackers' part. The opposite is also true: falsely-flagged copies need to be unflagged, or customers will suffer due to them being marked as a false positive. Either way, Microsoft has not kept this a secret, and even promised to reduce checking to once every two weeks (and that was way back in 2006).
I know a lot (probably most) of you guys on here will disagree with me, but I see this as a necessary evil that Microsoft has to perform, and if I were in their shoes, I'd go about it similarly (perhaps be a bit less intrusive). The fact of the matter is, WGA only negatively affects people who either pirated software, or were the victims of software piracy. The privacy argument, in my opinion, is a strawman. If you buy a PC from Dell, it's most likely they already have all that information (save for BIOS MD5 checksum, probably) linked to your customer account. If you buy a PC from Best Buy with a credit card, that purchase information is already linked with the product serial number, which is probably linked with all the serial numbers of the hardware that went into the thing. I don't see how this can be any different than that, other than the fact that Microsoft has it instead of Dell or Best Buy.
They didn't say GIMP was better, they said that that was the argument you would need to be able to make to convince someone that FOSS was worthwhile.
Yes, thanks, that is what I was trying to say. After I posted it, I realized I should have repeated "why" ("... why GIMP is *better* than Photoshop, why OpenOffice is...").
PS does not even offer scripting as far as I know
It does offer scripting support in either JavaScript, VBScript, or AppleScript. It's actually very flexible.
And you can also write binary plugins, though that takes significantly more effort if you're going to do something simple.
Those same "sins" can be applied to any proprietary piece of software; heck, some of them can be applied to certain open-source software as well. Now, putting Windows aside, people use proprietary software all the time -- and for some of it there is no FOSS equivalent. Whether it's Windows itself, or Photoshop, Visual Studio, AutoCAD, Mastercam, Office, VMWare, or any of the slew of proprietary pieces of software out there, it's a bad idea to sit there and categorically attack something that many people are either fine with, don't care enough to be against, or ignorant about whether or not they should be against it.
In fact, that's probably the least likely way those people will end up listening to you, and after all, those are the people you're trying to convince.
A lot of people like Windows very much, and even if they could afford an alternative, like a Mac, they choose not to, because they like Windows. Hardcore industry people, like professional photographers using Photoshop, graphic designers using Illustrator, computer-aided manufacturing engineers using things like Mastercam or AutoCAD are so dedicated to their tool-of-trade that they will take umbrage to anything that tries to insult it. After all, doing so may be taken as an insult to their very profession, and thus, to themselves.
So what I'm trying to say is, the strategy of attacking Windows, and proprietary software in general, in order to help bring people to FOSS is going to have the exact opposite effect -- it's only going to solidify people who use proprietary software and alienate them from any thoughts of an alternative. After all, you wouldn't listen to someone telling you you suck, the software you use sucks, and you're an idiot for using it. Now, I'm not saying that's what they outright said, but that's how it's going to be taken by people reading it.
Maybe FOSS should stop being like PETA and, instead, tell people why it's *good* to use FOSS. Why Linux is *better* than Windows, GiMP is *better* than Photoshop, OpenOffice is *better* than MS Office. And maybe people will listen. But if you insult their software and tell them to use something else, they won't be very open to the idea.
Y'all know that £20 isn't really half as much spending power as $40, right?
Indeed, but TFA says in the UK they are paying (converting here to dollars) $107 USD for a full version of Windows 7, whereas here in the US we're paying $200 for a full version (and $120 for an upgrade).
So the issue is, they're paying $93 less for a full version than we are, and on top of that, $13 less for a full version than we are for an upgrade.
I read recently that you have decided to cut Windows 7's price in the UK to about half of what it is here in the US. I don't feel that it does justice to us here in the States, as we're actually getting less value than your UK market.
Take, for example, all the U's that have been dropped from words. My color is not colour, but yet, I have to pay more for the lack of the U. This is unfair. Has the cost of cutting U's from words taken a sharp climb?
Perhaps the letter Z is charging too much these days, and I know how that can be. It only makes sparse appearances in words such as localize and marginalize, but despite its rare occurrence, it, much like a has-been movie star, has the gall to demand top billing. Perhaps your royalties payable to this (not)under-appreciated letter raise the costs here in the US.
