But, but, but, we just GOT to XP!
on
Time To Dump XP?
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· Score: 2, Informative
A little background: I work for a large (50k emp) company. We only just (Q2 this year) officially got rid of Win2k as a supported desktop. There is no way we will be ready for Win7 anytime soon. There are many issues an organization like mine faces:
-Training - non-IT people have jobs to do beyond "messing with computers". Computers aren't toys for these people, they are tools. Changing tools requires re-training. -Training - IT people, frankly, are lazy and don't like to learn new things any more than non-IT people. Yes, there are exceptions, but lets not pretend that all tech folks are super eager to change to the latest and greatest all the time. (I really do wonder why so many geeks still write user level apps in C and like the command line.) -Interaction - We have a very complex environment where many things are setup to interact "just so". Is this bad? Yes, but it's the way things are. Implementing a large change like WinXP->Win7 requires a HUGE amount of testing of sometimes very subtle differences. -Legacy - We have mission critical applications (both in house and 3rd party) that are not ready to deploy on Win7 without substantial work. Could they have been developed differently so that this wouldn't be the case? Yes. AND they weren't.
To be fair, this is not a question of WinXP-to-. It a fundamental issue with how IT resources are used. While I would like to lay a lot of the blame at MS' feet, it's really an industry issue. Having (and USING) frameworks to enable forward migration is an issue technology has been facing for 40+ years. There are a handful of solutions that have been proposed and even implemented. They amount to little more than academic curiosities since they are not widely deployed.
Oh well. Here's looking toward the big news of 2020 as we finally start moving away from Win7!
I've just finished my first semester of grad school after a 7-8 year break. My undergrad is in Comp Sci, I'm getting an MBA now. I'm also in night school, as opposed to full time, but here's what I'd suggest...
1. As much as possible, take at least half the course load in relativly "easy" courses. (To the degree such things exist in grad school...)
2. Forget about a social life for the first semester. Concentrate on school work (see #3)
3. Over prepare. In under grad, I'd usually just skim the text and do as little (ungraded) homework as possible to get a handle on the material. Since you've been away, spend lots of extra time even going over unassigned problems.
4. Get the "answer guides" for text books, when possible. If you use them appropriately (ie: AFTER you do the homework) you'll be able to see what you got wrong and maybe even have time to email the profs or get other assistance.
While I don't know how grad schools in general think, my school (William & Mary, Williamsburg, VA) places less emphasis on undergrad work the longer you've been out of school.
For those of us in the United States may wish to remember that MANY CELL PHONES HAVE FREE LONG DISTANCE. Not that I would suggest we ab^h^huse that little detail.
The ISP I work for is in the process of implementing a policy like this. We haven't done this in the past due to the hassle factor, but people are registering domain names, forgetting their passwords and then yelling at us when we can't change their name servers.
Also, there have been a few cases where we got burned on web design where we created the site and didn't get paid. If we had their domain we would have. Evil? Yes. But then so is stealing someone's time and work.
With the dominant browser being IE and MS' consumer focus I really don't see this standard ever being implemented for a meaningful percentage of people. And then MS will implement it just wrong enough to make it worthless.
I hate to say it, but if you're really doing this stuff you probably already know (La)TeX, so you can just write it up in that and generate a graphic, or distribute the (La)TeX. Using graphics to represent this stuff on the web isn't optimal, but at least you know it will work and display right. (Sorry to you freaks who browse text only;)
Chris
Think beyond the first job
on
CS vs CIS
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· Score: 1
Based on what I've seen the CIS people probably have a slight advantage right out of the gate since most CIS programs focus on "current" technology. CIS grads can make really great coders.
CS programs usually focus more on fundementals. You might not learn a C switch statement, but you'll know enough about programming in general to pick it up very quickly.
Now, not all CS grads can be more than coders and not all CIS grads are stuck in the coder role forever, but the training in CS programs lends itself to more long term career development.
Take a look at the Network Appliances devices. They write first to NVRAM and then say that the write was committed. Then they can write the data to actual disk at leisure. The NetFilers don't require any changes to the kernel or special drivers, so I don't know why the author thinks his idea would. Just implement the NVRAM onto the controller.
