Mine contains my name and age... and that's about it... you might be able to work out more from my friends but... I don't even think it's reasonable to put a real name up. All these companies share all the data they have on you, so if one of them has your name and another has your photo and another has your browser photo, they have a complete file on you. I think it's safer to remain anonymous everywhere.
All Linux browsers Firefox (Macintosh) Safari (all platforms) Firefox 3 (all platforms) Opera (all platforms)...... and so on I never expected to see Google release something that was (practically) IE exclusive...
Physics requires number crunching. It's that simple. It's not much use learning differential equations if you're incapable of solving anything useful. Any physics or engineering major should learn at least basic numerical methods and how to implement them. For me, we did it with C, nothing fancy. As far as using Excel for scientific computing, some of my classmates tried to pull this in a heat transfer class. It's a joke, it'll work for something really simple, but it's no good for any serious work. I know a couple people who did the computational work that earned their professors a Nobel prize who used Excel to do it all. It took a couple years to run simulations that probably could otherwise have been done in a month, but while they waited for the computer they were busy doing other projects, and if they really wanted they could have used more than one computer at a time.
The iPhone users use 30x the data of others. That's because Mobile Safari is about 30x better than the competition. The "30x the data of other users" includes the vast majority of users who don't have data plans at all, so you should have said: That's because iPhone users all have data plans.
The administration asked for increased funding for the DOE Office of Science. Congress instead slashed its budget --- all while fully funding Bush's multi-trillion dollar war in Iraq.
When Congress cuts the budget, there's nothing the administration can do. This is patently wrong, as anyone who uses DOE funded national labs knows due to the weekly emails from lab personnel asking us to lobby lawmakers on their behalf. You're probably expecting me to say that it was Bush's fault, but I won't say that, either. Here's what happened:
1) Congress decided to increase funding to natural sciences. Republicans and Democrats agreed on it. The Bush administration (which does have heavy, heavy influence in the Republican-sponsored budgets in congress) agreed with Congress. Things looked good.
2) Democrats in Congress and the Republican Congress/Presidential administration started fighting about funding for veteran-benefits (D's wanted more, R's wanted less), the war (D's wanted a timeline for withdrawal, R's didn't), and several other issues. They needed to compromise, as usual.
3) The compromise they reached ended up cutting the funding increase that they ALL had supported, and which was already being spent. Instead, funding for natural sciences was cut. This is why the DOE, NSF, etc. are in their current situations.
Why did the politicians cut something they all agreed was worthwhile? I'm going to speculate that it was because they didn't really care about it much one way or another, and also because research funding is such a tiny part of the budget with virtually no lobbyist support that our esteemed leaders essentially forgot about it.
So holding a company accountable is a bad thing because they didn't hold every company accountable at the same time?
Whenever one company is held accountable it makes it easier for others to be held accountable.
Anyway, the class action suits do a decent job of holding big pharma in check. Juries just don't give out the same awards because your computer repair was a couple of days late. 1) Dell tech support isn't half bad.
2) You think that "big pharma" is currently "in check?" The insane markups and massive profiteering that occur at the expense of millions of lives a year are the happy result of our effective class action lawsuits? Just checking.
If MinWin is removed out of Win7, then the "new" product could leverage a lot of the existing work already done with Vista and the work for MinWin can be saved for release in the next operating system. MinWin seems better for a distributed operating system which is closer to the "no major OS model" of future networked hardware. So in some ways, spending more time to make MinWin more compatible to that future (and thus removing it from Win7) makes financial sense.
So, will Microsoft succumb and make Win7 into a "Vista Release 2"? MinWin was never in Windows 7. Check out the MinWin story comments and you'll see that it was to be developed based on the kernel of 7, but never offered as a product. Not that MinWin wouldn't be welcome, in theory, but it was never announced as part of 7 in the first place.
You can buy the original Xbox at GameStop (in the US) for $60 used. However, my understanding is that it doesn't handle HD streaming well at all, and you still need the know-how to mod the system. Plus, it's huge...I'll take something small even if there is a price premium involved...which is offset by the ease of installing the MythTV frontend. Yeah, you need a softmodded xbox, to do it, but an xbox with xmbc handles HD streaming better than any other media streamer on the market. The only problem is that it can't handle most HD content.