Whatever the reasoning, I still find it unfair, and being such a large and powerful corporation, the fact that you can be taken advantage of like this is not only sad, but reprehensible. Use those lawyers of yours and get back at them! Hey, you can even be on the winning end of an anti-trust suit... think of the headlines now: "'Z' Loses Anti-Trust Judgement Thanks to Microsoft". Won't that be good press?
Sincerely,
A Concerned Citizen
PS - This message has been brought to you by the letter 5.
Just impliment Open Document Format (ODF) like every other word processor.
Does ODF use XML format? Because if it does, it's also technically in trouble just as much as the DOCX format is for Word. If anything, that should be the cause of even greater worry for Microsoft's format. If Microsoft can't or won't defend themselves against this ridiculous patent, then any XML format that even partly resembles something technically covered by this patent would be subject to a lawsuit. And while IANAL, it would seem that having this "legal victory" under their belts against a huge company such as Microsoft, the plaintiffs can use that as precedence to go after ODF, the custom XML format I use in the applications I write, the custom XML format *you* use in the applications *you* write, etc.
I would suggest we all hope for Microsoft's lawyers to prevail in this case. It will be a victory for all of us, even if you dislike Microsoft and think they should get their comeuppance. Please save your schadenfreude for another case.
I understand that this may not be actually answering your question, but, if you have *any* Windows systems in your office running XP Professional or Vista Business/Enterprise, you might try getting a label printer for one of those. These OSes come with IIS, and you can easily write a.NET web service that you can then access via PHP from your Linux machine and print labels that way. Yes, a hacky solution indeed, but it works if you can't find any compatible printers for Linux.
It sucks that manufacturers don't really make printer drivers for a lot of high-end equipment for Linux, but I suppose that's the nature of things, when the vast majority of people who would need them tend to only use Windows or OS X.
As TFA mentions, Apple pushed the recording industry to accept the $0.99/track, even when they weren't happy about it. When the iPhone was being developed, and Apple was shopping around for a carrier, AT&T made a significant amount of concessions that other carriers would never have made: modify the voice mail system, lack of network branding on the phone, complete control by Apple over the design of the phone, etc. It can be said that a lot of this would not have been possible without Steve Jobs at the helm, with his influence and charisma telling these other companies that *they've* got to work *with* Apple, not the other way around, if they want a slice of the pie.
Now it seems AT&T is walking all over Apple and Apple is just letting them. Is it because Jobs is absent from the spotlight, and he's lost his influence? What is going on that makes them cower in the corner and submit to AT&T? If anything, it should be the other way around. AT&T would be *nothing* without the iPhone, and Apple would be able to go to any other carrier and have them begging at their feet (contracts notwithstanding).
On a completely different note, I wonder when this sort of thing will stop? Carriers have finally let handset developers do what they want, because they realized that companies like Nokia and Palm and Apple make better phones than Verizon, Sprint, or T-Mobile does, and that they shouldn't inject themselves into the process. This is all thanks to Apple. But these networks are still protective of their cashflow model, trying to use their relative exclusivity and propriety to keep relatively cheap methods of communication off. They charge for SMSes, even though these things actually, *literally* don't cost them anything (the packets in which SMSes are sent are sent or received regardless of whether or not there's an SMS in there) -- especially US carriers. The cost of text messaging in the US far outweighs any other market, for no reason other than it's a million dollar cash cow annually. They keep the Internet crappy, slow, and unreliable so that users can't use it to do anything important, other than get email or browse Facebook, because God forbid you should be able to make a phone call... then that keeps them from charging you $0.40/min when you go over your minutes; or charging you exorbitant monthly fees for voice time. When will all of this change?
Something has to remove their stranglehold over the industry. I get that they want to protect their business model, but they've had it for close to 40 years now in one form or another, and they're stifling change and innovation. And I suppose we can only hope that by doing this, new players will come to market that will be the death knell for the old timers that can't or won't change. And technically, we don't even need a player; all we need is one of the current players to change their tune. Remember the unlimited plans? None of them had it until T-Mobile or Sprint (not sure which) introduced it, and then suddenly everyone jumped on the boat. The first company took an awful big risk to do something like that, but in the end, it paid off.
