Thanks for the advice, this is exactly what I was looking for. It never occured to me to either buy 120mm filters, or use some home-store materials.
i already have my PC off the floor - the computer desk I bough (for cheap money, too, was a great deal), has an elevated spot for the PC. The problem I have now, is my case is too small for my PC - I had to remove the power supply just to fit the CPU cooling fan - hence the dust problems, as my case has to be open, with the PSU sitting on top. Ugly, but its worked up until now:)
I'll be picking up a large case this week. Thanks again, your advice was great.
Its not just the hardware vendors, its the software vendors too. I needed to install Suns Java on my RH 8.0 box. I downloaded and installed the.bin file, all seemed ok. However, Mozilla still didnt see the plugin. Did a bit of research, found out I needed to create a soft-link in the Mozilla Plugin directory. Ok, did that. Still, no Java plugin in Moz. Did a bunch more research. Turns out, Suns Java wont work with the GCC3 compiled versions of Mozilla. Wonderful. Download and install 'Blackdowns' JRE, delete the old softlink, create the new softlink. Finally, Java in Mozilla on RH8.
On my windows machine, I downloaded Java, ran setup. No soft-links to create, no 'different versions' needed, it just worked, and automagically installed the plugin in Mozilla.
Try getting my Mom (my litmus test for PC usage) to install Java on a Linux box. Heh, that would be funny. She did it herself on the Windows box, no problem. I *did* have to tell her where to get the file, though:)
You, sir, are a sick fuck. You said "No one gets hurt when you share child porn" ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS? What about the child? Have you considered that? So, because no-one 'bought' the child-porn, no money is lost, so noone is harmed? I call BULLSHIT. Oh, its just a picture you say? What about the childs emotions - or what about more graphic child porn? That child is scarred FOREVER, but no harm done, as no money was made?
You need to get your head checked. I sincerely hope you are sterile.
The first time I saw an image displayed on the web, without having to decode it, etc. WOW, that was the COOLEST thing ever. I knew it was going to take off, but had no idea it would ever exceed my wildest dreams. Ah, the web back then, unspoiled by commercial entities, a playground for the intellectuals. Oh, and mostly devoid of any content.:) But it was COOL.
This isn't just endemic to the politicians, and other beurocracies (sp?). I work for a small, highly specialized software company, and we sell our products to giant multi-nationals (yes, business sucks right now:) ). They do the exact same thing - thier boards, and large shareholders want a process in place for choosing new software, but they always word thier RFP with a specific piece of software in mind (sometimes our, sometimes not). Point is, just by looking at the RFP, you can usually tell which vendor will win the project at the end of the year long eval and purchase cycle. I can't imagine how much $$$ they'd save, if they would just skip the whole RFP process to begin with, as its already been decided before hand.
BAH, missed the comment about talking to the lawyers (being a career limiting move and all). At this point, then, I think you are screwed. I'd put as much as you can in writing, send it off to your boss. Thats the CYA part, in case something happend, you can always say "I warned you!"
It seems to me that you work for a fairly large company - if you don't think its too far out of bounds, fire off a quick email to one of your corporate risk lawyers (or some such similar position), to schedule a meeting. If you want to be nice and PC, then be sure to invite your immediate manager, and his/her supervisor, too.
Then, you can explain the risk/rewards etc. Unless the lawyers are incompetant, they are going to want to do whatever they can to mitigate the risk of lawsuits/fraud etc.
What's next? My "Check Engine Soon" light will be programmed to come on from time to time and the on-board computer will make the car run badly until the proper "reset" signal is used? And don't try to figure out the reset code yourself - you'd be in violation of the DMCA!
Let me guess, you own a late model Volvo? I would *swear* mine did this to me from time to time - I'd have to take it in, they would reset the light, and give me some BS story about some small stupid (and probably non-existant) problem...
My problem is, I'd be using this Mac at home, primarity for net access, and gaming (a good % of the games I want to play are coming out on the Mac). Id be afraid of getting less than the 1.2ghz G4, because of this.