That's sort of like saying "Al-Quaeda hates freedom" -- I don't think Thompson hates the first amendment, it is just (in his mind) trumped by other values. He has further picked a particularly poor method for promoting his values. AQ doesn't really attack freedom directly - the main way they have affected freedom is through giving Bush the '04 election and thus helping him to cut back on freedoms around the world. Jack Thompson, on the other hand, does directly attack things covered under the First Amendment. I agree that the GP's statement is overly stating the case, but your comparison manages to go too far in the other direction.
Notice that it ranks cookies as a 2/5 threat severity. Yes, it calls it "Adware.Advertising" and not "Malware.Advertising" but if you look you'll notice that they don't actually use the Malware.XXX tag because everything in this database is considered a piece of malware. The tags identify which type.
3) This stuff is easily available on the first page of a Yahoo search.
And there are a series of videos on Youtube by a guy called Thunderf00t that is very intelligent about this topic. If you look to Youtube for intelligence, your standards will degrade.
The problem with Scientology isn't their belief system. They're entitled to it. The problem is the massive persecution of anyone who leaves or criticizes the church (up to and including sanctioned murder), and the way they brainwash members into giving up all their money, friends and family. I have a relative who joined a sect of a more widely popular religion who was brainwashed into giving up friends and family, and I condemn that sect on the same basis.
"I've never had trouble removing QuickTime. The uninstaller always works for me."
The point that I and a lot of other posters were making is that Quicktime is a pain unless you remove it. On my home system I have it removed, and this is why.
"That's why they put this handy little checkbox in the preferences. If you don't want QuickTime to load in the system tray, simply uncheck the box to tell it not to."
The box resets itself, maybe it's on updates, but the self-checking box is what got me to finally uninstall QT a few years ago.
"If you don't like iTunes, don't use iTunes. My only real complaint is that the UI design puts minimalism over intuitiveness (but since I've been using it for years, not being intuitive isn't a problem for me), and on Windows it takes forever to launch. I suppose it takes awhile to launch on Mac OS X too, but Mac apps always take awhile to launch so that's expected; on Windows it's not."
That's interesting - I don't find the UI to be minimalist enough. I keep it installed, though, because the third party apps I've used to upload songs to my iPod had occasional bugs, and once corrupted my old iPod's disk. What I don't like is that in the ~month that passes between each time I run iTunes, it keeps two processes running constantly, and if I disable them from startup, they add themselves as new entries. If I kill their processes and run iTunes, the program functions normally, so I know they're not necessary even when I do run it.
"It also crashes way too much on a new MacBook Pro, and since I don't know what Apple compatible software is a good replacement for it, I can't just replace it for my friend as I would if he had Windows."
Luckily it's not my computer that has the problem. I've had bad RAM before, and just identifying it as the problem was an experience I don't want to repeat.
"If bad web designers didn't have Flash at their disposal, they'd just use JavaScript and animated GIFs to create their horrible crap, just like they did in the late 90s. Don't blame the tool."
My complaint is outdated, I guess. When Flash ads first showed up everywhere I was very annoyed that they were much harder to block than the old stuff. Now addons for Firefox (and I'm sure for other browsers that I don't know about) make blocking Flash easy.
"All the network printers I've seen let you set the IP via the front panel. My complaint with HP printers is the need for a 300MB driver download. What the hell is wrong with them?"
This old printer which I got for free when it was retired from an employer didn't let me set an IP on the front panel. I could print the IP, but not change it. Using the parallel cable was the procedure HP told people on their forum to use. 300 MB? Wow, I guess I haven't been paying attention.
"Do you happen to recall the names of some good ones? I might have to look into that." http://www.midiox.com/desktoprestore.htm It's nice - right click on the desktop and it shows up in the context menu.
"My roommates are sick of Verizon, and are debating whether to break their contract."