I would suspect that, should Microsoft include Google Chrome in the browser ballot screen, they would only put the icon with the word "Chrome" next to it. The icon is unfamiliar, and gives no indication of Google. Of course, if they do it for Google, they'd have to do it for all the other browsers. So, instead of seeing "Mozilla FireFox", it'd just be "FireFox". I have no idea if that's something that they care about, or consumers for that matter.
We'll just have to find out.
... well, at least, the ones I've had experience with.
I've been with T-Mobile (BlackBerry), AT&T (iPhone), and now Sprint (Pre), and they all asked for SSN when signing up. I don't think any place is going to let you into a contract with a subsidized phone without running a credit check (hence the SSN request), especially with the economy in the shape it is nowadays.
Did you have experience at another provider that didn't ask for an SSN when selling you a subsidized phone?
Yes, I know it's been mentioned before. Yes, I know it's Microsoft. But SharePoint is an excellent document management system. It supports clustering natively, load balancing, search, information rights management, web editing for most Office formats, InfoPath web-integration. Users can also save natively to SP via WEBDAV through Office apps directly, or through Explorer. There's a whole crapload more that you may want to check out at the SP site.
To get yourself organized and imported, there are.Net libraries available for you to natively access SP and manipulate the whole system via scripts. Importing and exporting files is a cinch using these APIs. There's also exposed web services via SOAP that let you do the same thing. And, in the end, there's the actual SQL backend that is very straight-forward so if you don't want to use the SOAP or SP.Net libraries, you can manipulate the database directly.
So no, you are not locked in.
And, the licensing cost is the most reasonable out of all the document management software out there.
My point was that there are ways you can solve the specific problem I was having *without* a keyboard at all (i.e., with an alphabet down the side so you can pick a letter). In my situation, having any kind of keyboard, on-screen or not, would be inconvenient.
I think the on-screen keyboard is a nice idea; I'm not sure I would call it "genius" since it's been around for years before Apple even made a phone. Apple's *implementation* of the on-screen keyboard is the best in existence, however; that I can attest to. Regardless, typing anything lengthy on the on-screen keyboard is difficult and time-consuming, even with the auto-correct features. So, I will take a physical keyboard any day, despite the apparent "clunkiness" of it, because I prefer to get done faster and without so many mistakes.
Indeed, an on-screen keyboard would be ideal; perhaps in the future when we perfect haptic feedback on a touch screen, possibly through creating "grooves" in the screen where the buttons are when the keyboard is up, and providing a "pressed-in" response when one pushes the button. I know there is development of these technologies, but we're fairly far away from seeing them on a commercial phone. So, until then, I'll stick with physical keyboards.
I encountered the same issue. I found that you can trust certificates a few ways:
- You can send the certificate via e-mail to a gmail account that's hooked up to the phone and add trust that way.
- You can copy the.crt file to the device via USB and go into the Certificate Manager in the menu of Device Information (hit "More Info" to see the menu option).
- You can visit a website serving the CRT and trust it that way.
Sort of a pain, so I hope they fix it by allowing you to add a cert when connecting, like the iPhone.
An addendum: According to Gizmodo (http://gizmodo.com/5154269/confirmed-palm-pre-to-support-flash), Flash support will "be expected to be released at the end of the year". So, we'll see.
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Pfft, phone numbers. That's so 19th century. They really should come up with something a lot more modern. Ahhh yes, I can see it now:
"Oh my number? Sure, no problem. Do you have a pen? Here we go: f3a9d4c1-0bff-4792-bf3b-09513ef61af8. It forwards to my home, though, so don't call too late. You can also use it to text me, or IM me. Looking forward to hearing from you!"
Back maybe a bit more than a decade ago, IT and everything around it (computers in general) were pretty specialized. IT technicians were well-respected almost to an engineering/scientist level. Most were well-versed in their field; they were professional and experts in what they did.