If you wear glasses, be sure to get an anti-glare coating. The coating not only looks better for other people (they can see your eyes not the glare), but it cuts out the glare caused by the monitor on your lenses. (This glare is part of why your eyes find it difficult to focus in the right place... check out the PRIO stuff mentioned in another post)
When you talk to people about the coatings, be sure you talk to people who got their anti-glare coatings in the last 6-9 months. The technology is changing fast and the older coatings had serious problems. (Like peeling off and scratching up...)
If you go this route be prepared to get and use one of the microfibre cleaning rags and a special cleaning formula, no more rinse with water and paper towel routine with these. The coating will degrade and scratch. (It's better than it was, not perfect...)
The coating ain't cheap (I think it added $80US to the price) but I tend to think my eyes are worth it. Before I would get serious eye fatigue after 4-5 hours, even with breaks. Now I can go 12-15 hours, with breaks and my eyes aren't sore or tired.
a stupid, slow interface weighed down even more by ads and dumb useless buttons.
I've been looking foreward to a at least moderatly acceptable version of Netscape for a long time. I work for a small ISP and lots of people don't like to use M$'s browser.. but I have no choice but to recomend IE. NS v4 is slow, buggy and bloated. NS v6 (I downloaded and tested it) is even slower and more bloated. (I won't comment on the bug issue here...)
The only improvement is the mail client since they finially started to support multiple email accounts. (Gee, only took 5 years to fix that! Maybe NS won't suck in, oh, 10 years or so!)
I guess the question I have is if the NS folks really tried.. I mean with usability studies and focus groups... to create a really lousy product. Oh well, MS wins again.
I've been using TWIG for a while now. It's all PHP and just about the closest thing to a Yahoo! clone out there right now.
It has Mail, Contacts (with a realistic amount of info that can be supplied), schedule, todo, notes and bookmarks. It uses only plain HTML so it can be used on any browser, no java or javascript needed.
It seems to work with just about any IMAP backend (I'm still using a NT based IMAP package on a different machine that was left from the previous admin.)
As an aside... As long as the packages your interested in aren't tied to different backends, there isn't any reason to not install several and play with them all until you find The One True(tm) mail package for you.
Actually PayPal has a very sustainable business model. I'd be very surprised to hear if they aren't profitable, or close to it now.
The word of the day is: float.
PayPal eats the initial credit card fees.
PayPal encourages people to leave the money within the PayPal system so they can use existing money to pay other people.
As long as the money stays within the PayPal system, they can loan the money to other people at prevailing interest rates. (Banks lend each other money "overnight" at, what, 6.5% these days?) The money can be transfered around in the PayPal system almost for free.
When/If the money is finially removed from the system it takes 2-3 days to actually leave the PayPal system. That's 2-3 days of interest.
I don't know what kind of retension rate PayPal can get, but even if they keep money for a week on average they can do pretty well.
From the money possible with the above, I don't think bankruptcy is a big issue. The cash advance fee is also trivial, especially as money stays in the system longer. (I'd wager that most people who recieve money via PayPal also buy stuff with it. So why take the money out?)
The disputed charge issue is tricky. PayPal shields themselves a little by having "credit limits" on how much you can put in at a time. They do address these issues in their TOS. (Start looking at item 10 and down) Basically, they're saying that if you try to charge back, and you have a balance with PayPal, they're going to get their money. I don't know if this is enforceable or not.
I haven't use PayPal much, but for any person to person or auction transfer of funds it can't be beat.
If anyone is interested in signing up, feel free to send me some money as a trial of the system!
First, while there are some getting close, Linux doesn't have a full replacement for Quicken. Right there is reason enough.
I get paid to work with computers. There are a lot more people who will pay me to work on a Windows platform. (Plus they need me to work on their computers more often, which makes me more money.)
While I do use Linux for some tasks, by and large the apps I need to use and support are Windows based. People pay me to get stuff done and get it done now. Could I eventually get as competant with Linux? Sure. But right now it isn't worth the enormous amount of effort it would take.
Some of the problems I have with Linux are being dealt with: Common interface (KDE, GNOME), automated installs (RPM).
But the larger problem that the OSS culture doesn't seem capable/willing to address is highlighted by lack of common configuration guidelines (config file locations, standard file formats).
I do think there is room for a growing Linux presence, but I don't think it's quite there yet.
Well, I'm a late 20's geek who missed out on this stock market things for most of the 90's. (Lazy, stupid, poor, take your pick) I try to avoid funds since 90% don't even match the market (and you *PAY* them for the priviligde of them not doing well). The only funds I have are index funds in my 457 (I work for a state controlled hospital, it's kinda like out 401k.)