Unless the 1ghz (or 800mhz) actually perform well with games?
I mean, the prices they charge for the PowerMacs looks at first glance to be insane - a dual 1.4mhz powermac for $3500 with a 17" monitor? Urk! I built my AMD 1700+, 512 mb memory, etc, for about $500. Throw in software, nice 17" monitor etc, and Im up to $1200 or so. Sure, I'd get a dual processor with the Mac, but is that worth an additional $2300? If I go with a linux distro, then suddenly my AMD rig shoots down to the sub $1000 range.
I don't want to sound like I am flaming here - but are the Apples REALLY worth that kind of insane cash? I'd like to try to make the switch, at least for one of my macines, but for that kind of moolah, forget it.
I use these benchmarks (3dMark2001/2003) not nessicarily (sp?) to see how much faster my rig is than another with a different card, but to benchmark against similar machines - ie: same processor, MB, vid card, etc. That way, if my numbers are the same (or close enough), I know my rig is running up to its potential. And, if its not, I can compare driver versions, etc, to get it to run as fast as it can.
For me, its all about peace of mind, and knowing something isn't messed up.
Having never been in a school enviornment, I don't know how restrictive/open most schools networks are - but shouldn't something like this be firewalled, or at least monitored? I do corporate security where I work now - we allow port 25 open outbound (against my advice), but I monitor it to keep an eye open for abuse, and shut down any abusive client ASAP. I would think *someone* at Tufts should have/would have noticed this, and corrected the situation.
It isn't clear to me how Symantec could know, hours in advance, about a worm which took ten minutes to spread throughout the entire Internet, unless they had something to do with its release.
Taking off the tin-foil hat for a bit, its totally plausible that they were notified in advance, from numerous sources - a guilty programmer, etc. I would find it hard to believe that they would have anything to do with the release of such a worm.
As for the question about wether or not they had some 'moral obligation' to the rest of the world to let us know what was coming - they don't. They exist to make money. If they did know in advance, as customer Im going to be pissed, but if you don't purchase thier products, you have nothing to say.
I'd like to think, that if they know what havoc this could spread, that they would tell the world in advance, but thats not the realities of todays marketplace.
As for Palladium, I don't see the advantage to me in buying it... so I won't.
While I agree, with you, and will not be purchasing any pd hardware/software etc, I feel as if it may be all in vain. We, as geeks, really don't matter. All that will matter is when Gateway/Dell/Compaq/etc. all ship 100% of thier hardware with pd - the unwashed masses will have no clue, and pd will become more and more widespread. "Normal" hardware will become harder to find, and more expensive, driving up the prices for you and me. Then, we have to deal with the specter of not being able to browse to sites we used to, not being able to use the new technologies that are being developed, etc.
At least that is one way this can play out. Our challenge is to educate the unwashed masses, then pd will fail.
I run linux on a laptop at work (a Toshiba Tecra 7200 - man that install was interesting), and I love it. I cannot however, run my Windows ADS tools on it (not that I'd want to), so I also run a windows desktop, just for that.
At home? Sorry, no can do on Linux. My games wont run, and that is the primary purpose of my home machine. AFAIK, no planned MMORPG (what I am into), plans on a linux port. Neverwinter nights? Yeah, right around the time that Duke Nukem Forever comes out....
Like I said, if I could run linux at home, I would. Developers wont develop, until the desktop numbers increase, and the desktop numbers wont increase, until the developers develop. Kind of a chicken or the egg kind of thing...
No, unfortunately I don't. One of my last employers had a subsctription on CDROM, and I was able to look it up then. They like to keep thier research close to thier chest - its how they make money. IIRC, it was something like an 'average' of 1-250 or so. But IMNSHO, the variables are endless, which invalidates the research....