But nowadays, when people think of computer people, they think of Geek Squad or the neighborhood computer nerd. Just fiddle around with some software and BAM, it works. In fact, it's so "easy" to "do computers" that you can find "Idiot's Guide" books on it, people who aren't really technically savvy going to places like ITT Technical Institute, and end up working with computers in a place like help desk, or maybe in the lower echelons of the IT department... so couple this with the fact that most people don't realize that programming and information technology (especially the higher-level jobs in those departments) are basically engineering-grade/scientist-grade positions, and the fact that the knowledge required to call yourself a "computer person" or "IT technician" is getting less and less... IT people, especially professionals, become less well-respected. Some even get treated poorly by fellow employees. Management tends to treat them as "just tech guys" -- like any other employee -- not really realizing that your data-entry person or secretary might be easily replaceable, but an IT person is a valuable asset because of his/her knowledge and experience. The more they know, the more valuable they are to your company, etc.
So, being an IT guy ain't what it used to be... at least to the public at large. And I think that lack of respect/not being appreciated for the kind of work that we do/etc is what's causing a disconnect and a need for professionals to become *consultants*. Because, once you bill at several hundred dollars an hour, people start listening to you a lot more, and respecting you significantly better.
A laptop as a blunt force instrument? The potential energy stored in a laptop battery? The RF radiation created by handheld electronics? The fact that a highschool football player could overpower the flight crew and air marshals? They worry about that tube of toothpaste.
http://xkcd.com/651/
I thought the homebrew argument had no merit because of the X-Box SDK and it being free to download from Microsoft, and you can distribute your applications... so the only reason to mod a console is to play pirated games.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_7
Really? That's quite a bit of new features for a service pack. Compared to this the list is exponentially larger.
EVERY country needs to be doing this, and not making it voluntary either. Any problem on the internet affects everyone connected to it. Cutting off PCs in one country has limited effect in isolation. Considering botnets are an exclusive Windows problem, Microsoft should be forced to pay for the scheme too. It's their mess after all.
Um, not exactly. Evidence of Linux botnets and OS X variants with confirmed infections in the wild. Methinks you're buying a bit too much into the late 90s / early 2000s era FUD against Microsoft. Maybe if this was ten years ago your sabre-rattling might have been acceptable. But these days, to categorically deny the leaps and bounds at which Microsoft has improved security in both Windows Vista and Windows 7, and not realizing that malware is more and more becoming a user education problem than anything else, is not only foolish but ignorant. Not to mention claiming that neither Linux nor Mac OS is susceptible to the same threat is... well, along the same lines, really.
I'm not saying Windows is perfect. Far from it. But please, let's put it into perspective.
There, fixed that for you.
No, you broke it.
Visual Studio Express is free, and has everything you need that comes with Visual Studio, save for VSS support, some refactoring support, and a couple of other features that, to most freelance amateur developers, would not be missed. Most professional developers can afford the $300 price tag. Students can also get the professional edition for a fraction of the cost.
I bet you also believe that 'if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear', right?
No, I do not believe in that 100%. If Microsoft required me to provide my driver's license, SSN, and other such information to activate my copy of Windows, I'd be pissed off to no end.
This is different. They have your hardware serial numbers and your IP. They can't track you down without a court order anyway. In which case, *anyone* can track you down, given even just one of those: your IP.
You may be happy to bend over for big corporate profits, but I'm increasingly fed up with this crap -- not just from Microsoft but from other companies who decide to prevent software I've purchased from running until I beg them to fix their god-damn piece of crap 'validation'/'activation'/DRM bullshit
Fewer than 12,000 copies stopped working for less than 12 hours. And if you called for support, your problem was fixed.
More people are affected when EVE's servers go down because of an unforeseen problem. You're a paying customer there, too.
Shit happens. Stuff goes down. You know that, being in the computer industry.
The issue may be privacy. According to the WGA FAQ and an analysis by Groklaw (2006), the following information is sent to Microsoft every time WGA "phones home":
It may be a tad bit disturbing to have all that information being broadcast, but some of it makes sense. Windows Activation is tied to a computer and its hardware, and what WGA is supposed to do is verify that the activation is legit, they'd (presumably) need to broadcast the same information to the WGA servers to verify that activation (since we all know activation can be faked/bypassed).