Verizon increased one of their fees by something like 0.6% on May 1st, and by the terms of their own contracts, any Verizon customer who calls and mentions that can get out of a contract with no penalty within the next 60 (or maybe 90) days.
"Actually, the only reason Flash movie players exist is because Apple pissed people off by making QuickTime for Windows annoying a decade ago. We should all just be using the QuickTime plugin, and it shouldn't suck."
I almost mentioned that old movie player but decided it would date me too much. I suppose that there is no standard movie playing method that makes everyone happy yet.
"RealAlternative, QuickTimeAlternative, and Media Player Classic."
All essential to my system, since I dislike Realplayer, QT, and WMP, but want to be able to play their respective content. VLC is nice, too.
Apple already has significantly more than 10000 movies available? I thought they actually had a smaller, though probably more recent, selection than Netflix.
I think that asking whether this will beat AppleTV is ignoring that AppleTV hasn't exactly been the newest iPod. AppleTV is a very tiny player in the video over IP market. The real competition is bit torrent, which has already defeated AppleTV. Will people pay for something they can get (not streaming, but in higher quality) for free? I will.
"The best part about Quicktime? It's not as bad as Realplayer. Seriously, every time I see a file offered in real audio or video format, I'm just like WTF? Real offers absolutely no advantage over any other format, and a huge list of negatives...why is anyone still using it?"
I agree exactly.
"I still haven't found anything genuinely better than Winamp 2.9 (although I did upgrade to Winamp 5 last time I bought a computer. It wasn't any better, but not enough worse to make me revert)."
Also exactly what I did, but I think I was using 2.85.
"For video, it's Media Player Classic, although I might try VLC instead."
Exactly like me...this is getting creepy.
"I can't even begin to comprehend why Logitech drivers should be so huge. I like their mice, though, so I just use them without installing the drivers. Windows XP recognizes 4 out of 5 buttons plus the scroll wheel on my mouse."
I managed to get addicted to having my thumb click do a double click and my middle button minimize back in the mid '90s. I liked my MS Intellimouse Pro's drivers more than the Logitech software, but I overall prefer Logitech hardware, so as far as I know I'm stuck.
"You really should not have left Adobe reader off your list. It's horrifically bloated and selfish. It should be a case study of how not to do things."
Yeah, I do hate it, but having not used it on my home computer in a few years I forgot about it. I'm using Foxit, which I don't really like either, but at least it's not Adobe.
"And how about the google toolbar? Another fun standard install at my work. I type a valid URL into the address bar, but sometimes it randomly decides I don't actually want to go to that site, but rather to a google search for the URL."
I thought about it but decided it didn't quite make the cut. In retrospect, I might add browser toolbars in general. They don't do anything useful, but they certainly like to screw things up. Also, with bars from Google and Yahoo I'm sure they spy on you.
"The IBM/Lenovo Thinkvantage software suite deserves a special mention. It seems every program in it is just a duplicate of a standard XP utility, and it butts heads with Windows at every turn. I've had this laptop at work for a year, and I still can't get the power management to work right. I only just recently got the wireless working (mostly) right after spending several hours pounding my head against a brick wall."
I just got my first Lenovo but so far it's been smooth sailing.
In summary, will you handle the software on my next computer?
Dude you seriously need to lay off that weed. You are getting paranoid.
AC posts like this are a perfect example why all ACs should be by default moderated as "-1 Noise".
You can do that yourself in your settings.
Also, beyond your anger toward MS, there's no content in your posts on this topic. You claim that the OLPC is incapable of educating children because MS is providing the OS. I, in turn, suggest you wait and see how it turns out.
nope. it will never happen. Professors and their desire to rape the students by publishing slight revisions of their drivel year after year for insane prices are what keeps ebooks from being common.
If I could carry my entire semesters books in one reader I would be in heaven. All college students would love this. I've known a few professors who published textbooks. In all cases, they fight to have low prices. Sometimes they win and can get a paperback published for $20 after the publisher demanded a $100 hardcover, and sometimes they can't, but it's the publisher setting the high price, and as another poster said, they're also the party demanding the slight revisions.