I looked into doing this a few years ago, when staffing where I used to be got low. There is a reason that its hard to find this info - it varies (ALOT) by situation. I know Gartner has come out with some numbers, but you have to question thier validity.
It all depends on the situation and circumstances you are in - depends if you are working in high-tech (ie intelligent users, power users), or at a financial firm. It depends on the overall commitment to IT your company has - do you have predominatley new equipment, or is it mostly old crap that is patched together with duct tape and bubblegum. Do you have strong management, or are you constantly having to re-work issues due to poor planning? Are the admins any good, or is one or two of them constanly covering for the other screw-ups on the team? Etc....etc...etc...
Each situation is completely different. Bottom line is, if you are competant, and are overworked, your ratio is too low. The problem is how to get management to see that - I eneded up leaving my last situation because of this exact issue, and management refused to correct the situation.
There are several ways you can do this (why, I don't know, but thats your call). Any Network Administrator should already know this stuff, however.
You could VLAN the XP boxes onto thier own segment, then use Access Control Lists to only let the traffic through that you want. Or, alternately, a firewall.
You could publish desktop standards (with management approval, of course), and simply turn of the switch ports of the XP boxes until they get a Mac.
Or, you can leave them on the same networks as the Macs. Just dont let them install 2000 Server or whatnot with ADS, and you should have no problem. Is there a specific cross platform virus you are worried about, or are you just a chest thumping over-zealous sysadmin?
Slashdot Mirror
Replace the word 'computer' with the word 'automobile' in the following sentance:
"Users should *not* have to be scared of using their computer. The computer should simply stop them from doing anything wrong."
Now how do you feel about that?
I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you here - just food for though.
www.tera-byte.com
I've been very happy with them. Mysql/php, etc.
I'm only on a shared server (its all i need), but they offer dedicated servers, too.
Here are thier virtual server plans, seems to fit what you are looking for:
http://www.tera-byte.com/hosting.html
FYI, I have plan 4U.
Thanks for the advice, this is exactly what I was looking for. It never occured to me to either buy 120mm filters, or use some home-store materials.
:)
i already have my PC off the floor - the computer desk I bough (for cheap money, too, was a great deal), has an elevated spot for the PC. The problem I have now, is my case is too small for my PC - I had to remove the power supply just to fit the CPU cooling fan - hence the dust problems, as my case has to be open, with the PSU sitting on top. Ugly, but its worked up until now
I'll be picking up a large case this week. Thanks again, your advice was great.
=Ummagumma
Its not just the hardware vendors, its the software vendors too. I needed to install Suns Java on my RH 8.0 box. I downloaded and installed the .bin file, all seemed ok. However, Mozilla still didnt see the plugin. Did a bit of research, found out I needed to create a soft-link in the Mozilla Plugin directory. Ok, did that. Still, no Java plugin in Moz. Did a bunch more research. Turns out, Suns Java wont work with the GCC3 compiled versions of Mozilla. Wonderful. Download and install 'Blackdowns' JRE, delete the old softlink, create the new softlink. Finally, Java in Mozilla on RH8.
:)
On my windows machine, I downloaded Java, ran setup. No soft-links to create, no 'different versions' needed, it just worked, and automagically installed the plugin in Mozilla.
Try getting my Mom (my litmus test for PC usage) to install Java on a Linux box. Heh, that would be funny. She did it herself on the Windows box, no problem. I *did* have to tell her where to get the file, though
Incoming fire is never friendly :)
Time to burn some karma.
You, sir, are a sick fuck. You said "No one gets hurt when you share child porn" ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS? What about the child? Have you considered that? So, because no-one 'bought' the child-porn, no money is lost, so noone is harmed? I call BULLSHIT. Oh, its just a picture you say? What about the childs emotions - or what about more graphic child porn? That child is scarred FOREVER, but no harm done, as no money was made?
You need to get your head checked. I sincerely hope you are sterile.