Microsoft also needs to create a disincentive for people who pirate their software. WGA, besides nagging the user that they have an illegal copy, also prevents optional and recommended updates from being installed, prevents Office users from downloading templates, and prevents the download of certain products/services that would be free to paying customers.
So why is "phoning home" okay? Why not do it once and be done with it? Every day crackers find ways to get around Windows' copy protection. As a developer, Microsoft needs to stay ahead of that and tailor their systems to counter-act innovation on the crackers' part. The opposite is also true: falsely-flagged copies need to be unflagged, or customers will suffer due to them being marked as a false positive. Either way, Microsoft has not kept this a secret, and even promised to reduce checking to once every two weeks (and that was way back in 2006).
I know a lot (probably most) of you guys on here will disagree with me, but I see this as a necessary evil that Microsoft has to perform, and if I were in their shoes, I'd go about it similarly (perhaps be a bit less intrusive). The fact of the matter is, WGA only negatively affects people who either pirated software, or were the victims of software piracy. The privacy argument, in my opinion, is a strawman. If you buy a PC from Dell, it's most likely they already have all that information (save for BIOS MD5 checksum, probably) linked to your customer account. If you buy a PC from Best Buy with a credit card, that purchase information is already linked with the product serial number, which is probably linked with all the serial numbers of the hardware that went into the thing. I don't see how this can be any different than that, other than the fact that Microsoft has it instead of Dell or Best Buy.
They didn't say GIMP was better, they said that that was the argument you would need to be able to make to convince someone that FOSS was worthwhile.
Yes, thanks, that is what I was trying to say. After I posted it, I realized I should have repeated "why" ("... why GIMP is *better* than Photoshop, why OpenOffice is...").
PS does not even offer scripting as far as I know
It does offer scripting support in either JavaScript, VBScript, or AppleScript. It's actually very flexible.
And you can also write binary plugins, though that takes significantly more effort if you're going to do something simple.
Those same "sins" can be applied to any proprietary piece of software; heck, some of them can be applied to certain open-source software as well. Now, putting Windows aside, people use proprietary software all the time -- and for some of it there is no FOSS equivalent. Whether it's Windows itself, or Photoshop, Visual Studio, AutoCAD, Mastercam, Office, VMWare, or any of the slew of proprietary pieces of software out there, it's a bad idea to sit there and categorically attack something that many people are either fine with, don't care enough to be against, or ignorant about whether or not they should be against it.
In fact, that's probably the least likely way those people will end up listening to you, and after all, those are the people you're trying to convince.
A lot of people like Windows very much, and even if they could afford an alternative, like a Mac, they choose not to, because they like Windows. Hardcore industry people, like professional photographers using Photoshop, graphic designers using Illustrator, computer-aided manufacturing engineers using things like Mastercam or AutoCAD are so dedicated to their tool-of-trade that they will take umbrage to anything that tries to insult it. After all, doing so may be taken as an insult to their very profession, and thus, to themselves.
So what I'm trying to say is, the strategy of attacking Windows, and proprietary software in general, in order to help bring people to FOSS is going to have the exact opposite effect -- it's only going to solidify people who use proprietary software and alienate them from any thoughts of an alternative. After all, you wouldn't listen to someone telling you you suck, the software you use sucks, and you're an idiot for using it. Now, I'm not saying that's what they outright said, but that's how it's going to be taken by people reading it.
Maybe FOSS should stop being like PETA and, instead, tell people why it's *good* to use FOSS. Why Linux is *better* than Windows, GiMP is *better* than Photoshop, OpenOffice is *better* than MS Office. And maybe people will listen. But if you insult their software and tell them to use something else, they won't be very open to the idea.
Just a thought, anyway.
Y'all know that £20 isn't really half as much spending power as $40, right?
Indeed, but TFA says in the UK they are paying (converting here to dollars) $107 USD for a full version of Windows 7, whereas here in the US we're paying $200 for a full version (and $120 for an upgrade).
So the issue is, they're paying $93 less for a full version than we are, and on top of that, $13 less for a full version than we are for an upgrade.
Dear Microsoft,
I read recently that you have decided to cut Windows 7's price in the UK to about half of what it is here in the US. I don't feel that it does justice to us here in the States, as we're actually getting less value than your UK market.