With most tech companies so high to begin with, I've largely been avoiding them (my one exception, AMD. They seem to have gotten their stuff straight and the Athlon rocks. But I digress...)
Smaller biotech and medical services companies are what I've been looking at for the high growth portion of my portfolio and a couple bigger more established firms as anchors.
Since I've got a long horizion (35-40 years) I'm making only a few big investments instead of lots of small ones. I can only lose 100% in the worst case, whereas my winners can go up 200% or more.
I have my money split between a straight investment account, my Roth and my rollover IRA. Short term transactions (under 2 years) I do in the Roth or IRA and long term stuff in the regular investment account. (I *HATEHATEHATE* taxes, so unless I plan to hold for at least a few years I buy in the tax deferred accounts.)
Check out http://fool.com for some good advice. Also read about the "prank" ZDNet played on April 1. I understand many investors got burned because the just traded on a tip. If a stock is a good stock today, it'll still be a good stock tomorrow. Do you research!
First off, properly used, the "normal" mouse is just fine. I have mine set about 12" from the edge of my desk and I lay my whole forearm on the desk for support. At home I have a chair with arms for support.
The buttons on this pen seem like they would take some real getting used to.
And now for more of the same...
The Freepen site was very interesting, even though I my browser supports both text and graphics, the good folks at FreePen thought I needed Flash to display their menu.
While a whizbang menu it was, I expect more than just good looks for the time it took to download. For instance, when I hit the back button in my browser, the 85k(!) Flash menu didn't catch that I wasn't viewing the same page anymore.
Also, they claim that there were no repetive stress injuries before computers...umm...there were none, or they weren't reported/known as such. I seem to recall hearing that typists in the '20s and '30s frequently had wrist pain. They also imply that using a pen is always better than the mouse.
I don't know about you but my hand *hurts* after 20 minutes of writing. I surf all day and not have my wrist/hand hurt. (College essay tests were hell.:-(
i just don't think that the pen is going to help the problem any...seems like the Logitech and MS ergo mice are a better solution (where the wrist is allowed to maintain a "neutral" position.)
RSA went to Australia. India won't buy our stuff. Hey Congress, whatever happened to helping the US having let alone maintaining a technological leads. Maybe in 3-4 years when the gov can't buy a US made security system they'll see the error of their ways...
Slashdot Mirror
A little background: I work for a large (50k emp) company. We only just (Q2 this year) officially got rid of Win2k as a supported desktop. There is no way we will be ready for Win7 anytime soon. There are many issues an organization like mine faces:
-Training - non-IT people have jobs to do beyond "messing with computers". Computers aren't toys for these people, they are tools. Changing tools requires re-training.
-Training - IT people, frankly, are lazy and don't like to learn new things any more than non-IT people. Yes, there are exceptions, but lets not pretend that all tech folks are super eager to change to the latest and greatest all the time. (I really do wonder why so many geeks still write user level apps in C and like the command line.)
-Interaction - We have a very complex environment where many things are setup to interact "just so". Is this bad? Yes, but it's the way things are. Implementing a large change like WinXP->Win7 requires a HUGE amount of testing of sometimes very subtle differences.
-Legacy - We have mission critical applications (both in house and 3rd party) that are not ready to deploy on Win7 without substantial work. Could they have been developed differently so that this wouldn't be the case? Yes. AND they weren't.
To be fair, this is not a question of WinXP-to-. It a fundamental issue with how IT resources are used. While I would like to lay a lot of the blame at MS' feet, it's really an industry issue. Having (and USING) frameworks to enable forward migration is an issue technology has been facing for 40+ years. There are a handful of solutions that have been proposed and even implemented. They amount to little more than academic curiosities since they are not widely deployed.
Oh well. Here's looking toward the big news of 2020 as we finally start moving away from Win7!
I've just finished my first semester of grad school after a 7-8 year break. My undergrad is in Comp Sci, I'm getting an MBA now. I'm also in night school, as opposed to full time, but here's what I'd suggest...
1. As much as possible, take at least half the course load in relativly "easy" courses. (To the degree such things exist in grad school...)
2. Forget about a social life for the first semester. Concentrate on school work (see #3)
3. Over prepare. In under grad, I'd usually just skim the text and do as little (ungraded) homework as possible to get a handle on the material. Since you've been away, spend lots of extra time even going over unassigned problems.