Well definitely it's a benefit to have different curricula for different students. It produces a wider range of ideas that then interact when these people move on from high school. On the other hand, "conflicting" curricula, depending on the level of conflict, are not a good thing, and having half the students unable to do multivariable calc isn't a good idea either. I like systems that have consistent minimum standards across all schools but still allow for flexibility. The main difference between a system that does this well, such as IB, versus one that doesn't (arguably the current California public school system), is that IB sets the minimum standards much higher.
More on point, though: By deleting the file (or doing this little hack I proposed) you're still "changing your usage." It would be easier to just disable it in msconfig.
Of course, even that is fallible: Next time the app updates itself it'll be re-enabled. Removing all Apple software is a good first step in prepping any Windows computer for use. When Apple has no attack vectors into your system you don't have to worry about qttray coming back at all.
It'll tell you every few minutes that it wants to reboot, no matter how often you tell it to go stand in the corner.
If you ignore it for too long, something like 20 minutes or whatever, it forces the reboot for you. So if you have stuff you are working on, and get up for lunch, you can come back and find Windows decided to reboot itself since you were obviously not around to mind. That doesn't happen in XP, so I'm assuming this is a Vista behavior. Either way, if you actually use the system you should disable automatic updates and just run things manually every once in awhile.
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...and what data did you put on FacebookMine contains my name and age
The (as of yet without an upper bound) size of the universe makes it very hard to believe there'd be no life in the universe other than on Earth.
Firefox (Macintosh)
Safari (all platforms)
Firefox 3 (all platforms)
Opera (all platforms)...
When Congress cuts the budget, there's nothing the administration can do. This is patently wrong, as anyone who uses DOE funded national labs knows due to the weekly emails from lab personnel asking us to lobby lawmakers on their behalf. You're probably expecting me to say that it was Bush's fault, but I won't say that, either. Here's what happened:
1) Congress decided to increase funding to natural sciences. Republicans and Democrats agreed on it. The Bush administration (which does have heavy, heavy influence in the Republican-sponsored budgets in congress) agreed with Congress. Things looked good.
2) Democrats in Congress and the Republican Congress/Presidential administration started fighting about funding for veteran-benefits (D's wanted more, R's wanted less), the war (D's wanted a timeline for withdrawal, R's didn't), and several other issues. They needed to compromise, as usual.
3) The compromise they reached ended up cutting the funding increase that they ALL had supported, and which was already being spent. Instead, funding for natural sciences was cut. This is why the DOE, NSF, etc. are in their current situations.
Why did the politicians cut something they all agreed was worthwhile? I'm going to speculate that it was because they didn't really care about it much one way or another, and also because research funding is such a tiny part of the budget with virtually no lobbyist support that our esteemed leaders essentially forgot about it.
Whenever one company is held accountable it makes it easier for others to be held accountable.
Anyway, the class action suits do a decent job of holding big pharma in check. Juries just don't give out the same awards because your computer repair was a couple of days late. 1) Dell tech support isn't half bad.
2) You think that "big pharma" is currently "in check?" The insane markups and massive profiteering that occur at the expense of millions of lives a year are the happy result of our effective class action lawsuits? Just checking.
So, will Microsoft succumb and make Win7 into a "Vista Release 2"? MinWin was never in Windows 7. Check out the MinWin story comments and you'll see that it was to be developed based on the kernel of 7, but never offered as a product. Not that MinWin wouldn't be welcome, in theory, but it was never announced as part of 7 in the first place.
That was me rearranging my sentence and not noticing that I left HD in there in the first place. It's great for NON-HD content, but chokes on HD.
Same here.
Or "18-year-old vaccine recipient."You could have also phrased that as, "..police dispatcher slain by 18-year-old fluoridated-water drinker Devin Moore."
You are aware that the word "Utopia" means "Nowhere", right? I was just about to post this.
"Threatfire considers
2) http://www.pctools.com/mrc/infections/id/Tracking+Cookie%2528s%2529/
Notice that it ranks cookies as a 2/5 threat severity. Yes, it calls it "Adware.Advertising" and not "Malware.Advertising" but if you look you'll notice that they don't actually use the Malware.XXX tag because everything in this database is considered a piece of malware. The tags identify which type.