Take, for example, all the U's that have been dropped from words. My color is not colour, but yet, I have to pay more for the lack of the U. This is unfair. Has the cost of cutting U's from words taken a sharp climb?
Perhaps the letter Z is charging too much these days, and I know how that can be. It only makes sparse appearances in words such as localize and marginalize, but despite its rare occurrence, it, much like a has-been movie star, has the gall to demand top billing. Perhaps your royalties payable to this (not)under-appreciated letter raise the costs here in the US.
Whatever the reasoning, I still find it unfair, and being such a large and powerful corporation, the fact that you can be taken advantage of like this is not only sad, but reprehensible. Use those lawyers of yours and get back at them! Hey, you can even be on the winning end of an anti-trust suit... think of the headlines now: "'Z' Loses Anti-Trust Judgement Thanks to Microsoft". Won't that be good press?
Sincerely,
A Concerned Citizen
PS - This message has been brought to you by the letter 5.
Just impliment Open Document Format (ODF) like every other word processor.
Does ODF use XML format? Because if it does, it's also technically in trouble just as much as the DOCX format is for Word. If anything, that should be the cause of even greater worry for Microsoft's format. If Microsoft can't or won't defend themselves against this ridiculous patent, then any XML format that even partly resembles something technically covered by this patent would be subject to a lawsuit. And while IANAL, it would seem that having this "legal victory" under their belts against a huge company such as Microsoft, the plaintiffs can use that as precedence to go after ODF, the custom XML format I use in the applications I write, the custom XML format *you* use in the applications *you* write, etc.
I would suggest we all hope for Microsoft's lawyers to prevail in this case. It will be a victory for all of us, even if you dislike Microsoft and think they should get their comeuppance. Please save your schadenfreude for another case.
We all write our comments in Word. Because the Internet Explorer doesn't have a spell checker.*
* (just a guess)
Wat are u tlaking abot, I dont nede a spellcheker.
I understand that this may not be actually answering your question, but, if you have *any* Windows systems in your office running XP Professional or Vista Business/Enterprise, you might try getting a label printer for one of those. These OSes come with IIS, and you can easily write a .NET web service that you can then access via PHP from your Linux machine and print labels that way. Yes, a hacky solution indeed, but it works if you can't find any compatible printers for Linux.
It sucks that manufacturers don't really make printer drivers for a lot of high-end equipment for Linux, but I suppose that's the nature of things, when the vast majority of people who would need them tend to only use Windows or OS X.
As TFA mentions, Apple pushed the recording industry to accept the $0.99/track, even when they weren't happy about it. When the iPhone was being developed, and Apple was shopping around for a carrier, AT&T made a significant amount of concessions that other carriers would never have made: modify the voice mail system, lack of network branding on the phone, complete control by Apple over the design of the phone, etc. It can be said that a lot of this would not have been possible without Steve Jobs at the helm, with his influence and charisma telling these other companies that *they've* got to work *with* Apple, not the other way around, if they want a slice of the pie.
Now it seems AT&T is walking all over Apple and Apple is just letting them. Is it because Jobs is absent from the spotlight, and he's lost his influence? What is going on that makes them cower in the corner and submit to AT&T? If anything, it should be the other way around. AT&T would be *nothing* without the iPhone, and Apple would be able to go to any other carrier and have them begging at their feet (contracts notwithstanding).
On a completely different note, I wonder when this sort of thing will stop? Carriers have finally let handset developers do what they want, because they realized that companies like Nokia and Palm and Apple make better phones than Verizon, Sprint, or T-Mobile does, and that they shouldn't inject themselves into the process. This is all thanks to Apple. But these networks are still protective of their cashflow model, trying to use their relative exclusivity and propriety to keep relatively cheap methods of communication off. They charge for SMSes, even though these things actually, *literally* don't cost them anything (the packets in which SMSes are sent are sent or received regardless of whether or not there's an SMS in there) -- especially US carriers. The cost of text messaging in the US far outweighs any other market, for no reason other than it's a million dollar cash cow annually. They keep the Internet crappy, slow, and unreliable so that users can't use it to do anything important, other than get email or browse Facebook, because God forbid you should be able to make a phone call... then that keeps them from charging you $0.40/min when you go over your minutes; or charging you exorbitant monthly fees for voice time. When will all of this change?