4. Get the "answer guides" for text books, when possible. If you use them appropriately (ie: AFTER you do the homework) you'll be able to see what you got wrong and maybe even have time to email the profs or get other assistance.
While I don't know how grad schools in general think, my school (William & Mary, Williamsburg, VA) places less emphasis on undergrad work the longer you've been out of school.
Bliss = Python + wxWindows
I've been a Sirius subscriber for about the last year and have been very happy with it.
Commercial free music stations along with a few others (comedy, NPR, old time radio) has made long drives much more bearable.
To me it's even worth it when I'm in town...commercial free radio with more variety than the few CDs I keep in the car it outweighs the cost.
For those of us in the United States may wish to remember that MANY CELL PHONES HAVE FREE LONG DISTANCE. Not that I would suggest we ab^h^huse that little detail.
I was given notice that my position "was being eliminated".
It's the thought that counts...
The ISP I work for is in the process of implementing a policy like this. We haven't done this in the past due to the hassle factor, but people are registering domain names, forgetting their passwords and then yelling at us when we can't change their name servers.
Also, there have been a few cases where we got burned on web design where we created the site and didn't get paid. If we had their domain we would have. Evil? Yes. But then so is stealing someone's time and work.
ChrisWith the dominant browser being IE and MS' consumer focus I really don't see this standard ever being implemented for a meaningful percentage of people. And then MS will implement it just wrong enough to make it worthless.
I hate to say it, but if you're really doing this stuff you probably already know (La)TeX, so you can just write it up in that and generate a graphic, or distribute the (La)TeX. Using graphics to represent this stuff on the web isn't optimal, but at least you know it will work and display right. (Sorry to you freaks who browse text only ;)
ChrisCS programs usually focus more on fundementals. You might not learn a C switch statement, but you'll know enough about programming in general to pick it up very quickly.
Now, not all CS grads can be more than coders and not all CIS grads are stuck in the coder role forever, but the training in CS programs lends itself to more long term career development.
Chris
Chris
When you talk to people about the coatings, be sure you talk to people who got their anti-glare coatings in the last 6-9 months. The technology is changing fast and the older coatings had serious problems. (Like peeling off and scratching up...)
If you go this route be prepared to get and use one of the microfibre cleaning rags and a special cleaning formula, no more rinse with water and paper towel routine with these. The coating will degrade and scratch. (It's better than it was, not perfect...)
The coating ain't cheap (I think it added $80US to the price) but I tend to think my eyes are worth it. Before I would get serious eye fatigue after 4-5 hours, even with breaks. Now I can go 12-15 hours, with breaks and my eyes aren't sore or tired.
YMMV.
Chris
a stupid, slow interface weighed down even more by ads and dumb useless buttons.
I've been looking foreward to a at least moderatly acceptable version of Netscape for a long time. I work for a small ISP and lots of people don't like to use M$'s browser.. but I have no choice but to recomend IE. NS v4 is slow, buggy and bloated. NS v6 (I downloaded and tested it) is even slower and more bloated. (I won't comment on the bug issue here...)
The only improvement is the mail client since they finially started to support multiple email accounts. (Gee, only took 5 years to fix that! Maybe NS won't suck in, oh, 10 years or so!)
I guess the question I have is if the NS folks really tried.. I mean with usability studies and focus groups... to create a really lousy product. Oh well, MS wins again.
It has Mail, Contacts (with a realistic amount of info that can be supplied), schedule, todo, notes and bookmarks. It uses only plain HTML so it can be used on any browser, no java or javascript needed.
It seems to work with just about any IMAP backend (I'm still using a NT based IMAP package on a different machine that was left from the previous admin.)
As an aside... As long as the packages your interested in aren't tied to different backends, there isn't any reason to not install several and play with them all until you find The One True(tm) mail package for you.
Just My View
The word of the day is: float.
- PayPal eats the initial credit card fees.
- PayPal encourages people to leave the money within the PayPal system so they can use existing money to pay other people.
- As long as the money stays within the PayPal system, they can loan the money to other people at prevailing interest rates. (Banks lend each other money "overnight" at, what, 6.5% these days?) The money can be transfered around in the PayPal system almost for free.
- When/If the money is finially removed from the system it takes 2-3 days to actually leave the PayPal system. That's 2-3 days of interest.