3) This stuff is easily available on the first page of a Yahoo search.
You win, but your cyberchicken job sounds like a great story to talk about your skills and adaptability when you're looking for a new job.
The problem with Scientology isn't their belief system. They're entitled to it. The problem is the massive persecution of anyone who leaves or criticizes the church (up to and including sanctioned murder), and the way they brainwash members into giving up all their money, friends and family. I have a relative who joined a sect of a more widely popular religion who was brainwashed into giving up friends and family, and I condemn that sect on the same basis.
"I've never had trouble removing QuickTime. The uninstaller always works for me."
The point that I and a lot of other posters were making is that Quicktime is a pain unless you remove it. On my home system I have it removed, and this is why.
"That's why they put this handy little checkbox in the preferences. If you don't want QuickTime to load in the system tray, simply uncheck the box to tell it not to."
The box resets itself, maybe it's on updates, but the self-checking box is what got me to finally uninstall QT a few years ago.
"If you don't like iTunes, don't use iTunes. My only real complaint is that the UI design puts minimalism over intuitiveness (but since I've been using it for years, not being intuitive isn't a problem for me), and on Windows it takes forever to launch. I suppose it takes awhile to launch on Mac OS X too, but Mac apps always take awhile to launch so that's expected; on Windows it's not."
That's interesting - I don't find the UI to be minimalist enough. I keep it installed, though, because the third party apps I've used to upload songs to my iPod had occasional bugs, and once corrupted my old iPod's disk. What I don't like is that in the ~month that passes between each time I run iTunes, it keeps two processes running constantly, and if I disable them from startup, they add themselves as new entries. If I kill their processes and run iTunes, the program functions normally, so I know they're not necessary even when I do run it.
"It also crashes way too much on a new MacBook Pro, and since I don't know what Apple compatible software is a good replacement for it, I can't just replace it for my friend as I would if he had Windows."
Luckily it's not my computer that has the problem. I've had bad RAM before, and just identifying it as the problem was an experience I don't want to repeat.
"If bad web designers didn't have Flash at their disposal, they'd just use JavaScript and animated GIFs to create their horrible crap, just like they did in the late 90s. Don't blame the tool."
My complaint is outdated, I guess. When Flash ads first showed up everywhere I was very annoyed that they were much harder to block than the old stuff. Now addons for Firefox (and I'm sure for other browsers that I don't know about) make blocking Flash easy.
"All the network printers I've seen let you set the IP via the front panel. My complaint with HP printers is the need for a 300MB driver download. What the hell is wrong with them?"
This old printer which I got for free when it was retired from an employer didn't let me set an IP on the front panel. I could print the IP, but not change it. Using the parallel cable was the procedure HP told people on their forum to use. 300 MB? Wow, I guess I haven't been paying attention.
"Do you happen to recall the names of some good ones? I might have to look into that."
http://www.midiox.com/desktoprestore.htm
It's nice - right click on the desktop and it shows up in the context menu.
"My roommates are sick of Verizon, and are debating whether to break their contract."
Verizon increased one of their fees by something like 0.6% on May 1st, and by the terms of their own contracts, any Verizon customer who calls and mentions that can get out of a contract with no penalty within the next 60 (or maybe 90) days.
"Actually, the only reason Flash movie players exist is because Apple pissed people off by making QuickTime for Windows annoying a decade ago. We should all just be using the QuickTime plugin, and it shouldn't suck."
I almost mentioned that old movie player but decided it would date me too much. I suppose that there is no standard movie playing method that makes everyone happy yet.
"RealAlternative, QuickTimeAlternative, and Media Player Classic."
All essential to my system, since I dislike Realplayer, QT, and WMP, but want to be able to play their respective content. VLC is nice, too.
Apple already has significantly more than 10000 movies available? I thought they actually had a smaller, though probably more recent, selection than Netflix.