Something has to remove their stranglehold over the industry. I get that they want to protect their business model, but they've had it for close to 40 years now in one form or another, and they're stifling change and innovation. And I suppose we can only hope that by doing this, new players will come to market that will be the death knell for the old timers that can't or won't change. And technically, we don't even need a player; all we need is one of the current players to change their tune. Remember the unlimited plans? None of them had it until T-Mobile or Sprint (not sure which) introduced it, and then suddenly everyone jumped on the boat. The first company took an awful big risk to do something like that, but in the end, it paid off.
Let's hope it happens again.
I would suspect that, should Microsoft include Google Chrome in the browser ballot screen, they would only put the icon with the word "Chrome" next to it. The icon is unfamiliar, and gives no indication of Google. Of course, if they do it for Google, they'd have to do it for all the other browsers. So, instead of seeing "Mozilla FireFox", it'd just be "FireFox". I have no idea if that's something that they care about, or consumers for that matter. We'll just have to find out.
No, you have to pay for the jar.
Except Indians make an average of $2/hour, so that $1 piece of clothing looks a bit more like $20 to them.
... well, at least, the ones I've had experience with.
I've been with T-Mobile (BlackBerry), AT&T (iPhone), and now Sprint (Pre), and they all asked for SSN when signing up. I don't think any place is going to let you into a contract with a subsidized phone without running a credit check (hence the SSN request), especially with the economy in the shape it is nowadays.
Did you have experience at another provider that didn't ask for an SSN when selling you a subsidized phone?
Yes, I know it's been mentioned before. Yes, I know it's Microsoft. But SharePoint is an excellent document management system. It supports clustering natively, load balancing, search, information rights management, web editing for most Office formats, InfoPath web-integration. Users can also save natively to SP via WEBDAV through Office apps directly, or through Explorer. There's a whole crapload more that you may want to check out at the SP site.
.Net libraries available for you to natively access SP and manipulate the whole system via scripts. Importing and exporting files is a cinch using these APIs. There's also exposed web services via SOAP that let you do the same thing. And, in the end, there's the actual SQL backend that is very straight-forward so if you don't want to use the SOAP or SP .Net libraries, you can manipulate the database directly.
To get yourself organized and imported, there are
So no, you are not locked in. And, the licensing cost is the most reasonable out of all the document management software out there.
My point was that there are ways you can solve the specific problem I was having *without* a keyboard at all (i.e., with an alphabet down the side so you can pick a letter). In my situation, having any kind of keyboard, on-screen or not, would be inconvenient.
I think the on-screen keyboard is a nice idea; I'm not sure I would call it "genius" since it's been around for years before Apple even made a phone. Apple's *implementation* of the on-screen keyboard is the best in existence, however; that I can attest to. Regardless, typing anything lengthy on the on-screen keyboard is difficult and time-consuming, even with the auto-correct features. So, I will take a physical keyboard any day, despite the apparent "clunkiness" of it, because I prefer to get done faster and without so many mistakes.
Indeed, an on-screen keyboard would be ideal; perhaps in the future when we perfect haptic feedback on a touch screen, possibly through creating "grooves" in the screen where the buttons are when the keyboard is up, and providing a "pressed-in" response when one pushes the button. I know there is development of these technologies, but we're fairly far away from seeing them on a commercial phone. So, until then, I'll stick with physical keyboards.
I encountered the same issue. I found that you can trust certificates a few ways:
- You can send the certificate via e-mail to a gmail account that's hooked up to the phone and add trust that way.
- You can copy the .crt file to the device via USB and go into the Certificate Manager in the menu of Device Information (hit "More Info" to see the menu option).
- You can visit a website serving the CRT and trust it that way.
Sort of a pain, so I hope they fix it by allowing you to add a cert when connecting, like the iPhone.
> Does it have Flash
An addendum: According to Gizmodo (http://gizmodo.com/5154269/confirmed-palm-pre-to-support-flash), Flash support will "be expected to be released at the end of the year". So, we'll see.