The first time I saw an image displayed on the web, without having to decode it, etc. WOW, that was the COOLEST thing ever. I knew it was going to take off, but had no idea it would ever exceed my wildest dreams. Ah, the web back then, unspoiled by commercial entities, a playground for the intellectuals. Oh, and mostly devoid of any content. :) But it was COOL.
This isn't just endemic to the politicians, and other beurocracies (sp?). I work for a small, highly specialized software company, and we sell our products to giant multi-nationals (yes, business sucks right now :) ). They do the exact same thing - thier boards, and large shareholders want a process in place for choosing new software, but they always word thier RFP with a specific piece of software in mind (sometimes our, sometimes not). Point is, just by looking at the RFP, you can usually tell which vendor will win the project at the end of the year long eval and purchase cycle. I can't imagine how much $$$ they'd save, if they would just skip the whole RFP process to begin with, as its already been decided before hand.
BAH, missed the comment about talking to the lawyers (being a career limiting move and all). At this point, then, I think you are screwed. I'd put as much as you can in writing, send it off to your boss. Thats the CYA part, in case something happend, you can always say "I warned you!"
:)
Then, update your resume
It seems to me that you work for a fairly large company - if you don't think its too far out of bounds, fire off a quick email to one of your corporate risk lawyers (or some such similar position), to schedule a meeting. If you want to be nice and PC, then be sure to invite your immediate manager, and his/her supervisor, too.
Then, you can explain the risk/rewards etc. Unless the lawyers are incompetant, they are going to want to do whatever they can to mitigate the risk of lawsuits/fraud etc.
What's next? My "Check Engine Soon" light will be programmed to come on from time to time and the on-board computer will make the car run badly until the proper "reset" signal is used? And don't try to figure out the reset code yourself - you'd be in violation of the DMCA!
Let me guess, you own a late model Volvo? I would *swear* mine did this to me from time to time - I'd have to take it in, they would reset the light, and give me some BS story about some small stupid (and probably non-existant) problem...
-1 flamebait? Im making a legit point here. I guess thats what meta-moderation is for, afterall...
Thanks for the info.
My problem is, I'd be using this Mac at home, primarity for net access, and gaming (a good % of the games I want to play are coming out on the Mac). Id be afraid of getting less than the 1.2ghz G4, because of this.
Unless the 1ghz (or 800mhz) actually perform well with games?
I mean, the prices they charge for the PowerMacs looks at first glance to be insane - a dual 1.4mhz powermac for $3500 with a 17" monitor? Urk! I built my AMD 1700+, 512 mb memory, etc, for about $500. Throw in software, nice 17" monitor etc, and Im up to $1200 or so. Sure, I'd get a dual processor with the Mac, but is that worth an additional $2300? If I go with a linux distro, then suddenly my AMD rig shoots down to the sub $1000 range.
I don't want to sound like I am flaming here - but are the Apples REALLY worth that kind of insane cash? I'd like to try to make the switch, at least for one of my macines, but for that kind of moolah, forget it.
If they really want to get a TON of samples, we should post those email addresses all over the *.erotica.* groups on Usenet :)
Or would that be considered a DOS attack, due to the volume of mail they would probably receive?
I use these benchmarks (3dMark2001/2003) not nessicarily (sp?) to see how much faster my rig is than another with a different card, but to benchmark against similar machines - ie: same processor, MB, vid card, etc. That way, if my numbers are the same (or close enough), I know my rig is running up to its potential. And, if its not, I can compare driver versions, etc, to get it to run as fast as it can.
For me, its all about peace of mind, and knowing something isn't messed up.
Having never been in a school enviornment, I don't know how restrictive/open most schools networks are - but shouldn't something like this be firewalled, or at least monitored? I do corporate security where I work now - we allow port 25 open outbound (against my advice), but I monitor it to keep an eye open for abuse, and shut down any abusive client ASAP. I would think *someone* at Tufts should have/would have noticed this, and corrected the situation.