I think that asking whether this will beat AppleTV is ignoring that AppleTV hasn't exactly been the newest iPod. AppleTV is a very tiny player in the video over IP market. The real competition is bit torrent, which has already defeated AppleTV. Will people pay for something they can get (not streaming, but in higher quality) for free? I will.
"The best part about Quicktime? It's not as bad as Realplayer. Seriously, every time I see a file offered in real audio or video format, I'm just like WTF? Real offers absolutely no advantage over any other format, and a huge list of negatives...why is anyone still using it?"
I agree exactly.
"I still haven't found anything genuinely better than Winamp 2.9 (although I did upgrade to Winamp 5 last time I bought a computer. It wasn't any better, but not enough worse to make me revert)."
Also exactly what I did, but I think I was using 2.85.
"For video, it's Media Player Classic, although I might try VLC instead."
Exactly like me...this is getting creepy.
"I can't even begin to comprehend why Logitech drivers should be so huge. I like their mice, though, so I just use them without installing the drivers. Windows XP recognizes 4 out of 5 buttons plus the scroll wheel on my mouse."
I managed to get addicted to having my thumb click do a double click and my middle button minimize back in the mid '90s. I liked my MS Intellimouse Pro's drivers more than the Logitech software, but I overall prefer Logitech hardware, so as far as I know I'm stuck.
"You really should not have left Adobe reader off your list. It's horrifically bloated and selfish. It should be a case study of how not to do things."
Yeah, I do hate it, but having not used it on my home computer in a few years I forgot about it. I'm using Foxit, which I don't really like either, but at least it's not Adobe.
"And how about the google toolbar? Another fun standard install at my work. I type a valid URL into the address bar, but sometimes it randomly decides I don't actually want to go to that site, but rather to a google search for the URL."
I thought about it but decided it didn't quite make the cut. In retrospect, I might add browser toolbars in general. They don't do anything useful, but they certainly like to screw things up. Also, with bars from Google and Yahoo I'm sure they spy on you.
"The IBM/Lenovo Thinkvantage software suite deserves a special mention. It seems every program in it is just a duplicate of a standard XP utility, and it butts heads with Windows at every turn. I've had this laptop at work for a year, and I still can't get the power management to work right. I only just recently got the wireless working (mostly) right after spending several hours pounding my head against a brick wall."
I just got my first Lenovo but so far it's been smooth sailing.
In summary, will you handle the software on my next computer?
AC posts like this are a perfect example why all ACs should be by default moderated as "-1 Noise".
You can do that yourself in your settings.Also, beyond your anger toward MS, there's no content in your posts on this topic. You claim that the OLPC is incapable of educating children because MS is providing the OS. I, in turn, suggest you wait and see how it turns out.
If I could carry my entire semesters books in one reader I would be in heaven. All college students would love this. I've known a few professors who published textbooks. In all cases, they fight to have low prices. Sometimes they win and can get a paperback published for $20 after the publisher demanded a $100 hardcover, and sometimes they can't, but it's the publisher setting the high price, and as another poster said, they're also the party demanding the slight revisions.
Well definitely it's a benefit to have different curricula for different students. It produces a wider range of ideas that then interact when these people move on from high school. On the other hand, "conflicting" curricula, depending on the level of conflict, are not a good thing, and having half the students unable to do multivariable calc isn't a good idea either. I like systems that have consistent minimum standards across all schools but still allow for flexibility. The main difference between a system that does this well, such as IB, versus one that doesn't (arguably the current California public school system), is that IB sets the minimum standards much higher.
Of course, even that is fallible: Next time the app updates itself it'll be re-enabled. Removing all Apple software is a good first step in prepping any Windows computer for use. When Apple has no attack vectors into your system you don't have to worry about qttray coming back at all.
If you ignore it for too long, something like 20 minutes or whatever, it forces the reboot for you. So if you have stuff you are working on, and get up for lunch, you can come back and find Windows decided to reboot itself since you were obviously not around to mind. That doesn't happen in XP, so I'm assuming this is a Vista behavior. Either way, if you actually use the system you should disable automatic updates and just run things manually every once in awhile.