I don't know what kind of retension rate PayPal can get, but even if they keep money for a week on average they can do pretty well.From the money possible with the above, I don't think bankruptcy is a big issue. The cash advance fee is also trivial, especially as money stays in the system longer. (I'd wager that most people who recieve money via PayPal also buy stuff with it. So why take the money out?)
The disputed charge issue is tricky. PayPal shields themselves a little by having "credit limits" on how much you can put in at a time. They do address these issues in their TOS. (Start looking at item 10 and down) Basically, they're saying that if you try to charge back, and you have a balance with PayPal, they're going to get their money. I don't know if this is enforceable or not.
I haven't use PayPal much, but for any person to person or auction transfer of funds it can't be beat.
If anyone is interested in signing up, feel free to send me some money as a trial of the system!
I get paid to work with computers. There are a lot more people who will pay me to work on a Windows platform. (Plus they need me to work on their computers more often, which makes me more money.)
While I do use Linux for some tasks, by and large the apps I need to use and support are Windows based. People pay me to get stuff done and get it done now. Could I eventually get as competant with Linux? Sure. But right now it isn't worth the enormous amount of effort it would take.
Some of the problems I have with Linux are being dealt with: Common interface (KDE, GNOME), automated installs (RPM).
But the larger problem that the OSS culture doesn't seem capable/willing to address is highlighted by lack of common configuration guidelines (config file locations, standard file formats).
I do think there is room for a growing Linux presence, but I don't think it's quite there yet.
Erisian
Well, I'm a late 20's geek who missed out on this stock market things for most of the 90's. (Lazy, stupid, poor, take your pick) I try to avoid funds since 90% don't even match the market (and you *PAY* them for the priviligde of them not doing well). The only funds I have are index funds in my 457 (I work for a state controlled hospital, it's kinda like out 401k.)
With most tech companies so high to begin with, I've largely been avoiding them (my one exception, AMD. They seem to have gotten their stuff straight and the Athlon rocks. But I digress...)
Smaller biotech and medical services companies are what I've been looking at for the high growth portion of my portfolio and a couple bigger more established firms as anchors.
Since I've got a long horizion (35-40 years) I'm making only a few big investments instead of lots of small ones. I can only lose 100% in the worst case, whereas my winners can go up 200% or more.
I have my money split between a straight investment account, my Roth and my rollover IRA. Short term transactions (under 2 years) I do in the Roth or IRA and long term stuff in the regular investment account. (I *HATEHATEHATE* taxes, so unless I plan to hold for at least a few years I buy in the tax deferred accounts.)
Check out http://fool.com for some good advice. Also read about the "prank" ZDNet played on April 1. I understand many investors got burned because the just traded on a tip. If a stock is a good stock today, it'll still be a good stock tomorrow. Do you research!
Erisian
First off, properly used, the "normal" mouse is just fine. I have mine set about 12" from the edge of my desk and I lay my whole forearm on the desk for support. At home I have a chair with arms for support.
:-(
The buttons on this pen seem like they would take some real getting used to.
And now for more of the same...
The Freepen site was very interesting, even though I my browser supports both text and graphics, the good folks at FreePen thought I needed Flash to display their menu.
While a whizbang menu it was, I expect more than just good looks for the time it took to download. For instance, when I hit the back button in my browser, the 85k(!) Flash menu didn't catch that I wasn't viewing the same page anymore.
Also, they claim that there were no repetive stress injuries before computers...umm...there were none, or they weren't reported/known as such. I seem to recall hearing that typists in the '20s and '30s frequently had wrist pain. They also imply that using a pen is always better than the mouse.
I don't know about you but my hand *hurts* after 20 minutes of writing. I surf all day and not have my wrist/hand hurt. (College essay tests were hell.
i just don't think that the pen is going to help the problem any...seems like the Logitech and MS ergo mice are a better solution (where the wrist is allowed to maintain a "neutral" position.)
Hmmm, ever heard of a little thing called the 5th Amendment?
Nevertheless, I'm writing my Congressmen on this one.
Well, at least not until tommorrow when I can start feeding my DustPuppy and Iambe addiction again. ;->
RSA went to Australia. India won't buy our stuff. Hey Congress, whatever happened to helping the US having let alone maintaining a technological leads. Maybe in 3-4 years when the gov can't buy a US made security system they'll see the error of their ways...