It isn't clear to me how Symantec could know, hours in advance, about a worm which took ten minutes to spread throughout the entire Internet, unless they had something to do with its release.
Taking off the tin-foil hat for a bit, its totally plausible that they were notified in advance, from numerous sources - a guilty programmer, etc. I would find it hard to believe that they would have anything to do with the release of such a worm.
As for the question about wether or not they had some 'moral obligation' to the rest of the world to let us know what was coming - they don't. They exist to make money. If they did know in advance, as customer Im going to be pissed, but if you don't purchase thier products, you have nothing to say.
I'd like to think, that if they know what havoc this could spread, that they would tell the world in advance, but thats not the realities of todays marketplace.
As for Palladium, I don't see the advantage to me in buying it ... so I won't.
While I agree, with you, and will not be purchasing any pd hardware/software etc, I feel as if it may be all in vain. We, as geeks, really don't matter. All that will matter is when Gateway/Dell/Compaq/etc. all ship 100% of thier hardware with pd - the unwashed masses will have no clue, and pd will become more and more widespread. "Normal" hardware will become harder to find, and more expensive, driving up the prices for you and me. Then, we have to deal with the specter of not being able to browse to sites we used to, not being able to use the new technologies that are being developed, etc.
At least that is one way this can play out. Our challenge is to educate the unwashed masses, then pd will fail.
Where do you see this for MA online? I dug around the www.massdor.com page for a while, and could not find this. I'd be very interested in it.
:)
Of course, the possibility exists that I am completely blind, also
I run linux on a laptop at work (a Toshiba Tecra 7200 - man that install was interesting), and I love it. I cannot however, run my Windows ADS tools on it (not that I'd want to), so I also run a windows desktop, just for that.
At home? Sorry, no can do on Linux. My games wont run, and that is the primary purpose of my home machine. AFAIK, no planned MMORPG (what I am into), plans on a linux port. Neverwinter nights? Yeah, right around the time that Duke Nukem Forever comes out....
Like I said, if I could run linux at home, I would. Developers wont develop, until the desktop numbers increase, and the desktop numbers wont increase, until the developers develop. Kind of a chicken or the egg kind of thing...
"(and robots don't pee on your carpets)"
No, but they might leak hydraulic fluid.
*rimshot*
No, unfortunately I don't. One of my last employers had a subsctription on CDROM, and I was able to look it up then. They like to keep thier research close to thier chest - its how they make money. IIRC, it was something like an 'average' of 1-250 or so. But IMNSHO, the variables are endless, which invalidates the research....
I looked into doing this a few years ago, when staffing where I used to be got low. There is a reason that its hard to find this info - it varies (ALOT) by situation. I know Gartner has come out with some numbers, but you have to question thier validity.
It all depends on the situation and circumstances you are in - depends if you are working in high-tech (ie intelligent users, power users), or at a financial firm. It depends on the overall commitment to IT your company has - do you have predominatley new equipment, or is it mostly old crap that is patched together with duct tape and bubblegum. Do you have strong management, or are you constantly having to re-work issues due to poor planning? Are the admins any good, or is one or two of them constanly covering for the other screw-ups on the team? Etc....etc...etc...
Each situation is completely different. Bottom line is, if you are competant, and are overworked, your ratio is too low. The problem is how to get management to see that - I eneded up leaving my last situation because of this exact issue, and management refused to correct the situation.
Regardless, good luck!
There are several ways you can do this (why, I don't know, but thats your call). Any Network Administrator should already know this stuff, however.
You could VLAN the XP boxes onto thier own segment, then use Access Control Lists to only let the traffic through that you want. Or, alternately, a firewall.
You could publish desktop standards (with management approval, of course), and simply turn of the switch ports of the XP boxes until they get a Mac.
Or, you can leave them on the same networks as the Macs. Just dont let them install 2000 Server or whatnot with ADS, and you should have no problem. Is there a specific cross platform virus you are worried about, or are you just a chest thumping over-zealous sysadmin?